Chronic Case of iPhone Face

“iPhone Face” [ahy-fohn feys], proper noun: the face of an actor who is unconvincing in a period piece, due to the fact that they appear too modern (i,e., “look like they’ve seen an iPhone”). Although the idea that some actors simply do not fit in period pieces is not new, this term has recently gained great traction on Twitter following the March 2023 release of Amazon Prime’s ‘70s rock ‘n’ roll-inspired fictional documentary, Daisy Jones and the Six. One of the show’s leading actresses, 25-year-old Camilla Morrone, has become a hot topic, with a number of viewers diagnosing her with “iPhone Face.” Does Morrone’s appearance, like her full lips and thick brows, really take away from the viewer’s experience, preventing them from suspending their disbelief that she is a woman living in the 1970s?

Of course, this question does not just apply to Morrone, but any actor whose performance has faced the trending critique of “iPhone Face.” Guy Dolbey, a freelance writer who’s been featured frequently on Film Cred and Discussing Film, chalks a lot of this criticism up to confirmation bias. “You can’t believe Sam Claflin is from the 70s because you’ve seen The Hunger Games,” they tweeted before further stating, “I think to some extent the concern is overstated, and people are more reacting to the knowledge of who an actor is than anything objective about their appearance.” Of course, one may have difficulty seeing an actor as anything other than modern, especially in the social media age where we have almost unrestricted access to celebrities. There may not be a clear-cut solution to prevent viewers from feeling distracted (particularly in such a way that they are unable to enjoy their viewing experience), though Dolbey suggests that “the main thing is casting actors for demeanor more so than might be common, and deprioritizing star power and modern trends in what’s considered attractive” could minimize the amount of “iPhone Face” discourse.

Twitter user Carmen, known online as @riellesfeyre, echoes that sentiment. “I think it’s more about the manners, dialogues, gesticulating,” she says. “If you’re about to play a character from, for example, the ‘80s, you have to act as if you were living in that era.” To critique an actor who is unable to capture the essence of another time period is reasonable, given the actor’s job is to appear as though they are another person. To critique an actor entirely on the basis of their appearance, however, feels questionable—personal rather than professional.

Although an argument stands for a critique of costume creators and makeup artists, whose jobs are to help actors blend into their on-screen settings, the diagnosis of “iPhone Face” is one that seems far more surface level, particularly meant to undermine the acting abilities of women in Hollywood. “I do think [“iPhone Face”] is something the internet has made up about women,” Carmen says, “I suppose I’m just very opposed to this term because I think it perpetuates misogyny in the industry.” It seems every month there’s a new hyper-specific term that makes its way around platforms like Twitter, where users are eager to post their takes in greater quantities than qualities. Maybe a modern actor’s face can take away from one’s viewing experience, but there are certainly better ways to express that feeling than the easy out of diagnosing “iPhone face.”

Ultimately, it’s likely a critique that won’t last very long, falling under the category of Internet buzzwords instead of an advancement in media criticism. To take a literal look at the term, we can scoff at its absurdity: of course, these actors look as though they’ve seen an iPhone! The iPhone is just as old as some of the actors being criticized for their “iPhone Faces,” like Callie Haverda of That ‘90s Show. While she plays a 1990s teenager on screen, she was born in 2007, the year of the iPhone. In general, modern actors are likely to have modern features, like straight, button noses and defined jawlines, or follow modern trends, like veneers or dermal fillers, due to current beauty standards and norms. For one to have a face from a different time period is simply less common, therefore making it difficult to perfectly encapsulate the past in our modern day. Who knows? Maybe a hundred years from now, when physical features have once more evolved, criticism will fall on future generations of actors in period pieces of the early 2000s were criticized for looking as though they had never seen an iPhone.

Your MagazineMay 9, 2023