Sacha Baron Cohen - best known for being 'Borat' and now ready to roll as Austrian gay fashionista 'Bruno' has suffered serious burns after trying to bleach his pubic hair.

"He'd heard that all-over hairlessness is a popular trend in the gay community, so he thought he'd bleach all his hair so that it looked invisible," a source told the UK's Sun newspaper.

The 37-year-old was rushed to hospital. "Shortly after having the procedure done he felt a burning sensation and it grew steadily worse," the source explains.

"He had a bad allergic reaction to hydrogen peroxide, which is a strong bleaching agent. It was so severe around a certain part of his anatomy that he couldn't sit down for three days."

Filming had to be delayed for several days while Baron Cohen recovered.

Like 'Borat' before it, 'Bruno' includes several stunts involving real-life people's interactions with the larger-than-life character. In scenes already filmed, Bruno invades a Milan Fashion Week catwalk, infiltrates a same-sex marriage protest in California, and appeared on a Texas TV chat show with a baby wearing a T-Shirt saying 'gay-by'.

Bruno opens next month in the US and UK, and on Thursday 9 July in New Zealand.