Facial Hair is Part of New Shaving Campaign

(EndPlay Staff Reports) - Anybody who lived through the 1970s and '80s remembers when male body and facial hair was not only acceptable, but stylish. For those who didn't, there are always reruns of "Magnum, P.I."

Then came the '90s and the birth of the "metrosexual." The clean shaven look – or barely-shaven five o'clock shadow look – was hot.

But suddenly hair is cool again. Maybe not body hair, but facial hair is very definitely cool if the new hype from Gillette is to be believed.

According to research from the company, 40 percent of men undertake some type of "facial hairstyling" every day. Those same men say it's "critical to their look," revealed the company in a press release .

But, apparently, regular razors aren't enough – and neither are regular men. Gillette recently began using celebrities to tout their new line of facial hair grooming tools.

The new razors, a partnership between Gillette and another Proctor and Gamble titan, Braun, hit shelves in February. Gillette unveiled the new advertising campaign for the product in the weeks before the release. Rapper André "3,000" Benjamin, and actors Gael García Bernal and Adrien Brody appear in super-slick, highly stylized GQ ads as uber-hip brand ambassadors for the Gillette Fusion ProGlide Styler.

Gillette said the trio are "true facial hair stylers who have tremendous talent, a strong sense of self, depth of character, and authentic style."

The Fusion ProGlide Styler combines a Fusion razor with a Braun trimmer, to help those who call it "a complicated and frustrating grooming process."

"People are generally lazy about organizing their grooming and trimming things, and for someone like me who travels a lot, having the two things in one product makes it easier to travel with," Bernal recently told The Los Angeles Times .

Is the hairy look here to stay? Only time will tell, but "the campaign and its well-tailored stars well and truly confirm that today's fashion-forward gents are more likely to be seen with waxed handle bars or retro bushy whiskers than the designer stubble of the Nineties," wrote blogger Hannah Rand in The Daily Mail .