style

Zac Efron and Chace Crawford have made them their trademark looks. Ashton Kutcher has probably Twittered about his. Even the Jonas Brothers, well, one of them -- Joe -- is sporting the must-have hairstyle that's turning heads: boy bangs.

That would be the messy, adolescent-like fringe of hair tousled over a guy's forehead, barely brushing his eyebrows or swirling naturally over his eyes as seen on just about every male model during the recent men's ready-to-wear fall collections.

The style also can be side-swept in a flattering look or cut blunt, wispily styled or flat-ironed in disconnected directions as worn -- fiercely -- by Fall Out Boy's Pete Wentz, Christian Soriano of "Project Runway" and Adam Lambert of "American Idol."

But heads up, dudes: Whatever one's preference, boy bangs aren't new.

The cool-kid cut -- also influenced by interest in 1960s and '70s music and fashion -- is as old as those singing Von Trapp boys back in the 1920s. But it was the Beatles and their British Invasion "mop-top" hairstyle that gave men more options than the short, slicked-back "Mad Men" look -- and that in this century has made a comeback with the fashion-forward follicles on the heads of Hollywood hipsters.

In his "The Way We Were" 1970s heyday, Robert Redford's golden, cascading bangs -- um, the way he wore -- have remained his signature style. Other Hollywood hunks have preferred bangs at one time or another: Johnny Depp, Owen Wilson and Jared Leto. Rock stars, too: Jon Bon Jovi, Richie Sambora and, before them, Jim Morrison.

Still, 2009's looks show a new twist, says celebrity stylist and Nexxus creative director Kevin Mancuso, who has cut Tom Cruise's bangs (blunt and often styled sideways).

"It's soft and glamorous," Mancuso says from his New York salon. "The new boy-bang version has a more organic texture to it in that it's cared for and not overly controlled. That sounds a little feminine, doesn't it?"

Granted, the dividing line between the genders -- especially in fashion, where styles can often swing both ways -- has been blurred for many years. But, yes, real men do wear bangs.