Meet The Celebrity Dentist Who Charges $70,000 For Veneers

When New York City-based cosmetic dentist Michael Apa, DDS, was in high school, he already knew that he didn't just want to be a dentist when he grew up — he wanted to be a celebrity dentist.

"I knew from the beginning what I wanted," he tells Refinery29. "I sought out this guy named Larry Rosenthal who was the celebrity dentist, and I kind of targeted him." It worked: By the time Apa graduated from dental school he had secured a job in Rosenthal's office.

For the past 15 years, as a partner at Apa Rosenthal Group, he's garnered a client list that includes Chloë Sevigny, celebrity makeup artist Mario Dedivanovic, designer Vera Wang, and a few Real Housewives cast members (and that's just a few he can publicly name). Working with some of the most high-profile people on the planet means Dr. Apa's racked up more than 220,000 Instagram followers who freak over his tooth transformations on the regular.

With a speciality in veneers, Dr. Apa's also gained fame for just how expensive his are, with a single veneer, which is manufactured in his own space-age-style office on the Upper East Side, going for $3,500. That's about $70,000 for the 20 teeth normally needed for the whole mouth. Of course, that's chump change for the several members of royal families in the Middle East who call Dr. Apa their dentist as well, and frequently fly him out to Dubai for tweaks to their teeth. So what does being a celebrity dentist really mean, and what does this wild world of uber-expensive veneers really look like? We asked him all our burning questions, below.

Why was it important to you to become a celebrity dentist?
"It’s a boost to your self-confidence to know that a person who is scrutinized in the general public eye is coming to you to get something done. Obviously, you want to imagine that they are going to the best because they've done their research and really care. It’s not always true, but that’s what you want to think.

"Being a good celebrity dentist is about being able to disarm people. The more you treat a celebrity like a celebrity, the more panicked they get. The more you treat them like everybody else, the more they can relax. No one gets special treatment. They all have the same fears. They all have the same anxieties. They all want the best teeth."

What's the wildest story you can tell me about your time as a celebrity dentist?
"I treat the families of many Middle Eastern rulers. I’ve been summoned to many places: Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia, Qatar. They have dental chairs in their palaces and they fly me out and I land and go straight to the palace and then perform whatever they need.

"I had a patient in the Middle East, a very high-ranking, female royal family member who flew me back three times to change the length of just her front two teeth. It's 24 hours of flying. And I flew out there for, well, we're talking microns, like little bit longer, little bit longer, little bit longer each time. I did them, would fly all the way back home, and then they would summon me back. Then I would do what she wanted, and then fly back."

Since your expertise is veneers, how can we spot a celebrity with them?
"If it's done well, you actually can't tell. They're supposed to look like your natural teeth, with the shapes and indents and texture. But if it’s done poorly, it’s easy to tell. It changes your face. It pushes your lip out. Sometimes even the way they talk is changed."