Hugh Bonneville has joked he's undergone seven cosmetic surgery procedures after baffling fans with a bizarre filter during a TV appearance.
The Downton Abbey star, 57, seemed to use a skin-smoothing filter for his video call with The One Show on Wednesday and it prompted a barrage of tweets from baffled viewers.
Actor Hugh has now addressed the furore by releasing a cheeky statement on Instagram, making fun of "filtergate" and joking his new look was actually down to made-up procedures including "aura misting" and "cheekoplasty".
He posted a picture of himself without a filter standing in front of a green background and wrote: "STATEMENT: I have recently undergone a number of cosmetic procedures including rhinomicroscopy, breast indecision, cheekoplasty, follicoliopoly, dental undergouging, lipodonction and aura misting
"Hope that clears things up. #filtergate #iamnotacat #TheOneShow @bbctheoneshow."
Hugh also added "I am not a cat" in refenence to a video call recording which went viral recently in which a lawyer accidentally added a filter which turned him into a white fluffy feline.
After his appearance on the BBC show, viewers took to Twitter to debate why the actor looked so different.
One wrote: "Hugh Bonneville has found the touch up filter on zoom! At least he’s not a cat!"
Another added: "What sort of filter is Hugh Bonneville using? It looks very odd!" while a third commented: "Did a double take and had to rewind Hugh Bonneville on #theoneshow to work out what filter he was using!?!"
One more tweeted: "Is Hugh Bonneville living in a filterland or has he just smeared his screen with Vaseline?
"What’s going on with the screen on The One Show?"
"Hugh Bonneville’s portrait mode touch-up on The One Show is quite the thing," another wrote.
"He looks like an 80s Brian Wilson being interviewed on a breakfast show over a 525VT video link.
Hugh was on the show to talk about his new movie To Olivia, in which he plays author Roald Dahl.
The Sky Original film co-stars Keeley Hawes and is released today.
