Hey, who wouldn’t jump at the chance to speak to the Greatest Stage Actor of Our Generation about…sideburn maintenance? When just such an offer arrived in our inbos recently courtesy of a hardworking PR rep, we said, hell, yeah, picked up the phone, and dialed Liev Schreiber, who in addition to being the aforementioned GSAOG and the father of Naomi Watts’ children, plays the hirsute villain, Sabretooth, in the forthcoming Wolverine movie (and its attendant video game).

Schreiber describes his character’s look as "Bill Sikes from Oliver Twist mid in with Will Ferrell from Semi-Pro—which isn’t the prettiest thing. It’s basically a track straight down to the chin." And not so easy to pull off. "The single most difficult thing about being in this film was having to wear those sideburns in my everyday life," Schreiber said—a strong sentiment, given that the role also required gaining 35 pounds of muscle. "[But] what’s really funny is that in the past two weeks, I’ve seen at least eight guys with the Wolverine facial hair. I wonder if it’s one of those Zeitgeist things or if people are seeing the trailer? I kind of don’t think those guys are downloading the leaked copy, but maybe they are—if it serves to advance the cause of facial hair in fashion," he continued, so much the better.

Doubters, take note: Those ’burns are real—no Hollywood magic here. (Desperate to be rid of them, Schreiber shaved in an airplane bathroom on his flight home from shooting.) So mere mortals can rock them, too, Schreiber said, though unlike Sabretooth’s, they won’t grow back immediately if ripped off in a battle scenario.

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