Why men like me admire Sacha Baron Cohen's ‘midlife crisis' makeover

Times

24-07-2025

Sacha Baron Cohen's muscular body on the cover of the latest Men's Fitness requires a leap of faith. When a man who adopts comic personas poses looking heroic and ripped on the front of a magazine, you can be forgiven for thinking, 'This has to be a trap. This has to be AI, a new character, a clever body suit that will allow him to expose our vanities and hypocrisies once again.'
But no, it appears that Baron Cohen's frankly amazing body is the product of hours of training, combined with careful eating and possibly even weight-loss drugs, although with Baron Cohen it's impossible to know how serious he was when he quipped on Instagram, 'Some celebs use Ozempic, some use private chefs, some use personal trainers. I did all three. This is not AI. I really am egotistical enough to do this.'
This happens to more and more men in midlife. The recently divorced 53-year-old actor is starring as Mephisto in the Marvel movie Ironheart, so got in touch with Matthew McConaughey's trainer and started working with steely discipline.
I come to his transformation as someone just under ten years older who works out every day and has found himself the focus of well-meaning mockery for (counts on fingers) the past 45 years. While football, rugby and tennis have always been dignified ways for a man to spend his time, lifting weights so you can have cool muscles is deemed somewhat ridiculous.
I understand totally. When I stand in front of a full-length mirror to perform a biceps curl there is, even after all this time, just the faintest hint of Eye of the Tiger playing ironically somewhere in my head. But it works, it feels astonishingly good and it's a way of telling the world you are still very much alive.
The phrase 'still got it' is fired at older people who have made some undignified attempt at sexy and found themselves with egg and fake tan on their face. But trying to hang on to 'it' is human, hard work and, I think, totally admirable.
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With this in mind I'm seeing two kinds of middle-aged man emerging: the age-accepters and those who challenge decrepitude to come and find them among the machines and dumbbells of their local gym. What is clear is that when a man of a certain age decides to commit, there is no heart gadget, protein shaker or clingy vest that we will not at least think about buying.
Cohen says his workout regime with the celebrity trainer Alfonso Moretti stops his mind spinning. 'Instead of lying in bed overthinking and staring at my phone, I get up, jump on FaceTime and train with Alfonso. It sets a positive tone for the whole day.'
In our fifties, sixties and beyond, having a purpose and a constructive goal really helps. Knowing I'll be in the gym or on a run at some point every day gives me structure when otherwise, like Baron Cohen, I'd be an Olympic-standard overthinker.
The midlife male makeover is obviously rich comedy material and Baron Cohen has declared his midlife crisis before others take aim. The question for later-life men is not 'am I having a crisis?', it's 'what kind of crisis do I want to have?' We all confront mortality, invisibility, loss of sexual appeal and having to use reading glasses in dark restaurants: the task is to work out the most constructive way to deal with all that.
I say to all the men out there thinking they too might swap some of their pints for protein shakes, it's never too late and your body will respond to the work you put in. When you feel silly working out, remember that if the man who gave us Borat and Ali G managed to overcome his sense of the absurd, so can you.