Line #86 Main/BeardnessProtectionProgram


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12	[[quoteright:323:[[ComicBook/SpirouAndFantasio https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/spirou_beard_protection_program_5.png]]]]
13	[[caption-width-right:323:Escaping the law...by a hair.]]
14
15	-> ''"Do you know what this [being exposed] means, Hobbes? We'll have to change our names, move to another state, grow a beard and shave it off, then start all over again! From now on, we're no longer Calvin and Hobbes!"''
16	-->-- '''Calvin''', ''Fanfic/CalvinAndHobbesTheSeries'', [[Recap/CalvinAndHobbesTheSeriesS1TVM1CalvinsBatmanAdventure "Calvin's Batman Adventure"]]
17
18	A man who is on the run or otherwise trying not to be recognized will often grow a beard as part of his attempt at concealment. The {{inver\|tedTrope}}sion -- where a heavily bearded character shaves for similar reasons -- is also relatively common, doubling as an ImportantHaircut.
19
20	A sufficiently CrazyPrepared character might grow a beard so that, ''sometime in the future'', he'll be able to shave it off and go unrecognized - maybe this is [[JustifiedTrope the reason]] for the BeardOfEvil?
21
22	If the character in hiding is ashamed of what he's done, it may also count as a BeardOfSorrow.
23
24	WigDressAccent is another variation on the theme as is DyeOrDie.
25
26	Not to be confused with GrowingTheBeard, which is figurative instead of literally growing a beard.
27	----
28	!!Examples:
29	[[foldercontrol]]
30
31	[[folder:Comic Books]]
32	* ''ComicBook/GreenArrow'': In Mike Grell's run, Ollie shaves his beard and hair while on the run.
33	* ''ComicBook/TheIncredibleHulk'': Bruce Banner has tried once shaving his head, and another time growing a beard, to disguise himself from the authorities pursuing him. Consequently, we got to see a bald Hulk and a fuzzy-faced Hulk.
34	* In ''[[ComicBook/JustImagineStanLeeCreatingTheDCUniverse Just Imagine Stan Lee Creating Batman]]'', Wayne Williams gets out of prison knowing that a local mob boss is after him, so he shaves his head bald and turns his goatee into a handlebar mustache.
35	* ''ComicBook/LuckyLuke'': ''Doc Doxey's Elixir'': in the second half of the album, the villain Dr. Doxey shaves off his beard and moustache in order to avoid being recognized by Lucky Luke. It works, until Lucky Luke sees a mischievous boy [[MustacheVandalism vandalize a picture of the now clean-shaven Doxey with a beard and moustache]].
36	* ''ComicBook/SherwoodTexas'': Rob Hood grows a beard as part of his disguise when he adopts the identity of Loxley.
37	* ''ComicBook/SpiderMan'': Harry Osborn grows a handlebar mustache and shaves his head to get away from his [[ComicBook/NormanOsborn father]].
38	* ''ComicBook/SpirouAndFantasio''" Shows up briefly in the album "Machine qui rêve". The comic opens with a bearded man pursued by the authorities, who shaves his beard off in a bar's bathroom because his image is being broadcast on the news channels. [[spoiler:It turns out to be a movie the main characters are watching.]]
39	* ''ComicBook/{{Superman}}'': An unusual version in an old ''ComicBook/SupermansPalJimmyOlsen'' story; Jimmy has been trying to invent something and he comes up with a mixture that causes fast hair growth while trying to make some kind of fuel. Later in the story, he sees that a couple of men are coming to get him and uses the mixture to grow a beard for a fast disguise.
40	[[/folder]]
41
42	[[folder:Film — Live Action]]
43	* In ''Film/AnneOfTheIndies'', Pierre grows a beard before going to Port Royale, so the British will not associate him with the clean shaven French naval officer turned privateer.
44	* In ''[[Film/TheAssignment1997 The Assignment]]'' (1997), two men wear fake beards and wigs when [[OvertRendezvous meeting in an East Berlin café]]. The KGB photograph the meeting and use FacialRecognitionSoftware to remove the beards and match their faces with those of terrorist Carlos the Jackal (currently under KGB protection) and a known CIA agent. [[BatmanGambit This was the CIA's plan all along]]; 'Carlos' is actually a {{doppelganger}} and the fake beards make the meeting look suspicious while increasing the chance that the computer will give a false positive result.
45	* ''Film/AvengersInfinityWar'' sees Captain America with a full beard and moustache due to being on the run after the events of ''Film/CaptainAmericaCivilWar''.
46	* The [=McManus=] Brothers evidently grew beards and long shaggy hair while hiding out in Ireland after the events of the first ''Film/TheBoondockSaints'' film. Before returning to Boston, they [[ImportantHaircut shave and cut their hair]].... then [[LampshadeHanging wonder why they did that]], when ''now'' they match their wanted posters, and ''before'' they "looked like UsefulNotes/JesusChrist."
47	* In ''Film/DayOfTheWolves'', each of the Wolves is instructed to grow a beard before arriving to train for TheHeist, and then to shave it off after they have split up so that none of their fellow thieves knows what they look like without the beard.
48	* In ''Film/TheCountOfMonteCristo2002'', the Count does this, trimming his scraggly BeardOfSorrow into a refined nobleman's beard to pose as the Count. It even fools his love interest for a bit.
49	* In ''Film/DontLookNowWereBeingShotAt'', Sir Reginald shaves his iconic "Big Mustache" because it looks too British and would make him stand out.
50	* After staging his own death in ''Film/EddieAndTheCruisers'', Jersey rock-star-in-the-making Eddie Wilson is revealed in the sequel to have developed a cunning dual strategy for concealing his identity: (a) [[SequelGoesForeign moving to Montreal]] and (b) growing a moustache. At the very end of the first film, we see Eddie alive, watching a retrospective of his career on a TV in a shop window, with a big beard.
51	* ''Film/ElCamino'': Skinny Pete asks Jesse not to shave his beard to be less recognizable. [[SubvertedTrope Jesse ignores the advice and shaves it anyway.]]
52	* ''Film/{{Following}}'': When "Bill" fears that a witness would be able to connect him to a robbery, he then gets a haircut and shaves his beard.
53	* In the film version of ''Film/TheFugitive'', the second thing Dr. Kimble does after escaping from prison is shave off his beard. (The first thing is to ditch his orange jumpsuit.) That is, Harrison Ford begins the film with a beard only to lose it after 20 minutes and look like himself for the rest of the film. It pays off -- despite having a picture of Kimble ''in his hand'' as he speaks to him, a state trooper doesn't recognize him. This is an inversion from an early draft of the script, where the trope would have been played straight--Kimble would have ''grown'' a beard to conceal himself.
54	* In ''Film/LaGrandeVadrouille'', UsefulNotes/WorldWarII bomber command officer Sir Reginald Brook (Creator/TerryThomas) shaves off much of his mustache because he looks "too English" with it in occupied France.
55	* ''Film/HeWalkedByNight'': After hearing his description broadcast on the police radio, CopKiller Roy Morgan immediately shaves off his pencil moustache.
56	* ''Film/HidingOut'' has Jon Cryer as an adult accountant with a beard who shaves and gives himself a skunk stripe to hide from hitmen as a high schooler.
57	* In the first ''Film/{{Highlander}}'' movie, the Kurgan does a very messy job of shaving his head hair to evade police capture after several witnesses see him lop off a guy's head.
58	* Clark in ''Film/ManOfSteel'', when WalkingTheEarth. He apparently finds time to shave off-screen while changing into the Superman suit (deftly dodging the age-old "Kryptonite razor" question...)
59	[[/folder]]
60
61	[[folder:Literature]]
62	* Lampshaded in ''Literature/BoysLife''. Toward the end of the book, we discover the man killed in the beginning had helped relocate a Nazi scientist. The victim's brother comes looking for him and, learning he's dead, believes the killer is the Nazi. He shows Cory's father a picture but explains that he's probably changed his appearance, and the easiest way to go unrecognized is to "shave your head and grow a beard." [[spoiler: The vet, who was much earlier described as a bald, bearded man, is the Nazi and the killer.]]
63	* ''Literature/{{Deryni}}'': Early in ''High Deryni'', Morgan and Duncan are depicted sporting beards and wearing the colours of the rebel leader Warin [=deGrey=] while gathering intelligence, partly among Morgan's own subjects. When they report to Kelson, the king comments on the fact he's never seen them with beards before, and Duncan notes how effective their disguises have been.
64	* ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'': In ''Literature/GoingPostal'', Reacher Gilt has an elaborate beard as part of his pirate "look". He shaves it when he has to go on the run after his plans fail. Since he was planning on disappearing if his plans ''succeeded'' (before people started asking for their money back), he seems to have had this in mind from the start.
65	* In ''{{Literature/Dragonlance}}'', Tanis takes advantage of this several times, since as a [[HalfHumanHybrid half-elf]] he's able to grow facial hair unlike all but the oldest full-blooded elves and can pass for a human when he has one.
66	* One ''Literature/EncyclopediaBrown'' story features a wanted criminal who wears a false beard in order to avoid detection. He ends up getting discovered in Idaville when a small boy sees him pull off the beard when he enters the car, recognizes him from his wanted poster, and goes to tell Encyclopedia that [[ChildrenAreInnocent he'll pull off his beard like that instead of shaving when he grows up.]]
67	* In the Dutch children's book ''Het geheim van Mories Besjoer'' (The secret of Maurice Bonjour) a French resistance fighter grows a big mustache and uses Monsieur Moustache as his alias, planning to shave himself clean if he ever had to flee from the Germans.
68	* In ''Hell in the Palo Duro'' by Creator/JTEdson, Dusty Fog and Waco grow beards when they go undercover as outlaws on the run to infiltrate the OutlawTown of Hell.
69	* Attempted by Buck Williams in the first ''Literature/LeftBehind'' novel, and is lampshaded by his boss Steve Plank, who comments how unnecessary he believes it to be.
70	* In the {{Literature/Lensman}} books:
71	** In ''Gray Lensman'', Kimball Kinnison grows a beard to go undercover as Chester Q. Fordyce.
72	** It's also implied that Kinnison went bearded as Wild Bill Williams: "He cut his hair, and his whiskers too, with ordinary shears, as was good technique."
73	* The ''Literature/LordPeterWimsey'' books:
74	** In ''The Nine Tailors'', [[GentlemanThief Nobby Cranton]] grows a beard before going to look for an emerald necklace he'd stolen some decades before.
75	** Lord Peter himself grows a beard when infiltrating a criminal gang in one of the short stories.
76	* Garion suggests this to Zakath when he joins them in the ''Literature/TheMalloreon''. (As Zakath is the Emperor of the largest nation in the world, his face is on almost every coin in Mallorea, which would tend to hinder attempts at stealth.) Zakath has no trouble complying because he doesn't know how to shave. Garion's a little incredulous that a man at his level of power/paranoia would let other people near him with a straight razor.
77	* ''Masked Dog'' by Raymond Obstfeld. A CIA agent relates how a colleague always wore a beard while undercover. "He must have seen ''Film/{{Serpico}}'' a dozen times." This caused a problem when the house he was sleeping in was firebombed and his beard caught fire. He had to get a skin graft from his behind transplanted to his chin, causing his new beard hairs to be somewhat curly.
78	* The ''Literature/JamesBond'' novel ''Literature/{{Moonraker}}'' has an example of the prepared-in-advance version. BigBad Hugo Drax has his men shave their heads and grow moustaches, so after that his missile strike on London they can completely change their appearance by shaving off their moustache and letting their hair grow back.
79	* Downplayed in ''Literature/TheMurderbotDiaries''. [[SapientShip ART]] convinces Murderbot to use the AutoDoc to modify its body in order to disguise itself as human. The changes include longer hair to conceal the data port and body hair to conceal the joins in its body, but also to subconsciously avert UncannyValley.
80	* [[ZigZaggingTrope Doubly inverted]] in ''Literature/ThePrisonerOfZenda'' -- in order to impersonate the king, the protagonist shaves off his beard. He bears a remarkable resemblance to the King but isn't identical, so someone could pick up on the difference. Both protagonist and king wear beards, but that the "king" suddenly chose to shave is a convenient explanation for why something about his appearance seems off.
81	* ''Literature/RomanceOfTheThreeKingdoms'' records Cao Cao's rout by Ma Chao's forces, where they first target "the one dressed in red" - so he loses his red robe. Then they target "the one with the beard", and so he shaves his beard. [[RuleOfThree And then they start looking for "that guy with the shaved beard"...]]
82	* ''Film/{{Serpico}}'' wears a large mustache--and later the hippy beard made famous in the movie--at a time when so-called plainclothes cops are [[PaperThinDisguise wearing regulation haircuts and shoes]]. When attached to Vice however he adopts a long flowing beard that works too well -- word soon spreads among the hookers to beware of "The Beard", and Serpico has to shave again on seeing prostitutes fleeing a bearded man trying in vain to pick them up.
83	* In ''Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire'':
84	** When fleeing the Starks and trying to return to King's Landing, Jaime Lannister keeps the beard he acquired in captivity, then shaves his head for good measure. It doesn't seem to fool anyone, given his famous gold hair and handsome looks, and Tully bannermen pursue them almost from the get-go.
85	** There's also Ser Barristan Selmy, who grows a beard sometime between [[spoiler: being fired from the Kingsguard and joining up with Daenerys.]]
86	** Ser Rodrik Cassel shaves his very impressive whiskers. Initially, it's out of pragmatism -- they're on a boat and he's badly seasick -- but it later becomes a disguise.
87	* In Creator/NeilGaiman's ''Literature/{{Stardust}}'', Primus shaves his beard. He doesn't expect to fool his rival, but simply to have an extra moment to react before he was recognized. Its effectiveness is never tested.
88	* ''Literature/TalesOfTheBranionRealm'': In ''The Painter Knight'', two men wanted partly because of their religion shave their beards — a clear sign that they are members of the ''other'' religion.
89	* Creator/HarryTurtledove,
90	** In ''Three Miles Down'' the protagonist Jerry Stieglitz, a 1970s grad student with hippy hair and beard, gets a haircut and shave when he goes on the run from the CIA and successfully eludes capture until he can resolve the dilemma he's in.
91	** In the ''Literature/{{Worldwar}}'' series, Moishe shaves for the first time in two decades as part of his escape from a ghetto.
92	* In ''Literature/TheWorldAccordingToGarp'' by John Irving, a paedophile molests a girl in the park, then shaves off his mustache in a public toilet to avoid the police. In the book's SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome after Garp chases down the paedo, the young victim is confused. After Garp ''paints a mustache on him with his own blood'', the girl recognizes him.
93
94	[[/folder]]
95
96	[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
97	* George Bluth of ''Series/ArrestedDevelopment'' briefly has a beard after becoming a fugitive, though he shaves it as soon as he starts hiding out in the model home's attic. This was part of a reference to UsefulNotes/SaddamHussein.
98	* Regularly InvokedTrope in ''Series/{{Atlantis}}'', where a RunningGag is that Hercules' solution to everything is to "flee the city and grow beards!"
99	* ''Series/BlackSaddle'': In "Client: Tagger", Tagger has grown a beard so the man responsible for sending him to prison won't recognise him as Tagger stalks him.
100	* In ''Series/BreakoutKings'' the team figures that a big prison break was supposed to have another participant who missed the escape because he was sent to the prison infirmary. He stands out since he recently shaved his head so he would look different from his mugshot pictures.
101	* In the final two episodes of ''Series/BreakingBad'', Walter grows a full beard and all his hair back when hiding in New Hampshire, which helps no one initially recognize him as Heisenberg when he returns to Albuquerque.
102	* ''Series/DempseyAndMakepeace'': Inverted by John Bates from “Judgement”. Following an artist's representation of his picture being circulated on the news in connection to the rape and murder of Sarah Hardcastle, he shaves off his large bushy moustache before attempting to go on the run. It proves enough of a disguise to confuse people who don’t know him, but falls apart when an old school friend of his (who now works as a local constable) sees the picture.
103	* ''Series/DoctorWho''. In [[Recap/DoctorWho2014CSLastChristmas "Last Christmas"]], Clara Oswald wakes up to the sound of a reindeer-drawn sleigh crashing on her roof, piloted by two elves and a jolly bearded man in a red suit.
104	-->'''Clara:''' Are you Santa Claus?\
105	''[Extremely unconvincing denials ensue, then...]''\
106	'''Santa:''' All right, fine, yes. Yes, it's me. Ha! Guilty. How did you recognise me?\
107	'''Elf:''' You know how you grew that beard as a bit of a disguise? People have picked up on it.
108	* ''Series/DrQuinnMedicineWoman'', when Dr. Mike fails to recognize her presumed dead fiancé when he comes to town looking for her because of the thick beard he's grown.
109	* Inverted on ''Series/TheFlash2014''. The Earth-2 Hunter Zolomon was a prolific and well-known serial killer with an unkempt beard and hair. He was able to take on a whole new, equally-public identity [[spoiler: as "Jay Garrick"]] simply by going clean-shaven and cutting his hair.
110	* ''Series/GameOfThrones'':
111	** Barristan Selmy grows one during his ChekhovMIA.
112	** Roose Bolton sports one in "The Lion and the Rose" after having to smuggle himself into his own lands. The next scene includes him shaving it off.
113	** Tyrion grows a hybrid between this trope and BeardOfSorrow for Season 5.
114	* In "The Century Turns", the first episode of ''Series/HecRamsey'', one of the constables in New Prospect's first police force is a criminal who has grown a bushy moustache to disguise his identity. Hec is able to recognise him with the aid of the mini rogues gallery he keeps in his crime kit.
115	* In ''Series/{{Homeland}}'', terrorist leader Abu Nasir shaves his iconic and prominent beard when he infiltrates the United States. The change makes him unrecognizable even to the viewer.
116	* Eighties ''Fugitive'' clone ''Hot Pursuit'', involving a couple on the run after the wife is framed for murder, had the husband shave his beard along with mutual dye jobs.
117	* In ''Series/HowToGetAwayWithMurder'', Frank shaves his iconic beard to go on the lam after being implicated in a murder.
118	* In ''Series/LawAndOrderCriminalIntent'', a criminal had a thick beard but had it shaved once he got in the country.
119	* Inverted in the ''Series/MasterpieceTheatre'' series of ''Literature/LesMiserables'', where Javert fails to recognize Valjean because he's shaved the thick beard that he had in prison and conversely let the hair on his head grow out.
120	* {{Inverted}} once on ''Series/{{NCIS}}'' with an assassin who looks different from his bearded mugshot because he's currently clean-shaven (which doesn't stop Abby from identifying him before he can shoot his target).
121	* ''Series/TheProfessionals''. In the prologue of "Mixed Doubles" a terrorist sneaks into the country with this trope, and a maid who enters his hotel room while he's shaving it off [[HeKnowsTooMuch gets her throat cut with the razor he's using]].
122	* At the start of ''Series/ThePunisher2017'', Frank Castle has an unkempt beard that causes him to be called a {{hipster}}. It's implied to also be a BeardOfSorrow given that Frank has lost his purpose now his RoaringRampageOfRevenge has ended. When he discovers it hasn't he shaves the beard, joking that he doesn't like hipsters or being mistaken for one. He doesn't have the beard at the start of Season 2 because the authorities have [[UnPerson erased his records]] so he doesn't need it.
123	* ''Series/SpartacusWarOfTheDamned'': Marcus Crassus orders his subordinate, a young UsefulNotes/JuliusCaesar, not to shave. Once he has grown a shaggy beard, Crassus sends him to infiltrate the rebels. The beard makes his cover story of being an escaped slave more believable.
124	* Duncan grows a beard like this near the end of the first season of ''Series/VeronicaMars''. It might also be a BeardOfSorrow; at the time that he grows it, he's both depressed and running away from home.
125	* In the pilot of ''Series/WhiteCollar'', Neal grows a beard in prison, and then shaves it off the day he escapes so he won't be recognized. He doesn't look all that different, but he ''does'' look just different enough to fool the facial recognition on the prison security cameras. Peter realizes he can figure out when Neal first decided to escape from prison by looking through past security footage for the day Neal stopped shaving.
126	[[/folder]]
127
128	[[folder:Podcast]]
129	* ''Podcast/TheMagnusArchives'': In "Do Not Open" Joshua Gillespie hopes the beard he has grown in the months since meeting "John", the man who paid him to do a service he now wants to get out of, will prevent the latter from finding or recognising him. It doesn't.
130	[[/folder]]
131
132	[[folder:Video Games]]
133	* In ''VideoGame/ArcanumOfSteamworksAndMagickObscura'', the "Gnome" you met at the start of the game is quickly revealed to have been a Dwarf, who shaved his beard ([[OurDwarvesAreAllTheSame inconceivable to their culture]]) to flee from something. [[spoiler:He was forced to work on the machine that would bring the BigBad back to Arcanum and managed to use it prior to full completion due to his small size and technological aptitude]].
134	* In ''Videogame/DeadSpace3'', we see that Isaac Clarke grew one between the second and third ''Dead Space'' games whilst trying to avoid [=EarthGov=].
135	* ''VideoGame/DragonAgeInquisition'' has this in [[spoiler:Blackwall, to hide the fact that he ''isn't'' the real Blackwall]]. Iron Bull expresses disbelief that a beard was enough to hide his identity. [[spoiler:Thom Rainier]] admits that not speaking to other people for months at a time made it easier.
136	* ''VideoGame/RedDeadRedemption2'': In the Epilogue, [[spoiler:John Marston]] is shown to have grown a beard and cut his hair short to avoid being recognized as a former member of the Van der Linde gang.
137	* ''VideoGame/TeamFortress2'': The Spy has a miscellaneous item called a "Camera Beard" that's equal parts this trope and ShoePhone.
138	[[/folder]]
139
140	[[folder:Webcomics]]
141	* In ''Webcomic/TheAdventuresOfDrMcNinja'', a variation on the idea of growing a beard just to be able to shave it off for an easy disguise is the reason the McNinja family all [[HighlyVisibleNinja wear ninja facemasks at all time]]. If no-one knows what they look like, then when they really need to, they'll be able to take their mask off and disappear. This ends up being how [[spoiler: Dr. McNinja exits the cast at the end of the comic]].
142	[[/folder]]
143
144	[[folder:Western Animation]]
145	* On ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'', Zaheer shaves off the beard he grew in prison (and also shaves his head) in order to infiltrate the Air Temple in Republic City.
146	* There are a few ''ComicStrip/{{Popeye}}'' cartoons where Bluto shaved his beard to disguise himself, like ''Vim, Vigor and Vitaliky'', ''She-Sick Sailors'' and ''Parlez Vous Woo''.
147	* In ''WesternAnimation/SantaClausIsCominToTown'', this is supposedly why Kris Kringle first grows his beard. His wanted posters had him beardless and he wasn't an iconic toy-making symbol just yet. The bearded form is, according to the special, the symbol it is because he grew the beard to escape the law.
148	* After Krusty the Clown on ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' fakes his death, he grows a beard so nobody can recognize him... but Bart still does. Subverted in that his beard is fake.
149	[[/folder]]
150
151	[[folder:Real Life]]
152	* UsefulNotes/SaddamHussein, who was known for his moustache, [[http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Saddamcapture.jpg grew a very large beard]] when he went into hiding from the U.S. army.
153	* Radovan Karadžić, getting rid of his [[https://www.dw.com/image/47991462_401.jpg flamboyant hair to acquire a dignified white beard]].
154	* After the Okhrana, Imperial Russia's StateSec, started cracking down on opposition groups in 1907, UsefulNotes/VladimirLenin fled from the Grand Duchy of Finland (where he had established a Bolshevik revolutionary organization) to Switzerland, disguising himself by [[https://triviahappy.com/images/articles/03282014lenin.jpg donning a wig and shaving his distinctive facial hair]].
155	%%* [[UsefulNotes/CheGuevara Che]] [[https://triviahappy.com/images/articles/03282014che.jpg Guevara]] (Weblinks are not examples; effectively zero-context until further elaboration)
156	* UsefulNotes/CharlesDarwin. After publishing ''On the Origin of Species'' he became very famous, but he wanted no part of the controversy that followed. So, to go about unrecognized, he grew his now-iconic long, woolly [[WizardBeard beard]]. It worked so well that even his close friends didn't recognize him at scientific conferences. Ironically, the modern world wouldn't recognize him without the beard.
157	* French General Henri Giraud shaved his mustache just before his escape from a German POW camp in World War II.
158	* No less than Osama bin Laden managed to hide successfully by shaving off his beard. The [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abbottabad_Commission_Report Abbottabad Commission Report]] reveals that it apparently worked so well that the Pakistani policeman who stopped the car he was in on a routine traffic check [[RecognitionFailure did not recognize him.]] Keep in mind that not only was bin Laden of unusual height (1.95 meters, or 6'5"), this was in ''2002'', right when he was one of the most wanted faces in the world. The Report was quite scathing on that point.
159	* Creator/CharlieCox and Elden Henson generally sport beards in their day to day lives. When filming ''Series/Daredevil2015'', they have to shave their beards to play Matt and Foggy respectively, since Matt has PermaStubble while Foggy is clean-shaven. In at least one interview, Henson has said that people generally don't recognize him with the beard.
160	* French UsefulNotes/WorldWarTwo SerialKiller Marcel Petiot grew a long, black beard after his crimes were found. The disguise was so effective that he was able to join TheResistance, and was even tasked to [[HiredToHuntYourself find Petiot]] before someone recognized him.
161	* Although he was still as recognizable with a beard as he was without one, [[UsefulNotes/TheBritishRoyalFamily Prince Harry]] revealed in his memoir ''Spare'' that growing one helped him deal with his anxiety, seeing it as a sort of security blanket, showing that it can offer a form of psychological protection as well.
162	[[/folder]]

Context Main / BeardnessProtectionProgram