Zac Efron breaks silence on his facial transformation after plastic surgery rumours

After a flurry of plastic surgery rumours were sparked last year over Zac Efron's changed appearance, the actor has finally addressed what's really behind his altered look.

Appearing on the October cover of Men's Health, Efron, 34, revealed an accident in his home left his chin bone "hanging off" his face.

He told the magazine he was running in socks when he slipped and hit his face on the corner of a fountain, passing out from the impact.

It was during his recovery period that he says his facial muscles got "really, really big" and he ended up looking very different. Meanwhile, fans were pointing to plastic surgery as the reason for his changed appearance.

While rumours began to swirl last April about the High School Musical star going under the knife, his good friend and Australian radio host Kyle Sandilands went in to bat for him.

"It's like getting a Picasso and having a kid fingerpaint all over it," Sandilands said on The Kyle and Jackie O radio show. "Why bother? … I would know if he'd had any plastic surgery."

According to Page Six, it was Efron's mother, Starla Baskett, who alerted her son to the social media conversations about his appearance.

But he told Men's Health: "If I valued what other people thought of me to the extent that they may think I do, I definitely wouldn't be able to do this work."

The star has also previously revealed he'd never want to be the same extreme shape he got into while filming Baywatch in 2017.

According to Men's Health, he was left feeling burnt out from making the movie and found himself in a "dark depression" and suffering from insomnia.

"I had a really hard time recentring. Ultimately they chalked it up to taking way too many diuretics for way too long, and it messed something up."

This article was first published on the NZ Herald and is republished here with permission.