Celebrities Who Say Life Gets Better With Age
Women in Hollywood have started a movement when it comes to aging. They are tossing out ageist societal standards and ushering in a fresh perspective on how great life is at 40, 50, 60, and beyond. Leading the way is supermodel Paulina Porizkova, whose new book, No Filter: The Good, the Bad and the Beautiful, discusses her decision to lean into the power of her age on not only a physical level, but also an emotional level.
She’s shunned Botox and fillers for now because she wants people to see the wisdom in each line on her face. She explained to Women’s Wear Daily, “I really like the fact that I can have a conversation with you and I can react to what you say and you’ll know exactly what I think. It’s clearly visible on my face and I feel like isn’t that what our faces are for? To communicate? The communication thing is more important than looking beautiful at this point so I don’t want to take that away.”
She isn’t the only one who sees the magic in a life well-lived because stars like Jamie Lee Curtis, Gabrielle Union, Andie MacDowell, and more are proving that they are total badasses, who are sexy, smart, and confident. These women are thriving in their careers, with their families, and moving through life with knowledge they didn’t have in their 20s and 30s. “If I can challenge old ideas about aging, I will feel more and more invigorated. I want to represent this new way. I want to be a new version of the 70-year-old woman,” Curtis told Sixty and Me. “Vital, strong, very physical, very agile. I think that the older I get, the more yoga I’m going to do.” We are right in line behind her with our yoga mats!
Check out more aspirational celebrities who are proving that life does get better with age.
More from SheKnows
Best of SheKnows
Sign up for SheKnows' Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Keira Knightley
In a Nov 2024 interview with The Sunday Times, Keira Knightley briefly discussed how she isn’t afraid of aging, and how she’s excited to enter her 40s. “Most of my friends have turned 40 and it looks rather great,” she said.
Angelina Jolie
In an interview with The Sunday Times, Angelina Jolie talked about how aging has been a gift to her and her career, saying, “I’ve got better work as I’ve got older. I don’t think about it in terms of roles offered but in terms of life experience you contribute.”
Paulina Porizkova
Paulina Porizkova might be the team captain for women in their 50s — and everyone is happy to have her leadership. The 57-year-old supermodel realized how fabulous she was after wading through a dark time in her life when her ex-husband Ric Ocasek passed away in 2019.
“I was suddenly a divorced woman who had no career, had no way of making money, and also was completely ignored by the population at large and I thought that’s not cool because I’m actually a lot cooler now than I was 20 years ago. I am way smarter. I have more patience. I’m more intellectually curious. I’m more generous,” she told Women’s Wear Daily. “Everything about me is better. But I have wrinkles and that does not make me ugly. I just thought that’s unfair.”
Justine Bateman
Back in 2021, Justine Bateman talked to Glamour about how life gets better with age, thanks to all the opportunities, and how you shouldn’t focus on your looks and age throughout it.
“I think things are going to come my way whether my face is wrinkled or my skin is loose on my neck and under my eyes, or not,” she said. “Am I going to enjoy it or not enjoy it? Because right now I have a book coming out and I have a film that just premiered at a big film festival. If I was fixated on the fact that my face looks like it’s 55, I would be completely screwing myself out of enjoying this moment in my life. It’s happening whether I’m happy with the way my face looks or not. So what’s my attitude going to be? Am I going to spend time obsessing on the fact that my face is naturally aging? It’s ridiculous. No. I’m going to have a good f—ing time!”
Halle Berry
At 56 years of age, Halley Berry’s life “is firing on all cylinders” and she’s never felt better about her work, her family, or her smoldering romance with boyfriend Van Hunt.
“In my 30s, I was so focused on career, but I had a desire to have children and be a mother. So I felt I was lacking something,’ she explained to AARP magazine.“In my 40s, I took the decade to be at home and have children and be a mom. But my career was lacking—I longed to be back at work. Now, in my 50s I’ve got my babies, my career, and finally have love in a real, meaningful way.”
Maye Musk
“As I got into my 60s, people were talking about aging and being scared of aging, and I’m saying, ‘Why are you scared of aging?'” she said to CBS via People. “I mean, for example, when you turn 50, women are scared of losing their jobs. But then men become CEOs and presidents, so what’s that about?”
“We need to change that around. And if somebody’s making you feel bad about your age, just say goodbye,” Musk added. “You don’t need that person in your life.”
Tyra Banks
Tyra Banks told People in 2024 that she thinks she’s thriving with each passing year, and how 50 is so young. She said, “What my life is like now is totally different than what I thought 50 was going to be when I was a little girl. I’m poppin’. I am not insecure about myself. I ain’t trippin’. I often say ‘Child, [I’m] 50!’ before I say something. That statement gives me permission to say whatever the heck I feel like saying.”
Vanessa Williams
Vanessa Williams said on The Jennifer Hudson Show via People in 2023, when she turned 60 that growing older is such a gift.
“It’s a privilege. There’s a sense of ease. The older you get the less you care about what everybody else has to say,” Williams said. “You’re living in your own glory. You accept yourself, you give yourself grace. And you don’t beat yourself up the way when we’re 20s and 30s, ‘I’ve gotta do this, I’ve gotta be this, I gotta please people.'”
Jennifer Tilly
If you’ve been watching Jennifer Tilly over the years, then you know she is thriving even more with each passing year, whether it be with TV, reality TV, or her poker prowess. In fact, in a previous interview with the Independent, Tilly talked about how she loves that she still gets the type of roles that let her do whatever she wants.
“I didn’t become the greatest actress of all time and win multiple Oscars, but I’m super happy where I’m at,” she said. “Not a lot of people have had this kind of longevity, and there’s not many parts out there for women my age that are as rich and varied. I get to have sex scenes and kill people and pretend to be a master criminal.”
Helena Christensen
If you read anything about Helena Christensen, it’s that she isn’t worried about aging. She hits back at any journalist who wants her to talk about the topic because she thinks it’s strictly a sexist question reserved for women — and she’s not wrong about that.
As a supermodel, she’s still rocking that fashion world at 53 — and we love what she said about her age over a decade ago. “I’m 41 and better than ever,” she told The Mirror in 2010. “I will worry about age at 120”
Kate Mara
In a rare interview in 2019 with Refinery29, Kate Mara talked about how despite the ageism in Hollywood, she’s excited to age, and has loved it so far. “Even though I’m in this industry where that is a huge part of the discussion – and aging is seen as a negative – aging, to me, so far, hasn’t been a scary thing,” she said. “My mom never made a big deal about getting older. I wasn’t brought up to be concerned with that.”
Pamela Anderson
While talking on Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard, Pamela Anderson sad, “I can’t wait to see myself old. I always said I’d recognize myself when I was old in the mirror. I want to let my hair go kind of natural gray, put my little straw hat on, don’t wear makeup. I mean, that’s my comfortable kind of state. A lot of women, I think, that kind of are these classic beauties have a really hard time with aging.”
Hoda Kotb
Back in 2023, Hoda Kotb reflected on being 59 years old, and how it’s an amazing year, per People. She said, “If you’re worried about aging, and I know aging’s a thing, 59 is amazing. It’s an amazing year.”
Rebecca Romijn
Rebecca Romijn isn’t afraid of aging, and she hopes to pass that onto her daughters.
“I don’t have a huge fear of aging,” Romijn told PEOPLE in this week’s Beautiful Issue. “I always thought my mom was so beautiful growing up no matter how many lines she had on her face. I admired my mom’s laugh lines. I find peace in that and hope that when my daughters look at me, they do too.”
Helena Bonham Carter
Helena Bonham Carter has always talked about how she feels society needs to let go of ageism, and back in 2023, she talked about it more on BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour via People.
“It would be great if we could change our societal rules and say, ‘Come on, we’re in our prime in our 60s: We’ve got everything and we’re coming into our power,’ ” she said. “At the end of the day, you can get really obsessed. We can’t actually control what we look like, but we think we can, and in fact there’s so much else we should worry about.”
Viola Davis
One of the things Viola Davis loves about her career is how she gets to celebrate each decade as a spokesperson for L’Oréal Paris’ Age Perfect Line. “People always mention all the negative things about aging, they never mention that sort of beautiful thing that happens when you grow into your skin,” she explained to InStyle. “I love when faces tell a story, when faces grow into themselves and become comfortable and authentic.”
Andie MacDowell
Andie MacDowell might be the style icon for women with gray hair — she looks so sexy and chic! Her philosophy toward aging is also beautiful which is why she’s absolutely glowing at the age of 64. “The beauty myth that I’d like to debunk is that you must be young to be beautiful, age isn’t a detriment and we don’t need to chase youth, we should all embrace every moment of our life,” she told W magazine.
Reese Witherspoon
Reese Witherspoon is proudly wearing her 46 years because she has found her voice after many years of letting Hollywood dictate her career. “I’ve had a whole bunch of experiences, and I can speak with a thoughtfulness about the changes I’d like to see in the world, and…I just feel like I earned that gray hair and my fine lines. I like ’em,” she shared with Allure magazine.
Sofia Vergara
Sofia Vergara told People that she loves being older, because she knows what works for her and her confidence. She said, “And I think now that I’m older, it’s great, because you know exactly what you like, what looks good on you, what doesn’t look good on you. I don’t do what is in fashion. I just do what feels good, makes me feel confident and beautiful.”
Katherine Heigl
On Katherine Heigl’s 40th birthday in 2018, she wrote on Instagram, saying, “I’m pretty damn thrilled to be 40. For one thing, as my mother always says ‘Getting older is better then the alternative.’ Too true mother, too true! For another thing 40 feels to me like a certain kind of freedom. Freedom from all the self doubt, insecurities, self loathing, uncertainties and anxieties of my 20’s and 30’s. Not to say I don’t still have those moments but I just feel like 40 makes me older and wiser. Steadier in my convictions. More certain of my strengths. More forgiving of my faults. I’ve spent the last five years of my 30’s doing the work to evolve my mind and spirit.”
Penelope Cruz
Penelope Cruz is reminding the press that there are cultural differences when it comes to aging, and in Spain, it’s “something to celebrate.” She told The Guardian, “When I started getting asked: ‘How do you feel about aging?’ I would always pass. How can someone ask you that when you’re 25? There are only good things about it. That’s very much the way we see it in Spain.”
Victoria Beckham
Victoria Beckham says as she gets older, she’s not trying to look younger, but thrive as the age she is currently.
“I’m not trying to look any younger at all,” the British beauty revealed, per the Daily Mail. “I just wanna look good for my age. I wanna look like the best version of myself. I wanna look after what I have.”
Elle MacPherson
Elle MacPherson revealed she learned valuable lessons in her 50s, and how she learned to refocus her priorities to ensure she lives her best life.
“As I’ve matured, what I’ve realized is that it doesn’t really matter what I look like, the most important thing is, ‘how do I feel?’ ” she said to Sunrise via People. “[It’s] when I started sleeping more and relaxing a little more in my life and looking after my nutrition, because good nutrition can change everything. I hadn’t really understood my body was deprived from good nutrition.”
Jamie Lee Curtis
If you saw Jamie Lee Curtis in the recent Halloween movies, you know she’s a total badass — and that’s why she’s been telling everyone that she’s done with Hollywood’s idea of aging. “I am pro-aging. I want to age with intelligence, and grace, and dignity, and verve, and energy,” the 63-year-old actress told The Today Show. And we have to agree, she’s doing just that.
Iman
In an interview with British Vogue, Iman says that she never worried about aging, and that life gets better with every year. “That’s a very Western mentality. I come from Africa; we celebrate getting older…For me, it has never been a problem,” she said.
Kate Hudson
Kate Hudson kept her take on aging simple and sweet, telling Rachael Ray via People, “I’m having a blast!” Honestly, we love that mentality.
Kate Bosworth
In a previous interview with SheKnows about her role in Along for the Ride, Kate Bosworth talked about how she knows life only gets better with age. She said, “One thing only I know is people are so afraid of aging — I’m 39. It only gets better. I know that for sure.”
Eva Longoria
You aren’t going to catch Eva Longoria battling with the idea of aging, instead she’s welcoming the process. She told Prevention, “I associate aging with wisdom and experience and maturity. For me, I lean into it. So I kind of have a different approach.”
Melissa Gilbert
Little House on the Prairie’s Melissa Gilbert told People that because she was in Hollywood, she felt so much pressure to look a certain way. However, as she got older, she let that go, and is feeling so happy now. “I was always trying too hard to fit the mold that someone else wanted,” Gilbert said to the outlet. “I’m finally happy in my own skin. I’m so grateful and relieved and so much happier.”
Drew Barrymore
Drew Barrymore radiates more joy as an adult than she probably did during her troubled childhood, and that’s why she’s giving her two daughters, Olive, 10, and Frankie, 8, a different perspective. “I’m now determined more than ever to show my daughters that aging is a luxury,” she said. “If we’re lucky, we are all going to age. I just want them to be at peace with who they are and not what they look like.”
Demi Moore
At the 2024 Gotham Awards, Demi Moore says her mindset on getting older shifted dramatically, and she’s all about the joy of it.
“I can look back and go at 20, at 30 I was finding things that weren’t good enough,” she said to People. “My relationship with [aging] now is much more in a joyous acceptance. Of course there’s things that you go, ‘Oh I wish that was not that way,’ but in terms of the whole, I see myself and the fullness of who I am as opposed to just the external idea of who I am.”
Oprah Winfrey
If there’s anyone we all should listen to it’s Oprah, who embraces the wisdom and power that comes with each passing decade. She told O Magazine, via ABC News, on her 60th birthday in 2014, “I’m not one to get hung up on numbers, but if you want to say 60 is the new 40, I’ll take that.”
She added, “You can be and do whatever you want, thanks to exercise and hair color. The absolute best part is being able to be free and do whatever you want. There’s nothing better than that.” We hear you, Oprah, we really do.
Gabrielle Union
Anyone who saw the photos and videos of Gabrielle Union’s 50th birthday in late October knows that she’s owning every minute of her power — she feels great inside and out at this milestone age. She summed it up best in her celebratory Instagram post, “Walkin Into 50… Like A Champion.”
Vivica A. Fox
Vivica A. Fox talked about being “comfortable” in her own skin now that she’s older (a running theme with women over 40 and it’s amazing!). There are also some wonderful benefits to setting boundaries and understanding how to handle a mistake.
“To learn to say no, to own my own moments, to own my own judgments, and if I do something wrong to be woman enough to say, ‘I’m wrong,’ and to learn from that,” she noted to BET’s The Rundown. “We’re blessed to get older. We’re blessed to be able to go through different chapters. Embrace it. Look good. Take care of yourself.”
Sharon Stone
Sharon Stone understands how precious life is after almost dying from a severe brain aneurysm in 2001, so she has a much different perspective. “I started to understand that I was going to go for being more like a European woman who got more beautiful with age and who could understand that women are more beautiful than girls because they know something,” she explained to Allure.
Mindy Cohn
Mindy Cohn told Vanity Fair that she believes she’s thriving in her 60s, saying, “To be quite frank with you, I think I’m peaking now. I think I’m going to look the most adorable in my 60s. And I think girls like me, who have that life where you really aren’t your most attractive in your 20s and 30s [and] actually start to really kind of look good in your 50s and 60s, have it so much easier. I didn’t necessarily feel [as] protective over my physical self as people who are told they’re attractive.”
Cindy Crawford
Cindy Crawford never thought she would retain her supermodel status at 56, but it’s something she is so grateful for because she knows what she brings to the table at this age — she’s like an athlete on the runway.
“I’m aware that I don’t look the same as I did when I was 25, but I bring experience and confidence in front of the camera that I didn’t have then,” she explained. “And I still like what I do. I never thought I’d be working the way that I am at this stage.”
Tracee Ellis Ross
Tracee Ellis Ross is here to remind us all that what’s going on inside is way more important than our looks. It’s why she loves being 50 years old. “I feel the sexiest and the most beautiful I’ve ever felt,” she revealed to InStyle. “I didn’t say I look my most beautiful, I said I feel my most beautiful, and that’s what’s important to me.”
Kerry Washington
Turning 40 used to be a negative benchmark for women — they were often told that their careers (and looks) were over. In reality, it’s just the beginning, according to Kerry Washington. “For me, 40 feels like a beginning,” she remarked. “I’m in the middle of so much new – with this career, the kids, and I’m still sort of a newlywed. I’m excited to be at this stage in life.”
Kate Winslet
Kate Winslet thinks women should get excited about hitting those milestone birthdays because we finally start feeling comfortable in our own skin.
“We live in a world now where young women are familiar with people saying, ‘Oh, well, you know you look good now, darling, but wait until you’re 30,’ or, ‘Well, you’ve got nice legs now, but wait until you’re 30.’ What’s this wait until you’re 30? It gets more exciting. Aging is so far really fun and so much changes. You do feel more confident,” the Titanic star summed up to The Hollywood Reporter. She’s so right about that!
Margaret Cho
You won’t hear comedian Margaret Cho complaining about her age. She thinks 53 is “great” because she believes it’s a new chapter for her. “Life is just beginning. I think you are in your mid-forties when you get a handle on things,” she told Next Avenue. “Menopause is like a second puberty because you’re really coming into who you are as a person.”
Jada Pinkett Smith
For Jada Pinkett Smith, releasing the opinions of others has allowed her to feel her best self over the years. “I think as you get older, you really get to the point where you just don’t care anymore what people think,” she said to ET. “There’s a certain freedom that comes with that, [which] you really don’t have when you’re young. With age comes a lot of wisdom and I’m happier now than I have ever been, so it’s good.”
Jennifer Aniston
Jennifer Aniston has pledged to “continue to thrive” with each passing year and taking a bit of wisdom from her mother when it comes to prioritizing her health. “What my mom used to say to me was, ‘This is about longevity. It’s a privilege to grow old, but we don’t have to grow sick,'” she revealed to Vogue. “It’s just sort of been a theme in my life: to enjoy the age I am and not look at aging as a negative, but as the privilege that it is.”
Diane von Fürstenberg
Diane von Fürstenberg lived through the wild Studio 54 era and became a fashion mogul with her wrap dress design. However, she hasn’t given in to Botox, fillers, or plastic surgery for her own personal reasons.
She wrote in her memoir, The Woman I Wanted To Be, “In my older face, I see my life. Every wrinkle, every smile line, every age spot. There is a saying that with age, you look outside what you are inside. Your wrinkles reflect the roads you have taken; they form the map of your life. My face reflects the wind and sun and rain and dust from the trips I’ve taken. My face carries all my memories. Why should I erase them?”
'The Woman I Wanted to Be'
Solve the daily Crossword
