Andie MacDowell Calls Out Double Standards Around Aging

Buzz Feed

04-06-2025

Andie MacDowell was 31 years old when she landed her breakout role in the 1989 movie Sex, Lies, and Videotape, with the star going on to have a glittering acting career with other huge films including Groundhog Day, and Four Weddings And A Funeral.
And Andie has certainly switched up the kinds of characters she plays in recent years. In 2021, she played her real-life daughter Margaret Qualley's eccentric onscreen mom in the Netflix series Maid, and she has played grandmother Del in the fantasy show The Way Home since 2023.
Now, a two-year-old interview with Andie has resurfaced on social media, with the star being praised for how she articulately called out the double standards that male and female actors face as they age. Speaking at Cannes in 2023, Andie — who was 65 years old at the time — explained that men are 'allowed to get older' in the industry, whereas women see their job offers dry up.
'Why do we have this expectation for women to not age? You wouldn't question Hugh Grant or George Clooney!' she begins in the resurfaced clip. 'I feel debonair. I'm sorry, I do. I feel that. I feel just like a man, I do. I feel fabulous.'
'Why have men been glorified as they age? I've always talked about this, and I think it really is a psychological thing we have imprinted in us,' Andie went on, before referencing her gray hair. 'If you want me to look different, I can wear a wig. But I'm not coloring my hair — it took me three years for my hair to grow out. I'm not going to color it!'
Andie then revealed that while she struggled to book roles in her 40s, things took another turn as she got older. She said: 'I'm more appreciated now… We have this idea that men age and get sexy and women don't, and they don't know what to do with you.'
'So as soon as a man turns 40, they just put him with a younger woman,' she continued. 'And then, psychologically, we give them this power. We think that they are sexy because they've got this younger woman. We give them this power, but we don't do the same thing for a woman. We go: 'Woah! Well, what do we do with her?'''Unless she's very, very powerful in Hollywood,' Andie then clarified. 'Then it's different. But for the majority of women, it's a big struggle. And then we turn 60 and we get to play great characters!'
When this video was shared to a popular Reddit forum, people were quick to share their agreement with Andie's no-nonsense remarks. One popular comment reads: "propaganda I'm not falling for: 'men age like fine wine.'"
'Every man acts like they're automatically going to look like Pedro Pascal when they're fifty when that is absolutely not the case. Meanwhile I literally see really good looking women in their fifties all the time,' somebody else claimed. 'This is what always rubs me the wrong way about the whole Silver Fox hype and how men just aging decently is way more gushed over and praised than the women who do the same, and how they're allowed to age and not take care of their skin but older women that get work done are constantly clowned on,' one more wrote.'It's wild how men get 'distinguished' and women get 'washed up,'' another observed. While somebody else concluded: 'Loveeee this and love her whole vibe. If I look half as good as her as I get older I'd be chuffed."
What do you make of Andie's resurfaced comments? Let me know down below!