From PEOPLE Magazine Click to enlarge
For an Angel, David Boreanaz has endured more than his fair share of grooming hell. In college, the brooding and gorgeously ageless vampire of The WB's Buffy the Vampire Slayer went through his longhaired "Deadhead" period. Then he shaved the side of his head in a desperate attempt to control the unruly hair that made classmates call him Q-Tip Head. After that, he pierced his own left ear, with disastrous results. "It got infected, and I got this huge bubble behind my ear," he recalls with much regret. "I had to go to the emergency room to get it lanced."

These days the Philadelphia-bred 29-year-old has tamed his coif ("I just towel-dry my hair, put some Textureline gel in it, and I'm out the door") and turned away from home remedies. But his beauty can still be found in a refreshingly macho core. "David is a man in a world full of boys," marvels Marcia Shulman, a senior vice president at 20th Century Fox Television, which produces Buffy. "He's like a rugged, old-fashioned movie star. If this was the '50s, he might have changed his name to Rock."

His morning grooming is equally retro. "I just wash my face with soap and water," says the 6'1" Boreanaz, married to Ingrid, a social worker. Then, to control his oily skin, "I put some aloe vera gel on. Nothing too over-the-top." The actor, who will star in his own Buffy spin-off next fall, keeps fit thanks to golf, boxing, cardio work and weight training. And, reports Buffy herself, Sarah Michelle Gellar, he's "a great dancer." Also a man of mystery. "It's really hard to know what goes on inside of David," says Shulman. "He walks around with a story, but he's not willing to tell it." That's okay. It's too much fun guessing.