The Young And The Restless Actress Who Had Real Plastic Surgery On-Screen

In 1984, the legendary daytime actress Jeanne Cooper decided that she wanted to undergo a facelift to combat signs of aging, telling the hosts of "The Talk" (via HuffPost), "I walked by a mirror one day and scared the hell out of myself."

Since she and her character, Katherine "Kay" Chancellor, would look significantly different following the surgery, Cooper felt it would be an excellent opportunity to write the facelift into "The Young and the Restless" (via Daily Soap Dish). However, Cooper took things further by suggesting that the soap film the actual procedure and include it on the show. 

In an interview with Michael Fairman TV, Cooper described the experience. "It was so funny having the cameras in the procedure room while they were doing my facelift, but when it was over it was incredible," she recalled.

The "Y&R" episode featuring the facelift aired on March 28, 1984, and portrayed Kay going under the knife and Cooper's real reaction to seeing herself after surgery for the first time. Filming a real medical procedure of any kind was extremely rare in the 1980s, let alone putting the footage on national television, so it was no surprise when Cooper and "Y&R" became media sensations following the episode.