# Aidan Turner hopes his beard shifts focus beyond his looks

- URL: https://talkfuse.com/story/the-sexy-stuff-has-got-to-be-coming-to-an-end-right-rivals-star-aidan-turner-on-beards-ballroom-dancing-and-putting-poldark-to-bed/
- Published: 2026-10-31T12:00:43+00:00
- Updated: 2026-10-31T13:32:34+00:00
- Original publisher: The Guardian (publisher lean: Left)
- Original article: https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2026/oct/31/aidan-turner-interview-rivals-poldark-beards-ballroom-dancing
- Topics: Celebrity, Culture, Entertainment

## Key points

- Turner is tired of being labelled a pin-up.
- His beard was an attempt to look more like a dad.
- He chose Declan O’Hara’s moustache for *Rivals*.

## Summary

Aidan Turner says he is weary of being repeatedly described as “sexy” or as someone who “smoulders”, despite roles that have helped make him a pin-up. Now 43 and a father, he has grown a beard partly in the hope of being seen as more ordinary, while recognising that attention to his looks has also helped his career.

His fame grew sharply through the BBC’s 2015 adaptation of *Poldark*, where his role as Ross Poldark became closely associated with a scythe-swinging image. He later took the moustached role of faithful journalist Declan O’Hara in the bawdy television adaptation of Jilly Cooper’s *Rivals*. Turner says the moustache was his idea, after rejecting a stick-on beard that could fall off or leave him eating hairs on set.

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Summarised by TalkFuse (https://talkfuse.com/). Quote the original publisher for the reporting and link this page for the summary and discussion.