Makeup!
While there’s absolutely no green makeup–and for god’s sake, no neckbolts–costume designer Cassandra Carpenter suggested that James Carpenter (yes, they’re married), our Creature, try some minimal makeup to make him look “more cadaverous.”
Now–and this is fully a compliment–I think Jim is such an excellent actor that he can look rather cadaverous, with bags under his eyes too, just by acting. I’ve seen him do it in rehearsals–it’s subtle, but there. Still, last weekend they decided to try a makeup test, using some yellows just to bring out, well, the yellow. Lighting designer Stephanie Buchner was on hand to see how it looked under the lights–and you can get a slight idea of how it came out in that photo. You can see a little bit around his eye, and he did some on his hand and arm as well.
Our concept for how the Creature looks is much in the same vein as the stage version of Elephant Man. The actor isn’t all done up in massive amounts of makeup and prosthetics to make him look “deformed,” the actor conveys that illusion by acting, even if the text includes some physical description. So, although The Creature text describes the Creature as having long, black hair and being of impressive height (a height taller than Jim actually is), we aren’t going to put him on stilts, and as for the long, black hair, Jim already sported that look last month in As You Like It at San Jose Rep. It was quite Keith Richards.
