‘LeoLardo’: How DiCaprio shows dad bods are no laughing matter

When Leonardo DiCaprio, 51, was photographed last week wearing patterned swimming trunks and frolicking in the sea in Hawaii, be probably assumed he was just having a lovely beach day with supermodel girlfriend Vittoria Ceretti, 28 ahead of the wedding celebrations for jewellery designer Jennifer Meyer and billionaire Geoff Ogunlesi.

Little did he know that within hours of the pictures being released, he would be the subject of the onslaught of mirth at the sight of his “dad bod”. The problem, it seems, is that his paunch was where his toned Hollywood twentysomething “beach” bod once used to be. The 51-year-old’s soft, un-sculpted midsection went viral; some people took potshots at him, criticising his physique compared to his 1990s Titanic and The Beach era – making cruel jibes, including nicknaming him “LeoLardo”.

“God, what happened?” one commentator wrote under the photos in an online tabloid paper, while another person commented: “Oh my days no, we don’t need to see that”.

The star, who has just finished filming his new Martin Scorsese film What Happens at Night, co-starring Jennifer Lawrence, has previously stated that unlike other Hollywood actors, he doesn’t follow strict fitness and diet regimes, and skips the gym for a more relaxed lifestyle.

He told Esquire magazine last year that as he hit 50, it’s given him the desire “to just be more honest and not waste your time”.

Well done Leo; you have hit the nail on the head. It is something we women have been wanting to do for years. Life’s too short to waste it in the gym doing crunches, fearing that if we don’t have the perfect body, we will be unlovable, or somehow flawed.

We also know female A-list actors of a similar age to Leo, including Nicole Kidman, Jennifer Aniston, and Angelina Jolie, wouldn’t dream of hitting the beach and letting it all hang out like Leo, if there was any risk of them being papped. They are under constant pressure to look decades younger than their 50-plus age and in tip-top shape just to stay relevant – and employable. The endless obsession with physical perfection has drained women’s time, money, and mental energy since time immemorial.

And so women are doing themselves a great disservice by then starting to troll Leo’s “dad bod” and body-shaming him. After putting up with endless body scrutiny for decades, we should know better than to wade in with cruel jibes. If we don’t think it is okay to criticise a woman’s body, why on earth do we think it is funny to do the same to a man? Even when he is in the uniquely privileged position of being an Alister with a penchant for dating younger women.

No good comes of putting men’s body shapes under the microscope any more than women’s. Whether they are ribbed, chiselled, or lacking any structure at all, the time has come to stop commenting and getting our pound of flesh.

If we don’t want to watch men fall into the same trap as us, we can’t keep body positivity exclusively for women. Forty per cent of UK men are now reportedly unhappy with their weight and body image, with 30 per cent describing themselves as “not very happy” and 10 per cent “not happy at all”, according to YouGov tracking data in June.

Another recent study by CALM found that 39 per cent of men felt pressure to have a “perfect” body, with social media a major driver. In the book, The Adonis Complex: The Secret Crisis of Male Body Obsession, by researchers Harrison Pope, Katharine Phillips, and Roberto Olivardia, the modern-day Adonis complex is described as “causing sufferers to believe they are never enough no matter how others see them”.

James Corden has spoken about the abuse he’s suffered for his “dad bod”. When Chris Pratt got fit for his role as Star-Lord in the Guardians of the Galaxy films, and was criticised for being too thin, he said: “Just because I am a male doesn’t mean I’m impervious to your whispers. Body shaming hurts.”

If we hold men up to the same unrealistic beauty ideals that women have had to face for generations, we can’t expect to escape them ourselves. Nobody wants to spend their lives defying their age – and faking it to make it with Botox and Skims body contour shorts. LeoLardo might be funny to some, but when it comes to our own bodies, laughing at Leo’s paunch is a spectacular own goal.