In a World of Muddy Celebrities, Sydney Sweeney Capitalizes on Being Spotless

Last year, Sydney Sweeney told VF she’s made peace with her inability to control her own image even as she’s oversexualized by the media, and has to face general misconceptions about her success. But the Emmy-nominated actor is also shrewd about using the PR machine to her advantage, like with her latest stunt: selling a men’s soap infused with her very own bathwater.

On Thursday, Sweeney announced she’s partnering with soap brand Dr. Squatch to sell a limited-edition line of bars that includes drops of her actual bathwater. The unorthodox product follows her viral ad for the brand last October, in which Sweeney sits in a bubble bath while speaking to the world’s “dirty little boys.”

The 27-year-old told GQ that she “definitely was not aware” of the erotic interest in bathtub water “until I started seeing it in my own comments” on Instagram. She also credited the 2023 film Saltburn, in which Barry Keoghan’s character inhales the filthy bathwater of Sweeney’s Euphoria costar Jacob Elordi straight from the drain, as “a huge catalyst” for a renewed cultural fascination with bathing.

But there was another time in the not-too-distant past when celebrity hygiene was an even hotter topic. Back in the summer of 2021, just as both celebs and civilians began to venture out of the house again post-pandemic, a few brave actors proudly flaunted their ability to forego showers.

It began with Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis, who said on Dax Shepard and Monica Padman’s Armchair Expert podcast that they rarely bathed themselves or their adolescent children. “If you can see the dirt on them, clean them. Otherwise, there’s no point,” Kutcher argued, adding that he personally suds “my armpits and my crotch daily and nothing else ever.” Kunis, who was born in Russia and lived there until age seven, admitted: “I didn’t have hot water growing up as a child, so I didn’t shower very much anyway.”

Shepard and his wife, Kristen Bell, were asked about this interview while appearing on The View, where they also copped to skipping regular showers for their kids. “I’m a big fan of waiting for the stink,” Bell said. “Once you catch a whiff, that’s biology’s way of letting you know you need to clean it up.” They later defended their remarks in another interview, noting that at the time they were dealing with drought in California. “We don’t have a ton of water, so when I shower I’ll grab the girls and push them in there with me so we all use the same shower water,” Bell said. “And I don’t know, it just happens whenever it happens, I guess.”

Three is a trend, and Jake Gyllenhaal completed the grimy trifecta when he told Vanity Fair that same week: “More and more I find bathing to be less necessary. I do also think that there’s a whole world of not bathing that is also really helpful for skin maintenance, and we naturally clean ourselves.”

All of these sullied little secrets sparked extensive internet discourse. Reductress poked fun at Gyllenhaal with this headline: “Brave: Another White Person Comes Out as Stinky.” And Cardi B tweeted, “It’s giving itchy.”

But for every unwashed celebrity spreading their message, there are those who wisely commodify their own (presumably pristine) auras. Just before the world descended into questionable quarantine habits, Grammy-winner Erykah Badu and Oscar winner Gwyneth Paltrow each released products purportedly smelling like their own vaginas. And now Sweeney, who boasted to GQ that she had showered the morning of their interview with her own soap, has continued the tradition.

Only 5,000 bars of Sydney’s Bathwater Bliss will be manufactured, each coming with a signed certificate of authenticity and an $8 price tag, when it goes on sale June 6 at noon ET/9 a.m. PT. Given the narrow quantity, Dr. Squatch will also be holding a sweepstakes to give away 100 bars to US residents—who must, for reasons that admittedly feel a little sinister, be over 18 years of age to purchase.