Charlize Theron says her ‘Old Guard 2’ mullet made her daughter cry

Some people are just not prepared to handle the power of the mullet. 

While visiting Late Night with Seth Meyers on Tuesday, Charlize Theron revealed that her two daughters — 11-year-old Jackson and 7-year-old August — had a physical reaction to discovering that their mom had cut her hair into a mullet as part of her role in The Old Guard 2. 

“I have two girls and they’re very… they’re mostly very girly,” Theron explained to host Seth Meyers. “They think of me as a princess and they want mom to, like, look like a princess.”

However, the 49-year-old actress noted that her own personal style tends to skew more toward edgy and masculine looks, much to the displeasure of her kids. She added, “When I go to school functions, my daughter’s always like, ‘Mom, can you please wear a dress?’”

Theron explained that she was already mid-cutting her mullet for the film when her daughters returned home from school. 

“I just remember looking over and they both came into the room really excited, and then they just both froze and they just went…” she said, her mouth dropping open in shock. “And one started crying. One literally started bawling her eyes out.”

The haircut actually ended up being an important teachable moment for her and her kids. “I had to actually sit down with her and say like, ‘We all get to be who we want to be,’” Theron remarked. “‘And right now Mommy wants to wear a mullet. I don’t tell you what to do with your hair.’” 

Her daughter, however, still wasn’t pleased with her mom’s new look. According to Theron, she simply replied, “‘I still don’t like it.’” 

Sign up for Entertainment Weekly‘s free daily newsletter to get breaking news, exclusive first looks, recaps, reviews, interviews with your favorite stars, and more.

Meyers could understand where Theron’s kids were coming from. 

“I will say my dad — who still to this day has a mustache, and had a mustache the entirety of my life — one spring break when we were probably about the age your kids are now, he came out of the bathroom and he’d shaved his mustache as like, ‘Hey I want to look young!’” he recalled. “And my brother and I both screamed because we literally thought it was an intruder. I mean, that’s how different he looked. So at least you still look like you with the mullet!”

And, to be fair, Theron confessed that the mullet was “a big shock” for all involved, including herself. 

“It took me a while to get,” she admitted. “It’s also one of those hairstyles you have to get it right because, anything else, you can kind of mess up a little bit. But a mullet you cannot mess up because already everyone’s like, ‘It’s a mullet.’”

Theron isn’t the only actor whose kids have had an adverse reaction to one of their movie transformations. Josh Hartnett revealed on Today last month that his kids similarly burst into tears upon seeing the fresh blonde dye job he got for his action film, Fight or Flight. 

“They cry every time I change my look,” he said of his children. “And, being an actor, I have to do that quite a bit.”

Watch Theron discuss her mullet in the clip above.