Cosmetic surgery? Renee Zellweger joins Nicole Kidman, Meg Ryan, Jennifer Hawkins in altered appearance

RENEE Zellweger is only the latest female star to set tongues wagging with a radically altered appearance. Check out some of the others.

Nicole Kidman in 1992 compared with 2013.

RENEE Zellweger’s radically altered appearance created a media storm last week, even though she is far from the first Hollywood celebrity to take drastic action to try to slow the march of time.

While the online backlash was particularly vitriolic, the Oscar-winning actor took the extraordinary step of issuing a statement about her looks, claiming her taut skin and elongated face were the result of healthy living.

FACE OFF: Zellweger on new appearance

NEW ’DO: Nicole, is that you?

Zellweger, 45, countered the comments about her changed eye shape and brow line, smooth forehead and plumped cheeks with a statement declaring herself “peaceful” and “healthy”.

She stopped short of confirming she’d had cosmetic surgery but admitted she “made bad choices” about concealing her “visible exhaustion”.

Renee Zellweger after.

Renee Zellweger before.

So why do the public, particularly other women, feel the need to pick apart the appearance of a woman who makes her ­living in a youth-­obsessed industry?

At just 30, model Jennifer Hawkins has been accused of going under the knife because of her transformation since taking out the Miss Universe competition in 2004.

Hawkins, like fellow Aussie Nicole Kidman, has strongly denied plastic surgery.

Kidman’s recent appearance at Cannes sparked more criticism of her appearance on social media after her face appeared remarkably smooth.

Yet just days later she was photographed with wrinkles and crowsfeet, leaving some to speculate it is all just a trick of lighting and good make-up.

Meg Ryan now.

Meg Ryan then.

Some have been brave enough to own up to their ­surgical enhancement.

Actor Jennifer Grey admitted in a UK interview to having plastic surgery on her nose soon after her star turn in 1987’s Dirty Dancing. She said it had been a huge mistake as she was no longer her character Baby, just “somebody who looked a bit like her”.

“I went in the operating room a celebrity and came out anonymous,” she later said.

American sweetheart Meg Ryan, voted by People magazine as one of 1994’s “50 most beautiful people in the world”, shocked fans when she unveiled her frozen face in 2013. The once-prolific actor, now 53, had not worked since ­playing herself in a 2007 episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm before stepping out with an appearance many likened to The Joker.

Jennifer Hawkins in 2014.

Jennifer Hawkins in 2004.

By comparison, the similarly aged Julia Roberts and Debra Messing have remained staunchly surgery-free, as have older stars Meryl Streep, Diane Keaton and Helen Mirren, all of whom have enjoyed steady work on stage and screen.

It is not just women raising un-Botoxed eyebrows either, with several leading men also taking extreme action, as evidenced by actors Burt Rey­nolds, Sylvester Stallone and Michael Douglas.

Nicole Kidman in 1992 compared with 2013.