Mark Consuelos debuts shaved head on 'Live' with Kelly Ripa: See his new look

Mark Consuelos has a new look.

The " Live with Kelly and Mark " host, 53, debuted a shaved head on the talk show Monday alongside wife Kelly Ripa and teased that the transformation is for a mysterious new television project.

"Do not adjust your TV screens," Consuelos said at the top of the episode. "Yes, I got my hair cut."

The "All My Children" star joked his head is now "like a chinchilla," and as she touched it, Ripa quipped, "I've never rubbed an actual chinchilla, but I suspect this is what it feels like."

Ripa also joked that they would give everyone in the studio audience a chance to feel Consuelos' shaved head, and the audience cheered as he riffed that he would "pick someone out" of the crowd to do so.

Kelly Ripa reveals Mark Consuelos used to be 'insanely jealous,' which made marriage 'very hard'

Consuelos explained he has cut his hair short "every couple of years" since he and Ripa got married in 1996. In this case, though, he had a more specific reason, as he was asked to cut it for a role.

"I got a TV job, a role in a pilot, and they said, 'Can you cut it short?'" he recalled. "And I go, 'How short?' I go 'Military?' They go, 'Military.'"

But Consuelos' role is evidently so secret that not even Ripa knows what it is. She told viewers she has been "trying to get intel" out of her husband and joked he is "so cagey about the details" that she thinks he might be "in the CIA." All she knows is that the pilot was shot in Atlanta.

"I can tell you that because I was in Atlanta," Ripa noted. "I was being a Hollywood wife."

Watch Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos reunite with their baby from 'All My Children'

Ripa shared a look at Consuelos' haircut in an Instagram post on Saturday, posting a photo she said was taken from Switzerland. "Summer cut!!" one fan commented on the picture. "He can pull it off!!"

Consuelos starred opposite Ripa on the soap opera "All My Children," and he has also had roles in shows like " Riverdale ," " Only Murders in the Building " and " Friends ." He took over as Ripa's "Live" co-host last year after Ryan Seacrest's exit .

During a recent episode of "Live," Consuelos and Ripa had a heartwarming reunion with the actress, now in her 20s, who played their child on "All My Children" as a baby.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Mark Consuelos debuts shaved head on 'Live' with Kelly Ripa: See his new look