“The Substance” of Nightmares: Oscar-Nominated Makeup Effects Master Pierre Olivier Persin on His Terrifying Transformations
Since its release last fall, writer/director Coralie Fargeat’s body horror thriller The Substance has artfully shocked Academy Award voters to the tune of five Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Screenplay. Outstanding Actress nominee Demi Moore portrays aging actress Elisabeth, who gets way more than she bargained for after injecting herself with ...
Oscar-Nominated Makeup Artist Julia Floch-Carbonel on the Beauty of Transformation in “Emilia Pérez”
Emilia Pérez made history by casting Karla Sofía Gascón, the first transgendered woman to be nominated for a best actress Academy Award. The musical melodrama from director Jacques Audiard centers on Gascón’s portrayal of Mexican cartel boss Manitas, who undergoes surgery to begin a new life as Emilia. Nominated for an astonishing 13 Oscars, the ...
From Ranch to Rodeo to Rig: How the Hair on “Yellowstone” & “Landman” Tells the Story
The season finale of Yellowstone, the modern-day Western saga that became a cultural touchstone, aired in December. Audiences didn’t have to wait long for creator Taylor Sheridan’s next project, Landman, the first season of which was released even before Yellowstone bowed on Paramount+. Billy Bob Thornton stars as Tommy Norris, a West Texas oil company operations manager (or ...
Creating Count Orlock With “Nosferatu” Director Robert Eggers & Special FX Makeup Designer David White
Count Orlok (Bill Skarsgård) is a putrid feast for the eyes. In writer/director Robert Eggers’ brilliant Nosferatu remake, the iconic creature of the night is a decaying figure – nightmarish precisely because his living death was wrought with such chilling reality. Whether the Count is deep in the shadows or full view, his monstrosity remains ...
“The Penguin” Hair Department Head Brian Badie on Styling Gotham’s Gruesome Twosome
Spoiler warning… The Penguin capped its remarkable eight-part run this past Sunday night and accomplished a rare feat—it’s a series set in a comic book world, boasting characters well known to the genre’s most read-in fans, that delivered a profoundly satisfying drama for a person unfamiliar with DC Comics or unenthused by Gotham’s most iconic resident, ...
“Smile 2” Prosthetic Makeup Designer Jeremy Selenfriend on the Sequel’s Gruesome, Grinning Details
Editor’s Note: The story contains spoilers to the movie Smile 2. Prosthetic makeup designer Jeremy Selenfriend is no stranger when it comes to creating blood-curdling horror. He grew up watching Freddy Kruger films and turned an interest of the spooky into a career of conjuring some of the most terrifying dread imaginable. “It’s a weird thing ...
“Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” Hair and Makeup Head Christine Blundell on Bringing Out the Dead
Almost four decades after the original, Tim Burton’s follow-up, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, is a hit for Warner Bros. Reprising their original roles, Winona Ryder’s Lydia is now a television talk show host ghost hunter, Catherine O’Hara’s Delia is still a daffy cosmopolitan creative, and Michael Keaton’s Beetlejuice remains an undead charlatan pining for Lydia. Lydia also ...
Eye on the Emmys: “Abbott Elementary” Hair & Makeup Maestros Moira Frazier and Constance Foe
*Ahead of the 2024 Emmy Awards on September 15, we’re looking back at our interviews with some of this year’s nominees. Hair Department Head Moira Frazier is nominated for Outstanding Contemporary Hairstyling for season 3’s 12th episode, “Mother Day.” This story was originally published on June 10, 2024. As school is starting again for millions ...
Giving the “Abbott Elementary” Teachers a Glow Up With the Hair & Makeup Maestros Moira Frazier and Constance Foe
As summer shimmers just ahead and another school year wraps up, we take time now to reflect on the fire looks our teachers were serving. The educators at Abbott Elementary gave it their all through two semesters of change. As they navigated celebrations and setbacks, this season was filled with transformations guided by Hair Department ...
“Monkey Man” Mask Designer Eddie Yang Gives Dev Patel a Primal Facelift
Dev Patel’s directorial debut, Monkey Man, is a kinetic, deeply felt revenge story set in Mumbai, a world that is rarely depicted with such punishing, propulsive energy and passion. Patel stars as the Kid, an anonymous young man nursing a wound so deep it becomes a source of inexhaustible rage and, ultimately, power. The Kid’s ...
Andes to Oscars: How Makeup Masters Turned “Society of the Snow” Actors Into Survivors
Director J.A. Bayona’s Society of the Snow, which recounts the experience of a Uruguayan rugby team whose plane crashed in the Andes in 1972, is Spain’s Oscar entry for best international feature. But the film, which depicts the crash and subsequent survival of 16 out of 45 passengers in exquisitely painful detail, is also nominated ...
The Oscar-Nominated Hair & Makeup Team on Turning Helen Mirren Into “Golda”
In 2023, Oscar-winning director Guy Nattiv helmed Golda, a biographical drama about Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir set during the 19 days of the Yom Kippur War in 1973. As usual, Dame Helen Mirren is masterful in the title role. One key to the believability of her portrayal was visually melding Mirren and Meir together through ...
“The Color Purple” Hair Department Head Lawrence Davis on Capturing Iconic Characters in Flux
Director Blitz Bazawule’s The Color Purple, which builds on the legacy of Alice Walker’s original 1982 novel, Steven Spielberg’s 1985 drama, and the more recent Broadway musical, had the second-highest domestic opening of all time for a film released on Christmas day. Celebrating resilience in the face of trauma, racism, and tragedy, The Color Purple follows Celie Harris ...
How “The Book of Clarence” Hair and Makeup Head Siân Richards Turned LaKeith Stanfield into Twins
Set during one of the most influential human events ever, The Book of Clarence honors a deeply personal family rift. As the disciples of Christ spread a message of peace and brotherhood, one of their own siblings grapples with skepticism and resentment. LaKeith Stanfield devotedly portrayed both the wayward Clarence and his twin, the apostle ...
“The Color Purple” Makeup Department Head Carol Rasheed Finds Music in Many Shades
Like its heroine, Celie (Fantasia Barrino), The Color Purple is a story that continually grows in boldness and beauty over time. Director Blitz Bazawule’s musical version of Alice Walker’s classic tale of hope and sisterhood is a vivid interpretation for a new generation. Makeup department head Carol Rasheed approached the film with a clear intention ...
“Lessons in Chemistry” Makeup Department Head Miho Suzuki Captures the Pressure Cooker of Being a 1950s Woman
Chemical reactions can be calculated and quantified, but matters of the heart are far less predictable. When scientist Elizabeth Zott (Brie Larson) finds herself pressed toward domesticity from all sides, she realizes that the way to pursue her passions, empower women, and advocate for equality may be through the kitchen after all. Lessons in Chemistry ...
How Osage Tradition Influenced the Hair & Makeup in “Killers of the Flower Moon”
There is perhaps nothing more important than authentically depicting the Osage in Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, a poignant tale based on real events where the oil-rich nation was devilishly deceived, manipulated, and murdered for their money and oil shares by the very ones who married them. Newspapers later described the tragedy, which ...
Best of Summer 2023: “Barbie” Hair & Makeup Artist Ivana Primorac Conjures Personality From Plastic
*It’s our annual “Best of Summer” look back at some (not all) of our favorite interviews from the past few months. This non-comprehensive look back includes the Barbenheimer phenomenon and the wonderful interviews that followed those two history-making films, chats with the talented folks behind Mission: Impossible, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, our profile of MPA ...
Emmy-Nominated “The Last of Us” Hairstylist Chris Harrison-Glimsdale on Shaping the Locks of the Living and The Dead
Calgary-based hairstylist Chris Harrison-Glimsdale happily pursued the apocalypse and lived to tell the tale. In fact, she’s got an Emmy nomination for her efforts, alongside her colleagues Penny Thompson and Courtney Ullrich, for shaping the locks of the survivors and their undead pursuers who populated HBO’s critically acclaimed series The Last Of Us. Co-created by ...
“Barbie” Hair & Makeup Artist Ivana Primorac Conjures Personality From Plastic
How do you turn a human into a doll? Or, let’s reverse that—how do you turn the most iconic doll ever made into a human? These were the intermingled questions makeup and hair designer Ivana Primorac had to answer for co-writer and director Greta Gerwig’s history-making new film Barbie. Reader? She succeeded. Primorac has worked ...
