Emmy-Winning Actor Calls Out ‘Dance Moms’ Star for Airbrushing His Face

When Neil Patrick Harris saw a selfie snapped with Abby Lee Miller, the 52-year-old actor was so shocked by his own appearance in the photo that he felt compelled to respond.

On December 12, Abby Lee Miller of Dance Moms fame posted on Instagram that she saw Art on Broadway, a comedy starring Harris, James Corden, and Bobby Cannavale. The post featured a photo carousel of Miller, 60, in selfies with each of the three leading men.

In Miller’s first two selfies, taken with Corden and Cannavale, respectively, everyone’s faces appear relatively unscathed. But in her shot alongside Harris, the Emmy-winning actor looked near unrecognizable.

In the eerily altered image, Harris, best known for his role in the TV hit show How I Met Your Mother, has skin so airbrushed that it looks like a T-shirt graphic installed onto a human head.

“Did you airbrush Neil Patrick Harris?” wrote one commenter, who received nearly 40,000 likes on their inquiry. “Abby, why did you do that to Neil?” asked another.

The top comment came from Harris himself, who wrote, “Ummm… what did you do to my face..?“

Harris’s face was so heavily edited that one commenter joked he’d had plastic surgery. Even Facetune, the mobile phone editing app many use to smooth and blur their skin in photos—albeit rarely to the extent that Miller does—joined the conversation. “Abby let me proof-read your post next time,” the app’s social media team joked in Miller’s comment section.

There are entire Instagram accounts dedicated to before-and-after comparisons of celebrities who go overboard with airbrushing their selfies. Rarely, though, does one celebrity call out another for running afoul of Facetune and Photoshop.

The next day, the controversial choreographer explained her decision to use a heavy filter in a comment, citing her own health issues. She replied to Harris, writing, “Burkitt [lymphoma], 10 rounds of invasive chemo & a big birthday—so I’m sticking with the filters! You sir—always look fabulous no matter what!!!” Miller announced in 2018 that she was diagnosed with Burkitt lymphoma.

In the caption of her Instagram post, Miller hyped up her evening as “incredible,” and encouraged her fans to see the show if they ”truly want to LAUGH OUT LOUD!!!" She called the three leading men TV superstars and “such gracious, kind gentlemen!”

Art runs on Broadway through December 21, with tickets starting at $116. But if you happen to encounter its stars after the show, perhaps ignore your Facetune inclinations.

Miller rose to fame on Dance Moms, which premiered in 2011 and explored the behind-the-scenes drama between dancers at Miller’s studio and their parents. In its eight-year run, Dance Moms launched the careers of dancers like Maddie Ziegler (famous for her appearances in Sia’s music videos) and JoJo Siwa (famous for more confounding career choices than Ziegler’s). Though the show ended in 2019, Miller reappeared in the news cycle after former dance pupil Nia Sioux alleged racism in her 2025 memoir, Bottom of the Pyramid. (Miller has denied the accusations, telling TMZ that she has “different memories” of the events involved.)