Zac Efron probably thought he'd seen the last of this, but footage has once again re-surfaced of the infamous moment that he stooped to pick up a condom that fell out of his pocket while he was at a movie premiere. Watch below:
TikTok has a habit of bringing things back into the public realm that the stars would sooner lay forgotten, and so it has done for Efron.
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The year was 2012. Zac Efron was 24 years old and was still largely thought of as the squeaky clean famous kid from High School Musical.
Then the premiere of The Lorax happened.
Efron starred as idealistic 12 year-old Theodore 'Ted' Wiggins in the 3D-animated film of Dr. Seuss' tale. The film itself did little to change his child-friendly image.
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What he did on the red carpet at its premier certainly had an effect, however, as he quite clearly dropped something and stooped to pick it up.
Unfortunately for the former teen-star, it tuned out to be a condom - meaning that, for possibly the first time in his career, legions of fans were faced with the stressful prospect that he might do more than just sing, hold hands and occasionally kiss.
Efron quickly picked it up and tried to pass it off, nervously putting his sunglasses on to try and hide his blushes. It did not work.
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Such was the furore over the incident, the poor star found himself answering questions about it on talk shows.
For instance, Matt Lauer on the Today show was keen for him to run through the event, to which he sheepishly replied: "I don't want to take you through it."
At the time, Efron elaborated: "I never really had a pocket-checking policy prior to going on the red carpet before, but now we fully instated one."
That one moment accelerated Efron into adulthood more than his initial run of movie roles ever did. It's only really with 2019's The Beach Bum (where he played drug-addled libertine Flicker opposite Matthew McConaughey) and Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile (his portrayal of famed serial killer Ted Bundy) that his rep truly began to develop.
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Watching in 2021, TikTok users have found the red carpet incident no less amusing.
"Surely not a kids movie premiere," one person exclaimed, a sentiment backed up by several others.
Another said: "I would have been dead on the floor laughing at him".
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However, a third person made a very good point: "Hey at least he's using them!!"
After all, if you're a star who is wildly popular among teenagers and children, then if they do make the shocking discovery that at age 24 you might, you know, have sex, at least you can confidently prove that at least you're doing it safely.
Featured Image Credit: PATopics: Celebrity, Funny, Fail, Weird, Zac Efron