November 16, 2015 • 54 mins
Hollywood's first makeup artists were exclusively men. Cristen and Caroline highlight how Max Factor and the Westmore boys revolutionized movie makeup artistry and why the industry could use a facelift today.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to stuff Mom never told you from House Top
Works Nott. Come hello and welcome to the podcast. I'm Kristen.
Then I'm Caroline. And today's episode on Hollywood Makeup Artist
Caroline took me back to my childhood ballet days. Yes,
(00:26):
because I mean, obviously, I was like ten, eleven, twelve
years old and I did not wear full makeup or
any makeup for that matter, except for ballet performances. I
was ballerina, and I distinctly remember my mom taking me
to the drug store to go by Max Factor pancake
(00:48):
because I was on the stage. You know, stage makeup
obviously is well not always obviously, is a bit more
dramatic than everyday makeup. And I can still remember the
smell of that thick, pale pancake being applied to my
face and I felt like a star. I'll admit it.
(01:13):
I was writing for my clothes up, well, not too
close up. If you were wearing like super thick pancake makeup,
Oh no, clothes with it better, I don't mind. Um. So,
this this episode was was really fun to learn about
the roots of my my childhood stage makeup. Yeah, I
am When I was in elementary school. Every year each
(01:36):
grade would put on It was called the spring play,
and each grade participated first through fifth and each class
would put on a different like two song routine, um
singing and dancing and costumes in the whole nine yards.
It was traumatic. But one thing I remember so clearly
was that every year when this happened, my mother would
(01:58):
put my hair and hot rollers, plastic hot rollers that
had been around since approximately Uh sorry, mom. And what
went along with that was, of course putting on lots
of makeup so that you could definitely see my star feature.
You gotta make those cheeks pop, that's right, and also
lips and eyes. I can't tell you like how freakish
(02:21):
I looked when you see pictures of me, like off
the stage before or after the performance. I looked terrifying
because I've got this my hair is just naturally straight
and fine, and I've got this like big curly, frizzy
hair all over the place, and these bright red lips
and this pale, ghostly white skin. I look like the
(02:46):
ghost of stage performers past, but like the chubby ten
year old version. Yeah, I mean, if it makes you
feel any better, I think I was ten when the
photo was taken for I'm sure it was our spring
recital as well. Because I was a silver bell and
was almost busting out of my leotard. My mom had
(03:07):
to alter it bigger for me. I was, in my
grandfather's words, a husky child. And there's this photo of
me in all of my to do and adult makeup
regalia in my family's backyard, and I I looked, I
just look bizarre. It's not it looks very unnatural. Yeah,
(03:29):
like I imagine, I know for sure mine and I
imagine yours. Like these are the reasons that people write
horror movies around children and children and makeup and stage
children because it's horrifying. Come all these children dressed as
lions and other jungle creatures. Fun. Well, unfortunately we have
(03:50):
to reel this conversation into Hollywood. Although really, can we
just talk about child stage performances for the rest of
the parts so traumatic? But today, uh we we will
not listeners just be talking about um times when Caroline
and I were in the spotlight literally um. But we're
(04:13):
gonna focus on production makeup artists, not so much celebrity
or fashion makeup artists, not having like the Bobby Brown
kind of conversation, but really looking at the development of
makeup artistry in Hollywood because a makeup stuff I've never
told you. We talked about makeup related things all the time,
(04:34):
and of course Hollywood makeup widely influenced and continues to
influence beauty trends and women's body image offscreen. But this
also when we look specifically at early Hollywood, is a
rare stuff I'm never told you history. That is an
(04:56):
emphasis on his tree and no her story. Does that
make any sense whatsoever? Yeah, the ladies are missing ladies,
and it's not that like people just left them out
of the history, although it's entirely possible that they have
been left at that women makeup artists have been left
out of the narrative. That would not shock me in
the least. But when you go back and look at
(05:17):
the timeline of the development of first stage and then
on screen makeup, it's all guys. It's all guys, and
and it makes sense the more you read about it
and and consider what they were having to do, it
does make sense that it was guys. Because a professionalization
(05:37):
and especially professionalization happening in the early twentieth century, which
was almost exclusively a male pursuit, and also how there
were very technical aspects of it. So a little bit
of background to kick things off. So Hollywood actors first
began wearing makeup, not so much to look fabulous on screen,
(06:00):
but rather to not look horrifying on the screen. Yeah,
to not look like Kristen and me when we were children.
That's why they were makeup. And this, by the way,
is coming from a fantastic profile on Max Factor in
Cabinet Magazine. The link will be over in the podcast
link on stuff I've Never told you dot com and
I highly recommend you read it. Yeah, but Max Factor
(06:21):
the human being, not just Kristen's pancake makeup that she
wore a ballet. Yeah, he was a real Max. I'm
a real man, And I do remember thinking as a kid,
who was this Max guy. I just never thought it
was a person, Max Factor. It just sounds like Mabel
n It was Mabel Mabel. Maybe he's born with it,
maybe he's Max Factor. Well, so if we're talking about
(06:45):
why people look ghoulish, I don't want to leave you
hanging with that information. Get back to the ghouls. The
ghouls and the technology, so both both orthochromatic and pen
chromatic film made dark colors darker and light colors lighter,
which totally made you look like a freak. And this, this,
by the way, is the earliest film being used. Um.
(07:07):
It really gave people this almost ghost to the appearance.
So like anytime you had a slight blemish or a
wrinkle or anything, it would just be totally blown up
and blown out into something scary looking on on on camera.
But back then there was no Max Factor pancake, there
was no under eye concealer God. And then the makeup
(07:30):
options and you know, the nineteen tens were very limited
to things like commercial grease paint or if you want
to get d I y about it, mixtures of lard
talk and pigment that actors would apply before coming on set.
So Hollywood's first stars would happen to do their own
(07:52):
hair and makeup a lot of times. Yeah, make yourself
look beautiful or in it just not horrifying. Um. And
this is where I get super squipt out because I
have skin that breaks out super easily, Like I'm gonna
try a new moisturizer, acne, I'm gonna try a new
concealer more acne um, but so in lieu of makeup primer,
(08:18):
these actors and actresses would use things like petroleum, jelly,
vegetable shortening, or cold cream to help their makeup set.
And I'm just like shuddering. That just sounds so awful
and like I would never be able to get it off.
And that's underneath a thick grease paint, an inflexible thick
grease paint. Now, in order to achieve a little bit
(08:39):
of skin tone, they might add some brick dust or paprika.
I mean the living is like makeup back then was
real scrappy. It was food, go to dinner and get
a makeover all in one Um. They would also I
love this. They might dust flour on their faces to
(08:59):
demand a shine. And you want some dimple scales, just
use your lipstick. But the thing was like this stuff
was so thick and uh, the film could potentially make
you look so creepy, uh that if you made a
certain facial expression, it might crack. But the cracks would
show up on film like you were you were literally
(09:21):
breaking apart and melting, like every movie was a monster movie.
But that also explains why people in say like Silent
Era and the early talkies films look so different than
people on film today. It wasn't because you know, eighty
eighty years ago, hi, it's two thousand, humans had vastly
(09:43):
different faces, but because the makeup was literally being just
like slathered on. And by makeup, I mean makeup in quotes,
because Caroline Max Factor hadn't even invented the term makeup yet.
I know, I love this all of this background information.
Max Factor himself was a fascinating guy with sort of
(10:04):
a crazy story. He was hired as a personal cosmetician
two members of Czar Nicholas the Second Court. But he
must have been like some crazy great cosmetics guy, and
or know Nicholas was like nutty because Max Factor's activity,
I'm just gonna keep calling him Max Factor, not Max. Yeah,
(10:25):
I mean Max just seems too casual. I know. It
was closely monitored and restricted, which made it super tough
for him because dude, he had a secret family. Yeah,
he was able to start his secret family while he
was still, you know, being monitored by Czar Nicholas. I mean,
he couldn't leave court without a chaperone. I'm just gonna
(10:48):
pop into this bookstore slash make babies yeah, he had
three kids secretly Max Factor how quickies. But then this
was I love this part of his bio. So in
n He's like, Okay, this is ridiculous. I have a
secret family that I really would like to live with,
but I'm in the court of the czar who just
(11:10):
doesn't want to let me leave. What am I going
to do? What am I really good at? Oh? Yeah, makeup.
Makeup is a tool of deception, as every man knows,
so he uses his makeup skills. He does his face
with flour and paprika. No, I'm sure he did something
(11:30):
far and then he made cookies. And then he used
his makeup skills to fake an illness. So he made
himself up to look super sick, sick enough to get
sent to a sanitarium. But he actually did not go
to a sanitarium. Listeners. He scooped up his wife and
three kids and set sail for America, where everything was
(11:54):
instantly great, right, and where he established beauty standards the end,
the end. No, he had a tough go of it
when he first got to the US because he was
obviously very successful, knew what he was gonna do, get
into cosmetics. But when he uh started setting things up
with a business partner. The business partner souls money. Then
(12:17):
his secret wife, who was no longer secret, unexpectedly died,
and then he got a new wife, and then she
had a mental breakdown and started beating him in public
Melissa after their baby was born, so like he had
a baby with the new wife, she probably was suffering
from some postpartum She ends up abusing him. He divorces her,
(12:37):
and then he's like, Okay, my brother and I will
go into business. That'll be fine. His brother had come
over well. The brother then opens up a cosmetic shop
like two doors down, becomes a competitor, and then becomes
a gangster literally, so I know, I kind of want
to know about that and missed a factor. Um. But
(12:58):
then finally he's on his fourth wife, he's got five kids,
and he's like, let's go to Holly Weird. So in
nineteen o nine he opens up his cosmetics store, which
is also essentially a cosmetics lab. At the time, he
wasn't like opening up a Sephora or something, because stuff
didn't exist, and he was very much a scientist about it.
(13:22):
And with that he began, unwittingly the process of changing
an entire industry because in nineteen fourteen he started carrying
a flexible grease paint that he developed that wouldn't crack
when those actors made their overly dramatic expressions on screen. Yeah,
so here's a guy who is not only like he's
(13:42):
had a cookie life so far already, and he's an
incredible technological innovator. He's creating things. Then he's becoming the
artist and applying those things to the actors themselves, because
they were like, finally I don't have to do it.
But also everybody was so excited, like, oh, you mean
I can have a slight facial expression and not have
(14:03):
my pancake flower paprika combination crack and fall off. But
remember we haven't gone a pancake yet. God, I know,
I'm just so excited. Well, also, all of this stuff
is just food based, true, because they're just slapping actual
pancakes on their face, so delicious, poking out little nose holes. Um.
But Factor was a legit innovator. He made, for instance,
(14:28):
the first made for film Sweat Tears and Blood Delish.
He even invented a pie topping that, as opposed to
dairy cream, didn't get sour and curdled after a while,
but also stuck to the face longer. So thanking Max
Factor for like all of the three Stages movies. But
wait a second, so still though we're still using, we're
(14:52):
still in food, We're still in food. I like that
He's like, I'll create something different that's not food, but
first dessert. I like to imagine I don't know if
you watched House, but like in every episode of House,
there was always a moment where like a colleague was
talking and House would get this look on his face
like I figured it out, and he'd run away to
(15:12):
go solve the case. And I imagine that the same
thing happened with Max Factor. Like he was eating a
pie one night and he's like, I know what to do.
Some whipped cream stuck on his nose and he was like,
wait a moment. But he also invented lip glass, waterproof mascara,
and under eye concealer. Can can we insert like a
(15:34):
sound clip of just like wild applause after under eye Concealer?
I know. And in addition to this, he sold eyeshadow
and eyebrow pencils to non actors for the first time
because remember that as max factor was getting started. Makeup
was still okay for the stage, but it was largely
(15:55):
like if you weren't a woman on the stage and
you were wearing makeup, then you were probably a prostitute.
And like literally this is we're not like making an
old ye, old timey judgment. That was like what people thought.
But it's it's not to say though that Edwardian era
women were not completely obsessed with cosmetics, but it was
(16:16):
more about having a clean look and trying to get
away with um, you know, kind of like the natural
look today. Obviously they wouldn't be wearing, you know, the
same kinds of layers of foundation and doing contouring and
all of that stuff that we would be doing today,
but they were still applying lots of things to their
facial skin and still trying to achieve beauty. But obvious
makeup in the sense of wearing eyeshadow and lipstick and
(16:42):
blush would have been associated with ladies of the evening.
And I don't know if it's at this point, like
at the very dawn of civilians using his makeup, or
if it's a little bit later in the process, but
there were even in some of the sources we read.
There were even some complaints that we still here today
from men who were like, I hate to kiss lips
(17:03):
with lipstick on them. I want the clean, pure kiss. Well, buddy,
stopped judging and maybe you'll get one m And I
bet you fella back then you would smoke on us
a garrello with a pencil thin mustache. Yes, basically every
man in the Edwardian Arrow was a villain in like
a train heist movie. Yes, yes, um. But one thing
(17:25):
too to keep in mind for a little later in
our conversation is how Factor invented air brushing makeup, which
was often originally used for white actors playing non white characters,
but it also came in handy during World War Two
when women had to give up their nylongs their stockings
(17:46):
and they would use the same makeup to make it
appear that they were wearing stockings. So a non racist use, yeah,
take one, take with one hand, or give the Lord,
giveth and take it away and um so yeah, so
evening out there. But some of the iconic faces that
(18:06):
Max Factor kind of literally created were Joan Crawford's, Judy
Garland's teen Harlow's and Betty Davis so I mean, these
were these were looks that so many women at the
time and and even still today because yeah, Jim Crawford
is a babe, are still mimicking. But what's interesting is
(18:28):
that so many of his makeup innovations came out of necessity.
For instance, the rosebud and Cupid's bow lipstick designs or
styles which were popularized by Clara bou They were all
strategies to prevent the lipstick from running, because we didn't
have that like stay put for seventeen hours, even through
your sad salad kind of of lipstick. It was all.
(18:50):
It all started to run at one point or another,
so he would paint it in a very specific way
so that it wouldn't get all over your face. And
it wasn't just makeup either. He was also into hair
dye innovation and really helped make blondes all of the rage.
And this had to do with a shift in film
technology as well, because you have a movement toward a
(19:13):
less harsh incandescent lighting on set, and then in the
late twenties the adoption of panchromatic film, and so because
it would play so well off of those elements, factor
made a new Platinum Blonde Die for Gene Harlow. That
was such a sensation that her comedy title was changed
(19:33):
from the original Gallagher all the watermelon smashing to just
platinum Blonde, Like just make it all about the hair.
Fewer watermelons. Yeah, and um. As this Cabinet magazine profile
pointed out, in the process of creating Greta Garbo's signature look,
women around the US just copied it. I mean, Max
(19:55):
Factor essentially set the standard for what women in the
late or even mid twenties and thirties we're trying to
look like, which is fascinating, fascinating. He's such a genius. Well,
I don't know. Maybe if you hate makeup, you hate
Max Factor. I don't know, but I think he's such
a genius with the keeping up his innovations with the
(20:18):
technology of the day of of So I don't want
to say effortlessly, because I'm sure you put a ton
of effort into it, but it's just so seamlessly following
the technological innovations with his products, and in the process
he ended up setting beauty standards for women in the
United States. I have a feeling that when he was
(20:39):
like under a lock and key in Czar Nicholas's court.
You had no idea what what an impact he would
soon have. But for all of his innovation and work,
and how I mean, how much of an icon he
was within Hollywood even at that time, like everyone knew
who Max Factor was, even said up you know this
(21:01):
gorgeous um studio or I should say like beauty salon
right in Hollywood that people would go to as well.
But he didn't get a screen credit for his work
until Night with the Technicolor production, which yes I did
watch as a child, Goldwyn Follies. What's it about? I mean,
it's it about? So? The follies were essentially like the
(21:24):
stage shows, so lots of singing and dancing and glitzy
costumes and just technicolor bedazzlement. And we've been giving all
of this time and attention to Max Factor, which he
absolutely deserves because he's an amazing individual. But simultaneously, we
basically have the rise of a makeup family dynasty. Yeah,
so the Westmore Boys, and there were so many of them,
(21:48):
so many really cornered this market. And I had never
heard of the Westmore Boys. Obviously we've heard of Max
Factor because it's a household cosmetic name um. But the
Westmore boys weren't so much about creating lines of cosmetics
for women off screen, like Factor eventually got into but
(22:08):
really getting into Hollywood. And similar to Max Factor, who
was a Polish immigrant, George Westmore emigrated from England and
opened a wig and hat store in Hollywood, and in
the nineteen tens he began trading Hollywood prostitutes hairstyling for
(22:29):
their makeup tips, which is so fantastic, I know, so interesting.
So like, here's a group of people that society dismisses,
and your your gross and your unacceptable, and you your
harlots for all that makeup you wear. But this is
where the leader of this makeup dynasty gets his makeup
(22:52):
ideas and he really entrenches himself into the Hollywood system.
So in nineteen seventeen, old Georgie Boy found the first
movie makeup department at Sella Studios. And he has six sons,
and at one point they were just all working at
all of you know, individually, at different major studios. So
(23:15):
you have Monty Westmore who's working for David o'sals Nick
Big Deal. You have Earned who was at twentieth Century Fox,
Percy who was at Warner Brothers. Wali's at Paramount, Frank
also is at Paramount for a while, and then you
have Bud who's at Universal. And as I was reading
about all of these west More boys, I was like,
is that a monopoly? So an unlikely story in today's
(23:39):
twentieth century gendered makeup landscape to think of a father
grooming his six sons in the makeup artistry business. Yeah,
And I mean there's there's a lot of different social
factors that work there because you've got the, like you said,
the professionalization issue, but also just the idea that kind
of makeup at this time was still considered sort of
(24:02):
a special effect, especially to the degree that makeup artists
for film we're trying to slather it on people's faces
to cover up in imperfections and make them appear different
or of even of a different race altogether, a different ethnicity. Um.
And so that's why I kept looking, like, where are
the women? Why are there all these dudes? And I
(24:22):
think it has a lot to do with the fact
that this was a professional special effects realm well, because
it's also distinct from beauty salon work. Even though the
Westmoores did open a beauty salon in Hollywood. Um, but
that would be more of a feminized profession and also
just straight up makeup entrepreneurialism where you do have some
(24:44):
major women at this time beginning to emerge like selling
essentially women their problem areas. Um, but this is so
specific to Hollywood and this very particular industry need which
was very much tied up to with film tech analogy,
and it was a demand produced honestly like by the
(25:05):
rapidly developing camera and film tech. But one more name
though that we need to mention is yet another guy.
We have a dude named William J. Tuttle who was
establishing himself a little bit later after Westmore in Factor
were big names. He came along and established himself as
one of Hollywood's most successful makeup artist who mostly worked
(25:27):
at MGM, And I wanted to mention him just as
an example of how you would at this point get
into the job. Yeah. So if he landed in Studio
City through taking art classes at the University of Southern
California and through getting an apprenticeship with fellow makeup artist
Jack John at Twenty Century Pictures. So once he did
(25:48):
land at MGM the Tuttle recalled studio chief Louis B.
Mayer indicating that all women should appear beautiful and all
men should be handsome. And that's a good thing to
Number two is that these guys were definitely shaping the
beauty standards of ladies on screen, but also handsomeness standards.
Like Max Factor worked with Rudolf Valentino, who was one
(26:12):
of the earliest Hollywood heart throbs, on creating his quote
unquote dark Latin lover look. Yeah, which we'll get into
the whole uh dark Latin lover aspect in just a minute. Um.
But back to Tuttle. He also got into making and
(26:32):
selling his own makeup. In he launched Custom Color Cosmetics,
which became the industry standard for the next twenty years.
But as important a role as all these guys had,
makeup artists really didn't get a lot of industry prestige
for a very long time. For instance, Tuttle received an
(26:55):
Honorary Academy Award in five and that was the first
time the Academy think it was the first time. Oh
no, no no, no, there was one other Academy that Bud
Westmore received in um. But they were these two random awards.
It wasn't a competitive category that came up every year.
(27:15):
Four makeup artistry as it is today, Yeah, And I
don't know. I think part of that is that just
the actual like technological innovation aspect is so recognized now
that the role that makeup can really play in making
or breaking a character. And so we're going to get
more into, uh, those technological developments in today's industry. And
we come right back from a quick break. So in
(27:47):
Hollywood terms, the makeup artistry really is a science, as
it has had to continually evolve even still today in
order to meet the man's of evolving phil technology and
as well discuss in a moment racist casting. But if
we go back to Max factor for a minute, he
(28:10):
essentially ran this cosmetics lab. To begin with, you always
wore a lab coat, and which I know wearing a
lab coat doesn't necessarily mean you're scientists, but I'm just
saying he looked the part. But he took a very
scientific approach to trying to perfect how best to approach
(28:30):
women's makeup and figure out what exactly they needed to
make them look less disgusting. Um, but he used, for instance,
this horrifying looking beauty micrometer to measure all of the
possible ratios of women's facial features and see how it
(28:51):
matched up to, you know, the symmetrical ideal. And there
was only I think there's only one beauty micrometer in existence.
It was a major flop. He did not sell any
because these women were having to wear these like metallic
cages on their faces that looked like torture devices. Well, yeah,
I mean the way you describe it, Kristen sounds so
(29:13):
like technologically advanced, it sounds so precise. But when you
look at a picture of the thing, it looks like
something out of a horror movie or out of the
freaking Spanish in position, it's like it's a it's a
full faced helmet thing with nails basically, and you put
it on your face, putting eye out factor, the X factor,
(29:33):
what are you doing for you thinking? But for another example,
a less terrifying example of him innovating to catch up
with film technology, Color presented a new set of challenges,
and a number of actors, especially a list actors, were
nervous of how being on color film might amplify their
(29:54):
facial flaws because in a lot of ways, black and
white film is very forgiving, especially if you, you know,
have some good grease paint. I was gonna say, amplify
their flaws as opposed to the literal food they were
wearing on their faces before. Well, by this point, once
we get to like the late nineteen thirties, like black
and white film had improved um but with color factor
(30:17):
had a new challenge of creating, you know, less obvious
makeup that would look good on screen. So in nineteen
thirty nine he debuted his natural looking, blendable pancake foundation.
That was a revolution because it was something that would
be used not only by actors on screen, but also
(30:40):
could easily be sold to women off screen. So you
have all of these pancake advertisements at the time, with
for instance, Judy Garland's face saying, ladies, don't you want
to look like Judy? Judy, Judy, which is such a
departure from before when it was like only prostitutes or
actresses who we associate with pros toutes anyway are going
(31:01):
to wear makeup, you harlots. Now it's being sold to
the masses. But you also see that throwback to to
Edwardian era of it being maybe a little more acceptable
as well, because it is less obvious. Although yeah, people aren't.
People are no longer like applying like fluff or nutter
to their faces. It's like, oh, we can look, we
(31:24):
can wear makeup, but look natural. Is it bad that
that just immediately triggered my sweet too? Oh well, I
guess it's not fluffer nut fluffer. Nutter is the sandwich
when you mix the marshmallow fluff and peanut butter. So
I should have said, your ladies are no longer carrying
around a tub of marshmallow fluff to apply to themselves. All.
I'm thinking about this fluff or nutter now, Caroline. But
(31:45):
my college dreamy used to eat this all the time.
I don't know how she didn't. But then, but the
innovation didn't stop with pancake, obviously. I mean you have
Technicolor coming along, and all of the intense lighting that
it required demanded new kinds of makeup, and then of
course Technicolor goes away, and so you have new kinds
of makeup that are needed. So it's a continual science.
(32:08):
Like people who try to poopoo. Makeup artistry is just like, oh,
it's just putting on makeup. No big deal, No, he's
a big deal. Well yeah, especially for these early pioneers
who had to keep up with things as they changed
minute by minute. Well yeah, and there is, of course,
you know, the the innovation needed to figure out how
to make white actors look not white so that they
(32:32):
could Oh god, I'm talking about yellow face and brown
face and red face. That's an aspect of makeup artistry
history that I didn't really think about it first, like, oh, wait, no,
they're also innovating to um portray racist caricatures. Right, of
(32:54):
course they back then, they would not have argued that
those are racist caricatures. They were hiring white actors to
play people of color so that they would be more
palatable to basically white audiences. And the only roles that
actual people of color, whether you're black, Asian, whatever, would
be those very very racist, stereotypical portrayals. Well, and in
(33:17):
you know, movie magazines at the time like Photoplay, etcetera,
those kinds of quote unquote transformations of the white actor
into say, an Asian character would have been documented and
profiled as this amazing thing that you have to see.
Isn't this so incredible? Look? She doesn't look quite as
(33:38):
American anymore. What movie magic. So there are so many
examples of this happening, especially in early Hollywood, but even
even uncomfortably recent UM and Max factors airbrush breakthrough was
especially helpful for this, but you also had innovations of
(34:00):
using things like facial prosthetics, elastics, and adhesives to maybe
pull back foreheads and eyelids to alter facial structures. Meanwhile,
they're actual actors of color out there who were like, no,
you're not gonna you're not gonna hire me for the Okay, cool,
You're just gonna like racist, be racist and pull your
eyes back. Awesome, great, thank guys. For instance, in nineteen fifteens,
(34:22):
Madam Butterfly Mary Pickford played Cho Cho San and she
was sort of the one who was at the forefront
of this yellow face Hollywood trend. And I mentioned Rudolf
Valentino just a minute ago in the quote unquote Latin
lover starred in The Sheik and his makeup folks had
(34:44):
to figure out how to tow the line between Arab face,
which was acceptable for audiences at the time, and black face,
which by outright black face in that kind of role
would not have been as as okay, So their solution
was to paint his hands brown so that you could
(35:05):
see the contrast whenever he would gently caress his white
female co stars face. So I mean, just just thinking
about that kind of strategizing is a little bit of
a mind bender. And then we have an incident that
we talked about in our Asian Fetish episode where Annime Wong,
(35:29):
who was sensational, was passed over by Louise Rayner to
play Olan in The Good Earth and Rayner won an
Oscar for this role. This woman she was made up
to look Asian, and it was considered, I mean, it
wasn't considered. It was a huge sensation at the time.
And Annime Wong was offered another role in the film
(35:51):
and she just turned it down because she was done
with the whole thing. Well yeah, I mean this whole
the whole yellow face painting white people as Asian people
thing was such a big business in Hollywood, for for
Hollywood makeup artist. Because you've also got in Katherine Hepburn
as Chinese woman Jade Tan and the Dragon Seed in
nineteen sixty two Shirley McClain's My Geisha. It has a
(36:13):
plot that actively revolves around a whole yellow face ruse.
And in nineteen sixty five, William J. Tuttle, who we
mentioned earlier, received that honorary Oscar for his work transforming
actor Tony Randall in the movie The Seven Faces of
Dr Law, in which Randall play is sort of an
ambiguously Asian medicine man. Yeah, that's the doctor Allow. One
(36:36):
of the Seven Faces is that doctor Allow. And going
back briefly though to Katherine Hepburn and Dragon Seed, which
I had never heard of before. Um, there was a
blog post I was reading about it over at Turner
Classic Movies dot com and it was saying, how through
a contemporary lens, it's a little bit conflicting because the
plot itself and the character of Jade Tan that Cheaper
(36:59):
Trays is was ahead of its time in some ways
that it definitely has like feminist undercurrents running through it,
and we know as well that Katherine Hepburn herself was
very much a feminist, but all of that is kind
of erased by the discomfort that, oh she's she's dressed
up as a Chinese woman. But even more recently, this
(37:21):
made me think about the Hue and Cry over Zoe
saw Donna being given a prosthetic nose and having her
skin tone darkened in order to start in that highly
controversial Nina Simone biopic. So from this less Rosie angle,
this is another impact though of makeup artist free, where
it's like, okay, makeup art Street is so not just
(37:44):
about makeup. It's about beauty norms and film technology and
even reflecting our race relations and outright racism at the time. Yeah.
And so when we do take into consideration and how
these early makeup artist jobs were so multifascinated in terms
of incorporating both yes, art, but also science and technology,
(38:09):
and they were professionalist, it's really no surprise, like we
said that this is a predominantly male industry from the
early era. Yeah, and if we even transition from more
of the beauty makeup artistry that we would typically think
of into more special effects makeup, I mean, kind of
less surprisingly, it's still all dudes across the board. And
(38:32):
just as a heads up, I mean, if you're a
special effects makeup artist, you are part modeler, sculptor, painter, chemist, beautician.
I mean this again is kind of a I mean
it's a stem type job as well. And if we
look at who the legends are in special effects makeup, again,
it's all dudes. And it's just like, it's so funny
(38:53):
to me, like reading all of this, because we stereotypically
think of girls, little girls being the one who like
dressed up, play dress up and put on makeup and
all this, but clearly you have all these boys who
are dreaming about it as well. Although when it comes
to special effects makeup, this is when we get into
the grotesque schools and goblins and monsters, um. But one
(39:15):
of the first guys who really made a name for
himself was Lawn Cheney, Man of a Thousand Faces, who
is a silent film star during the era when like
you come to set with your makeup arty on, and
he did all of his own special effects makeup and
was kind of obsessive about it. And he once said
(39:36):
that as a man's face reveals much that is in
his mind and heart, I attempt to show this by
the makeup that I use. Can you imagine like a
leading dude film star saying that today, like Bradley Cooper
talking about how his makeup communicates who he is. I
wonder how all of his like perfectly quoft hair swoops
(39:57):
communicate who he is? Well, you know what I gotta
give to b C. He was. He was a very
stagy guy. He has a very stage heavy background and um,
you know he doesn't seem to gender hung up. Okay,
now I'm thinking too much about Bradley Cooper gets me
off on a tangent. We've also got the name Jack Pierce.
He's the makeup artist who turned a Boris karl Off
(40:17):
into Frankenstein's monster with that tall, misshapen head and the
screws and this and that creepy, creepy and fun fact
about why Frankenstein is green or Frankenstein as a Frankenstein,
It's not because Pierce wanted him to be green because
he was on black and white film, but because the
(40:38):
green would play off to create that particular shade on
the black and white film. So now when you see
a Frankenstein Frankenstein monster costume and it's green, that's why interesting. Well,
a name that should sound familiar. Bud Westmore, he of
the Westmore Makeup Dynasty, worked with Chris Mueller and designer
(41:01):
Militant Patrick to make the frog suit for gil Man.
Gil Man was super creepy. Looking creepy but also hilarious
and also sounds like like a frat bros nickname. Um.
And I also want to note that Bud Westmore was
a makeup artist for red facing Rock Hudson in his
(41:25):
starring role as Tazza, son of Cone Chiesi, in which
he played a Native American, so they just reddened his
skin and gave him some quote unquote native body paint
too good. Um. But then John Chambers is the Oscar
winning special effects artist behind Planet of the Apes, and
we have Dick Smith to thank for freaking everyone out
(41:48):
by making the little girl in the Exorcist the little
Girl in the Exorcist. And then finally in makeup, It's
finally added as a competitive category the Oscars and Rich
Baker wins it for the first time for an American
werewolf in Paris. Well, screw an American werewolf in Paris.
(42:09):
I want to talk about how Rich Baker was responsible
for Michael Jackson's wear cat in the Thriller video. I
can't even tell you how many times little Caroline like
on a stick day, would watch the making of Thriller
video that my parents taped off of TV for me.
Watched it over and over again. This is maybe my
(42:31):
new favorite fact about you. Yeah, oh my god, Like
I have it steered into my brain. The scene where
they're putting the yellow contact lenses into Michael's eye because
they were like giant hard contacts and he's like crying
and they've got all the sailing solution trickling down his
face and everything. But yeah, watching them apply and and
of course I didn't connect it until just now, and
(42:53):
so yeah, in addition to all that, all that contact Messa,
I could just like feel the pain watching who I
now know is Rich Baker apply that, like where cats
face and you've got Michael Jackson underneath, like layers and
layers and layers of makeup and prosthetics. You felt like,
oh my god, how's he even breathing under that? Because
they had to do the full cast of his face
(43:14):
and he had straws in his nose. And now I'm
just narrating the making of thriller video. I just love
imagining you watching it though as you're sick. That for
me was just the PBS and of Green Gables series.
Wait different you and I. Sometimes they asked some difference faces. Um,
(43:34):
but even today Hollywood makeup artistry. It's still having to
catch up to changing industry standards and technology because hello,
h D film demands a whole new kind of makeup.
And side note, HD film apparently brings out the ages
(43:56):
jerk in some Hollywood folks, as cinematographer Bill Row, who
maybe Bill Row is a fine man, but he did
tell the Today Show quote, you watch a basketball game
in h D and then you wonder what a close
up will look like on a forty year old woman,
Bill Row, Bill Row, just go take a seat, Bill,
(44:19):
go to time out. Well, now actors and other people
in Hollywood are having the same reaction to HD that
people did back in the day when we transition to color.
I mean everybody's like, oh my god, you're gonna see everything. Yeah,
and I personally then this really doesn't have anything to
do so much with makeup artist free But watching especially
television shows in HD and even movies, it's not I
(44:41):
don't like it. Really it looks too real, like you're
too close. Uh huh. I feel like I'm watching a play.
And if I want to watch a play, I got
it with theater. Yeah, I prefer not to do that.
I would go see your spring play, thank you. But
in addition to the whole h D is you, makeup
artists also have to deal with the whole thing of
(45:03):
reality TV, so actually being in people's living rooms and oh,
you're a real person, but you've still got a look
like a glamor pus for the TV camera, a glamour puss,
I mean yeah, And that is one of the reasons
why the Kardashians makeup artist Joyce Vanelli is considered one
of the most influential makeup artists in the world. But
(45:27):
I feel like she's in sort of like a different category.
But she did talk to broadly about how when she
decided to get into reality friends of hers in Hollywood
were like, gross, that is, you know, that's some D
level stuff. But now she's the makeup artists of the Kardashians,
so she's doing a okay or should I say k
(45:49):
okay wow wow wow wow um. And much like other
types of special effects in post production and visual effects
in Hollywood, studios want this stuff cheaper, faster, but still
somehow better, So you've still got the same outsourcing issues
and opting for cheaper c g I instead of those
(46:12):
old school special effects makeup or they're just gonna pay
less outright. And this is the thing that drove seven
time Oscar winner Rich Baker, he of Michael Jackson thriller
video fame, to retire. This made me so sad because
he had this like huge warehouse where he would develop
these creatures and all of these masks and models and
(46:34):
all of his makeup, not unlike I like to think
Max Factors Lab that he developed all of his makeup in.
But Baker said, I like to do things right, and
they wanted cheap and fast. That is not what I
want to do. So I just decided it is basically
time to get out. No more wear cat faces. Honestly, Caroline,
(46:54):
I think you gotta try that next Halloween. Oh god,
I would get way too claustrophobic. I don't like math
col Rich Baker, I know. But the thing that I
was trying to cobble together in my mind is I'm
reading all of this is sort of what does it
mean in terms of how Hollywood beauty standards, especially what
(47:16):
we consider I mean, but it's not just beauty, it's
the beauty and grotesquery as well of how that filters
down to us as an audience and as consumers and
as people looking out at us in the mirror. And
I mean, in some ways, I think that Hollywood makeup
artistry in terms of the like Max Factor, you know,
(47:38):
painting Greta Garbo's face and like everyone woman in America
trying to mimic the look, I feel like that's a
thing of the past, especially with the rise of reality
stars and also beauty bloggers because Michelle Fan just to
name one name, is probably you know, more of a
household name than even Max Factor. So I don't know,
(48:00):
like I don't entirely know what to think about this
very surprising history of makeup artistry and how even trying
to get a snapshot today of what it looks like
just for film it was a little bit tough. I
feel like makeup artists still don't get the recognition they deserve. Well. Also,
I mean it's a different type of recognition because you
(48:23):
have Max Factor who was developing all of these products
and technologies that eventually inspired women all over the world
to look a certain way or try to look a
certain way with his products once it hit the larger market.
Now you have all the products at the ready. You
can walk into a Sepphora with your v I b
Rouge card and buy all the makeup in the world. Um,
(48:45):
but now you're being inspired by, like you said, beauty
bloggers and people who are making their tricks of the
trade readily available. Yeah. Although I mean like the innovations
never stop. I mean I feel like every week there's
some new contoy orring tip I just can't figure out. Yeah,
I'm currently in the middle of trying to figure out
what type of makeup primer to switch to. I need
(49:06):
to switch to something for sensitive breakout proNT scan listeners suggestions,
but I'm so hopeful to hear from some makeup artist listening.
I mean, this clearly was a very limited snapshot of
the industry. It's really just some early Hollywood history. Um,
but hopefully gives you a little a sense of your heritage.
(49:30):
And also, I mean, just for for me and my
perspective on it, my appreciation for the impact of makeup
artistry has certainly broadened. So listeners, send us your letters.
Mom Stuff at house stuffwork dot com is our email address,
or you can also tweet us a mom Stuff podcast
(49:50):
or messages on Facebook. And we've got a couple of
messages to share with you when we come right back
from a quick break. With the holidays almost here, you
don't even have time to go to the post office
and deal with all of that traffic, the parking, carrying
all those packages and inevitably dropping them all over yourself.
It's going to be packed with everybody mailing those last
(50:12):
minute gifts. So do what the pros do and you
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(50:34):
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(50:56):
Enter stuff and now back to the show, And we've
got a couple from our witch is Halloween week. I've
got one here from Brittany, who writes, I was just
listening to your Witches episode and it reminded me of
a moment I had over the weekend. I was dog
(51:18):
sitting and somehow ended up watching a marathon of Hallmark
Channels the Good Witch movies. In the end of the
first movie, should I say spoiler alert? Are you playing
on watching a Hallmark Channel original movie and being surprised
by the ending? The town's sheriff is defending Katherine Bell's character,
the town's quite lovely new resident Witch from the Uppea
(51:40):
mayor's wife who claims that this herb shop owning woman
is going to bring evil to the town. The sheriff
actually uses a line saying that she quote may not
look like us, but that doesn't make her bad. This
is a white cis gender man talking to white cis
gender people about a white cis gender woman. I actually
(52:00):
laughed out loud apparently, which is are how Hallmark deals
with diversity instead of actually dealing with diversity. I love
the podcast and Happy Halloween, Brittany A believed Happy Halloween
to you. I know it is a long ways away
from Halloween, um, but that letter made me laugh out
loud as well. Well, I have a letter here from Chelsea.
(52:24):
She is one of several people who have written in
telling me to get on those books and movies about
Harry Potter. So, Chelsea, I can only say that I'm
working on it. Um, she says, I've been interested in
which is both fictional and historical, since I could read,
as you mentioned in the episode, Hermione grangers on a
(52:44):
lot of which lists. However, I think because of the
content of the episode, because you were looking at films
and TV shows, you missed some great points about what
makes the witches in the Harry Potter series so appealing.
In the early books, Hermione is described as having bushy
hair and buck teeth, and while there are a few
times she dressed for special occasions, her focus is on
her studies, elf rights, justice and friendship. She is strong, smart,
(53:06):
kind and hard working. She never takes the lazy root
and it's someone Harry admired. Hermione, alongside Luna McGonagall, Jenny
Molly Weasley, and of course Lily Potter, have been established
as strong female characters who stand up for themselves and others.
The Harry Potter series is often underestimated as a children's series. However,
these were the women I grew up with. Is my
strong female role models. Maybe this is because I've always
(53:29):
been a feminist, but always because I noticed straight away
that the female characters and the novels have equal parts
with the male characters, and there are very few instances
of gender di vibe. While they use magic for everything
from domestic chores to protection from evil forces, the female
characters and Harry Potter represents the strength and equality that
I know I crave in my literature and reality. Maybe
it is in part that the series was written by
(53:50):
a woman, but I think that the Harry Potter series
has some of the best and well rounded female characters
who are great role models for all readers. I know
Hermione certainly had an impact on me and also on
my young cousin. Chelsea goes on to say sorry for
the long email. I've only just caught up to recent
episodes and wanted to share my thoughts with you and
maybe convinced Caroline into reading the books too. So thanks
(54:11):
for the encouragement, Chelsea, and thanks for writing in, and
thanks to everybody who's written into us. Mom stuff at
how stuff works dot com is where you can send
your letters and for links all of our social media
as well as all of our blogs, videos, and podcasts
with this one including our sources so you can learn
more about the history of Hollywood makeup artistry. Head on
(54:33):
over to stuff mom Never Told You dot com for
more on this and thousands of other topics. Because it
how stuff works dot com
Welcome to stuff Mom never told you from House Top
Works Nott. Come hello and welcome to the podcast. I'm Kristen.
Then I'm Caroline. And today's episode on Hollywood Makeup Artist
Caroline took me back to my childhood ballet days. Yes,
(00:26):
because I mean, obviously, I was like ten, eleven, twelve
years old and I did not wear full makeup or
any makeup for that matter, except for ballet performances. I
was ballerina, and I distinctly remember my mom taking me
to the drug store to go by Max Factor pancake
(00:48):
because I was on the stage. You know, stage makeup
obviously is well not always obviously, is a bit more
dramatic than everyday makeup. And I can still remember the
smell of that thick, pale pancake being applied to my
face and I felt like a star. I'll admit it.
(01:13):
I was writing for my clothes up, well, not too
close up. If you were wearing like super thick pancake makeup,
Oh no, clothes with it better, I don't mind. Um. So,
this this episode was was really fun to learn about
the roots of my my childhood stage makeup. Yeah, I
am When I was in elementary school. Every year each
(01:36):
grade would put on It was called the spring play,
and each grade participated first through fifth and each class
would put on a different like two song routine, um
singing and dancing and costumes in the whole nine yards.
It was traumatic. But one thing I remember so clearly
was that every year when this happened, my mother would
(01:58):
put my hair and hot rollers, plastic hot rollers that
had been around since approximately Uh sorry, mom. And what
went along with that was, of course putting on lots
of makeup so that you could definitely see my star feature.
You gotta make those cheeks pop, that's right, and also
lips and eyes. I can't tell you like how freakish
(02:21):
I looked when you see pictures of me, like off
the stage before or after the performance. I looked terrifying
because I've got this my hair is just naturally straight
and fine, and I've got this like big curly, frizzy
hair all over the place, and these bright red lips
and this pale, ghostly white skin. I look like the
(02:46):
ghost of stage performers past, but like the chubby ten
year old version. Yeah, I mean, if it makes you
feel any better, I think I was ten when the
photo was taken for I'm sure it was our spring
recital as well. Because I was a silver bell and
was almost busting out of my leotard. My mom had
(03:07):
to alter it bigger for me. I was, in my
grandfather's words, a husky child. And there's this photo of
me in all of my to do and adult makeup
regalia in my family's backyard, and I I looked, I
just look bizarre. It's not it looks very unnatural. Yeah,
(03:29):
like I imagine, I know for sure mine and I
imagine yours. Like these are the reasons that people write
horror movies around children and children and makeup and stage
children because it's horrifying. Come all these children dressed as
lions and other jungle creatures. Fun. Well, unfortunately we have
(03:50):
to reel this conversation into Hollywood. Although really, can we
just talk about child stage performances for the rest of
the parts so traumatic? But today, uh we we will
not listeners just be talking about um times when Caroline
and I were in the spotlight literally um. But we're
(04:13):
gonna focus on production makeup artists, not so much celebrity
or fashion makeup artists, not having like the Bobby Brown
kind of conversation, but really looking at the development of
makeup artistry in Hollywood because a makeup stuff I've never
told you. We talked about makeup related things all the time,
(04:34):
and of course Hollywood makeup widely influenced and continues to
influence beauty trends and women's body image offscreen. But this
also when we look specifically at early Hollywood, is a
rare stuff I'm never told you history. That is an
(04:56):
emphasis on his tree and no her story. Does that
make any sense whatsoever? Yeah, the ladies are missing ladies,
and it's not that like people just left them out
of the history, although it's entirely possible that they have
been left at that women makeup artists have been left
out of the narrative. That would not shock me in
the least. But when you go back and look at
(05:17):
the timeline of the development of first stage and then
on screen makeup, it's all guys. It's all guys, and
and it makes sense the more you read about it
and and consider what they were having to do, it
does make sense that it was guys. Because a professionalization
(05:37):
and especially professionalization happening in the early twentieth century, which
was almost exclusively a male pursuit, and also how there
were very technical aspects of it. So a little bit
of background to kick things off. So Hollywood actors first
began wearing makeup, not so much to look fabulous on screen,
(06:00):
but rather to not look horrifying on the screen. Yeah,
to not look like Kristen and me when we were children.
That's why they were makeup. And this, by the way,
is coming from a fantastic profile on Max Factor in
Cabinet Magazine. The link will be over in the podcast
link on stuff I've Never told you dot com and
I highly recommend you read it. Yeah, but Max Factor
(06:21):
the human being, not just Kristen's pancake makeup that she
wore a ballet. Yeah, he was a real Max. I'm
a real man, And I do remember thinking as a kid,
who was this Max guy. I just never thought it
was a person, Max Factor. It just sounds like Mabel
n It was Mabel Mabel. Maybe he's born with it,
maybe he's Max Factor. Well, so if we're talking about
(06:45):
why people look ghoulish, I don't want to leave you
hanging with that information. Get back to the ghouls. The
ghouls and the technology, so both both orthochromatic and pen
chromatic film made dark colors darker and light colors lighter,
which totally made you look like a freak. And this, this,
by the way, is the earliest film being used. Um.
(07:07):
It really gave people this almost ghost to the appearance.
So like anytime you had a slight blemish or a
wrinkle or anything, it would just be totally blown up
and blown out into something scary looking on on on camera.
But back then there was no Max Factor pancake, there
was no under eye concealer God. And then the makeup
(07:30):
options and you know, the nineteen tens were very limited
to things like commercial grease paint or if you want
to get d I y about it, mixtures of lard
talk and pigment that actors would apply before coming on set.
So Hollywood's first stars would happen to do their own
(07:52):
hair and makeup a lot of times. Yeah, make yourself
look beautiful or in it just not horrifying. Um. And
this is where I get super squipt out because I
have skin that breaks out super easily, Like I'm gonna
try a new moisturizer, acne, I'm gonna try a new
concealer more acne um, but so in lieu of makeup primer,
(08:18):
these actors and actresses would use things like petroleum, jelly,
vegetable shortening, or cold cream to help their makeup set.
And I'm just like shuddering. That just sounds so awful
and like I would never be able to get it off.
And that's underneath a thick grease paint, an inflexible thick
grease paint. Now, in order to achieve a little bit
(08:39):
of skin tone, they might add some brick dust or paprika.
I mean the living is like makeup back then was
real scrappy. It was food, go to dinner and get
a makeover all in one Um. They would also I
love this. They might dust flour on their faces to
(08:59):
demand a shine. And you want some dimple scales, just
use your lipstick. But the thing was like this stuff
was so thick and uh, the film could potentially make
you look so creepy, uh that if you made a
certain facial expression, it might crack. But the cracks would
show up on film like you were you were literally
(09:21):
breaking apart and melting, like every movie was a monster movie.
But that also explains why people in say like Silent
Era and the early talkies films look so different than
people on film today. It wasn't because you know, eighty
eighty years ago, hi, it's two thousand, humans had vastly
(09:43):
different faces, but because the makeup was literally being just
like slathered on. And by makeup, I mean makeup in quotes,
because Caroline Max Factor hadn't even invented the term makeup yet.
I know, I love this all of this background information.
Max Factor himself was a fascinating guy with sort of
(10:04):
a crazy story. He was hired as a personal cosmetician
two members of Czar Nicholas the Second Court. But he
must have been like some crazy great cosmetics guy, and
or know Nicholas was like nutty because Max Factor's activity,
I'm just gonna keep calling him Max Factor, not Max. Yeah,
(10:25):
I mean Max just seems too casual. I know. It
was closely monitored and restricted, which made it super tough
for him because dude, he had a secret family. Yeah,
he was able to start his secret family while he
was still, you know, being monitored by Czar Nicholas. I mean,
he couldn't leave court without a chaperone. I'm just gonna
(10:48):
pop into this bookstore slash make babies yeah, he had
three kids secretly Max Factor how quickies. But then this
was I love this part of his bio. So in
n He's like, Okay, this is ridiculous. I have a
secret family that I really would like to live with,
but I'm in the court of the czar who just
(11:10):
doesn't want to let me leave. What am I going
to do? What am I really good at? Oh? Yeah, makeup.
Makeup is a tool of deception, as every man knows,
so he uses his makeup skills. He does his face
with flour and paprika. No, I'm sure he did something
(11:30):
far and then he made cookies. And then he used
his makeup skills to fake an illness. So he made
himself up to look super sick, sick enough to get
sent to a sanitarium. But he actually did not go
to a sanitarium. Listeners. He scooped up his wife and
three kids and set sail for America, where everything was
(11:54):
instantly great, right, and where he established beauty standards the end,
the end. No, he had a tough go of it
when he first got to the US because he was
obviously very successful, knew what he was gonna do, get
into cosmetics. But when he uh started setting things up
with a business partner. The business partner souls money. Then
(12:17):
his secret wife, who was no longer secret, unexpectedly died,
and then he got a new wife, and then she
had a mental breakdown and started beating him in public
Melissa after their baby was born, so like he had
a baby with the new wife, she probably was suffering
from some postpartum She ends up abusing him. He divorces her,
(12:37):
and then he's like, Okay, my brother and I will
go into business. That'll be fine. His brother had come
over well. The brother then opens up a cosmetic shop
like two doors down, becomes a competitor, and then becomes
a gangster literally, so I know, I kind of want
to know about that and missed a factor. Um. But
(12:58):
then finally he's on his fourth wife, he's got five kids,
and he's like, let's go to Holly Weird. So in
nineteen o nine he opens up his cosmetics store, which
is also essentially a cosmetics lab. At the time, he
wasn't like opening up a Sephora or something, because stuff
didn't exist, and he was very much a scientist about it.
(13:22):
And with that he began, unwittingly the process of changing
an entire industry because in nineteen fourteen he started carrying
a flexible grease paint that he developed that wouldn't crack
when those actors made their overly dramatic expressions on screen. Yeah,
so here's a guy who is not only like he's
(13:42):
had a cookie life so far already, and he's an
incredible technological innovator. He's creating things. Then he's becoming the
artist and applying those things to the actors themselves, because
they were like, finally I don't have to do it.
But also everybody was so excited, like, oh, you mean
I can have a slight facial expression and not have
(14:03):
my pancake flower paprika combination crack and fall off. But
remember we haven't gone a pancake yet. God, I know,
I'm just so excited. Well, also, all of this stuff
is just food based, true, because they're just slapping actual
pancakes on their face, so delicious, poking out little nose holes. Um.
But Factor was a legit innovator. He made, for instance,
(14:28):
the first made for film Sweat Tears and Blood Delish.
He even invented a pie topping that, as opposed to
dairy cream, didn't get sour and curdled after a while,
but also stuck to the face longer. So thanking Max
Factor for like all of the three Stages movies. But
wait a second, so still though we're still using, we're
(14:52):
still in food, We're still in food. I like that
He's like, I'll create something different that's not food, but
first dessert. I like to imagine I don't know if
you watched House, but like in every episode of House,
there was always a moment where like a colleague was
talking and House would get this look on his face
like I figured it out, and he'd run away to
(15:12):
go solve the case. And I imagine that the same
thing happened with Max Factor. Like he was eating a
pie one night and he's like, I know what to do.
Some whipped cream stuck on his nose and he was like,
wait a moment. But he also invented lip glass, waterproof mascara,
and under eye concealer. Can can we insert like a
(15:34):
sound clip of just like wild applause after under eye Concealer?
I know. And in addition to this, he sold eyeshadow
and eyebrow pencils to non actors for the first time
because remember that as max factor was getting started. Makeup
was still okay for the stage, but it was largely
(15:55):
like if you weren't a woman on the stage and
you were wearing makeup, then you were probably a prostitute.
And like literally this is we're not like making an
old ye, old timey judgment. That was like what people thought.
But it's it's not to say though that Edwardian era
women were not completely obsessed with cosmetics, but it was
(16:16):
more about having a clean look and trying to get
away with um, you know, kind of like the natural
look today. Obviously they wouldn't be wearing, you know, the
same kinds of layers of foundation and doing contouring and
all of that stuff that we would be doing today,
but they were still applying lots of things to their
facial skin and still trying to achieve beauty. But obvious
makeup in the sense of wearing eyeshadow and lipstick and
(16:42):
blush would have been associated with ladies of the evening.
And I don't know if it's at this point, like
at the very dawn of civilians using his makeup, or
if it's a little bit later in the process, but
there were even in some of the sources we read.
There were even some complaints that we still here today
from men who were like, I hate to kiss lips
(17:03):
with lipstick on them. I want the clean, pure kiss. Well, buddy,
stopped judging and maybe you'll get one m And I
bet you fella back then you would smoke on us
a garrello with a pencil thin mustache. Yes, basically every
man in the Edwardian Arrow was a villain in like
a train heist movie. Yes, yes, um. But one thing
(17:25):
too to keep in mind for a little later in
our conversation is how Factor invented air brushing makeup, which
was often originally used for white actors playing non white characters,
but it also came in handy during World War Two
when women had to give up their nylongs their stockings
(17:46):
and they would use the same makeup to make it
appear that they were wearing stockings. So a non racist use, yeah,
take one, take with one hand, or give the Lord,
giveth and take it away and um so yeah, so
evening out there. But some of the iconic faces that
(18:06):
Max Factor kind of literally created were Joan Crawford's, Judy
Garland's teen Harlow's and Betty Davis so I mean, these
were these were looks that so many women at the
time and and even still today because yeah, Jim Crawford
is a babe, are still mimicking. But what's interesting is
(18:28):
that so many of his makeup innovations came out of necessity.
For instance, the rosebud and Cupid's bow lipstick designs or
styles which were popularized by Clara bou They were all
strategies to prevent the lipstick from running, because we didn't
have that like stay put for seventeen hours, even through
your sad salad kind of of lipstick. It was all.
(18:50):
It all started to run at one point or another,
so he would paint it in a very specific way
so that it wouldn't get all over your face. And
it wasn't just makeup either. He was also into hair
dye innovation and really helped make blondes all of the rage.
And this had to do with a shift in film
technology as well, because you have a movement toward a
(19:13):
less harsh incandescent lighting on set, and then in the
late twenties the adoption of panchromatic film, and so because
it would play so well off of those elements, factor
made a new Platinum Blonde Die for Gene Harlow. That
was such a sensation that her comedy title was changed
(19:33):
from the original Gallagher all the watermelon smashing to just
platinum Blonde, Like just make it all about the hair.
Fewer watermelons. Yeah, and um. As this Cabinet magazine profile
pointed out, in the process of creating Greta Garbo's signature look,
women around the US just copied it. I mean, Max
(19:55):
Factor essentially set the standard for what women in the
late or even mid twenties and thirties we're trying to
look like, which is fascinating, fascinating. He's such a genius. Well,
I don't know. Maybe if you hate makeup, you hate
Max Factor. I don't know, but I think he's such
a genius with the keeping up his innovations with the
(20:18):
technology of the day of of So I don't want
to say effortlessly, because I'm sure you put a ton
of effort into it, but it's just so seamlessly following
the technological innovations with his products, and in the process
he ended up setting beauty standards for women in the
United States. I have a feeling that when he was
(20:39):
like under a lock and key in Czar Nicholas's court.
You had no idea what what an impact he would
soon have. But for all of his innovation and work,
and how I mean, how much of an icon he
was within Hollywood even at that time, like everyone knew
who Max Factor was, even said up you know this
(21:01):
gorgeous um studio or I should say like beauty salon
right in Hollywood that people would go to as well.
But he didn't get a screen credit for his work
until Night with the Technicolor production, which yes I did
watch as a child, Goldwyn Follies. What's it about? I mean,
it's it about? So? The follies were essentially like the
(21:24):
stage shows, so lots of singing and dancing and glitzy
costumes and just technicolor bedazzlement. And we've been giving all
of this time and attention to Max Factor, which he
absolutely deserves because he's an amazing individual. But simultaneously, we
basically have the rise of a makeup family dynasty. Yeah,
so the Westmore Boys, and there were so many of them,
(21:48):
so many really cornered this market. And I had never
heard of the Westmore Boys. Obviously we've heard of Max
Factor because it's a household cosmetic name um. But the
Westmore boys weren't so much about creating lines of cosmetics
for women off screen, like Factor eventually got into but
(22:08):
really getting into Hollywood. And similar to Max Factor, who
was a Polish immigrant, George Westmore emigrated from England and
opened a wig and hat store in Hollywood, and in
the nineteen tens he began trading Hollywood prostitutes hairstyling for
(22:29):
their makeup tips, which is so fantastic, I know, so interesting.
So like, here's a group of people that society dismisses,
and your your gross and your unacceptable, and you your
harlots for all that makeup you wear. But this is
where the leader of this makeup dynasty gets his makeup
(22:52):
ideas and he really entrenches himself into the Hollywood system.
So in nineteen seventeen, old Georgie Boy found the first
movie makeup department at Sella Studios. And he has six sons,
and at one point they were just all working at
all of you know, individually, at different major studios. So
(23:15):
you have Monty Westmore who's working for David o'sals Nick
Big Deal. You have Earned who was at twentieth Century Fox,
Percy who was at Warner Brothers. Wali's at Paramount, Frank
also is at Paramount for a while, and then you
have Bud who's at Universal. And as I was reading
about all of these west More boys, I was like,
is that a monopoly? So an unlikely story in today's
(23:39):
twentieth century gendered makeup landscape to think of a father
grooming his six sons in the makeup artistry business. Yeah,
And I mean there's there's a lot of different social
factors that work there because you've got the, like you said,
the professionalization issue, but also just the idea that kind
of makeup at this time was still considered sort of
(24:02):
a special effect, especially to the degree that makeup artists
for film we're trying to slather it on people's faces
to cover up in imperfections and make them appear different
or of even of a different race altogether, a different ethnicity. Um.
And so that's why I kept looking, like, where are
the women? Why are there all these dudes? And I
(24:22):
think it has a lot to do with the fact
that this was a professional special effects realm well, because
it's also distinct from beauty salon work. Even though the
Westmoores did open a beauty salon in Hollywood. Um, but
that would be more of a feminized profession and also
just straight up makeup entrepreneurialism where you do have some
(24:44):
major women at this time beginning to emerge like selling
essentially women their problem areas. Um, but this is so
specific to Hollywood and this very particular industry need which
was very much tied up to with film tech analogy,
and it was a demand produced honestly like by the
(25:05):
rapidly developing camera and film tech. But one more name
though that we need to mention is yet another guy.
We have a dude named William J. Tuttle who was
establishing himself a little bit later after Westmore in Factor
were big names. He came along and established himself as
one of Hollywood's most successful makeup artist who mostly worked
(25:27):
at MGM, And I wanted to mention him just as
an example of how you would at this point get
into the job. Yeah. So if he landed in Studio
City through taking art classes at the University of Southern
California and through getting an apprenticeship with fellow makeup artist
Jack John at Twenty Century Pictures. So once he did
(25:48):
land at MGM the Tuttle recalled studio chief Louis B.
Mayer indicating that all women should appear beautiful and all
men should be handsome. And that's a good thing to
Number two is that these guys were definitely shaping the
beauty standards of ladies on screen, but also handsomeness standards.
Like Max Factor worked with Rudolf Valentino, who was one
(26:12):
of the earliest Hollywood heart throbs, on creating his quote
unquote dark Latin lover look. Yeah, which we'll get into
the whole uh dark Latin lover aspect in just a minute. Um.
But back to Tuttle. He also got into making and
(26:32):
selling his own makeup. In he launched Custom Color Cosmetics,
which became the industry standard for the next twenty years.
But as important a role as all these guys had,
makeup artists really didn't get a lot of industry prestige
for a very long time. For instance, Tuttle received an
(26:55):
Honorary Academy Award in five and that was the first
time the Academy think it was the first time. Oh
no, no no, no, there was one other Academy that Bud
Westmore received in um. But they were these two random awards.
It wasn't a competitive category that came up every year.
(27:15):
Four makeup artistry as it is today, Yeah, And I
don't know. I think part of that is that just
the actual like technological innovation aspect is so recognized now
that the role that makeup can really play in making
or breaking a character. And so we're going to get
more into, uh, those technological developments in today's industry. And
we come right back from a quick break. So in
(27:47):
Hollywood terms, the makeup artistry really is a science, as
it has had to continually evolve even still today in
order to meet the man's of evolving phil technology and
as well discuss in a moment racist casting. But if
we go back to Max factor for a minute, he
(28:10):
essentially ran this cosmetics lab. To begin with, you always
wore a lab coat, and which I know wearing a
lab coat doesn't necessarily mean you're scientists, but I'm just
saying he looked the part. But he took a very
scientific approach to trying to perfect how best to approach
(28:30):
women's makeup and figure out what exactly they needed to
make them look less disgusting. Um, but he used, for instance,
this horrifying looking beauty micrometer to measure all of the
possible ratios of women's facial features and see how it
(28:51):
matched up to, you know, the symmetrical ideal. And there
was only I think there's only one beauty micrometer in existence.
It was a major flop. He did not sell any
because these women were having to wear these like metallic
cages on their faces that looked like torture devices. Well, yeah,
I mean the way you describe it, Kristen sounds so
(29:13):
like technologically advanced, it sounds so precise. But when you
look at a picture of the thing, it looks like
something out of a horror movie or out of the
freaking Spanish in position, it's like it's a it's a
full faced helmet thing with nails basically, and you put
it on your face, putting eye out factor, the X factor,
(29:33):
what are you doing for you thinking? But for another example,
a less terrifying example of him innovating to catch up
with film technology, Color presented a new set of challenges,
and a number of actors, especially a list actors, were
nervous of how being on color film might amplify their
(29:54):
facial flaws because in a lot of ways, black and
white film is very forgiving, especially if you, you know,
have some good grease paint. I was gonna say, amplify
their flaws as opposed to the literal food they were
wearing on their faces before. Well, by this point, once
we get to like the late nineteen thirties, like black
and white film had improved um but with color factor
(30:17):
had a new challenge of creating, you know, less obvious
makeup that would look good on screen. So in nineteen
thirty nine he debuted his natural looking, blendable pancake foundation.
That was a revolution because it was something that would
be used not only by actors on screen, but also
(30:40):
could easily be sold to women off screen. So you
have all of these pancake advertisements at the time, with
for instance, Judy Garland's face saying, ladies, don't you want
to look like Judy? Judy, Judy, which is such a
departure from before when it was like only prostitutes or
actresses who we associate with pros toutes anyway are going
(31:01):
to wear makeup, you harlots. Now it's being sold to
the masses. But you also see that throwback to to
Edwardian era of it being maybe a little more acceptable
as well, because it is less obvious. Although yeah, people aren't.
People are no longer like applying like fluff or nutter
to their faces. It's like, oh, we can look, we
(31:24):
can wear makeup, but look natural. Is it bad that
that just immediately triggered my sweet too? Oh well, I
guess it's not fluffer nut fluffer. Nutter is the sandwich
when you mix the marshmallow fluff and peanut butter. So
I should have said, your ladies are no longer carrying
around a tub of marshmallow fluff to apply to themselves. All.
I'm thinking about this fluff or nutter now, Caroline. But
(31:45):
my college dreamy used to eat this all the time.
I don't know how she didn't. But then, but the
innovation didn't stop with pancake, obviously. I mean you have
Technicolor coming along, and all of the intense lighting that
it required demanded new kinds of makeup, and then of
course Technicolor goes away, and so you have new kinds
of makeup that are needed. So it's a continual science.
(32:08):
Like people who try to poopoo. Makeup artistry is just like, oh,
it's just putting on makeup. No big deal, No, he's
a big deal. Well yeah, especially for these early pioneers
who had to keep up with things as they changed
minute by minute. Well yeah, and there is, of course,
you know, the the innovation needed to figure out how
to make white actors look not white so that they
(32:32):
could Oh god, I'm talking about yellow face and brown
face and red face. That's an aspect of makeup artistry
history that I didn't really think about it first, like, oh, wait, no,
they're also innovating to um portray racist caricatures. Right, of
(32:54):
course they back then, they would not have argued that
those are racist caricatures. They were hiring white actors to
play people of color so that they would be more
palatable to basically white audiences. And the only roles that
actual people of color, whether you're black, Asian, whatever, would
be those very very racist, stereotypical portrayals. Well, and in
(33:17):
you know, movie magazines at the time like Photoplay, etcetera,
those kinds of quote unquote transformations of the white actor
into say, an Asian character would have been documented and
profiled as this amazing thing that you have to see.
Isn't this so incredible? Look? She doesn't look quite as
(33:38):
American anymore. What movie magic. So there are so many
examples of this happening, especially in early Hollywood, but even
even uncomfortably recent UM and Max factors airbrush breakthrough was
especially helpful for this, but you also had innovations of
(34:00):
using things like facial prosthetics, elastics, and adhesives to maybe
pull back foreheads and eyelids to alter facial structures. Meanwhile,
they're actual actors of color out there who were like, no,
you're not gonna you're not gonna hire me for the Okay, cool,
You're just gonna like racist, be racist and pull your
eyes back. Awesome, great, thank guys. For instance, in nineteen fifteens,
(34:22):
Madam Butterfly Mary Pickford played Cho Cho San and she
was sort of the one who was at the forefront
of this yellow face Hollywood trend. And I mentioned Rudolf
Valentino just a minute ago in the quote unquote Latin
lover starred in The Sheik and his makeup folks had
(34:44):
to figure out how to tow the line between Arab face,
which was acceptable for audiences at the time, and black face,
which by outright black face in that kind of role
would not have been as as okay, So their solution
was to paint his hands brown so that you could
(35:05):
see the contrast whenever he would gently caress his white
female co stars face. So I mean, just just thinking
about that kind of strategizing is a little bit of
a mind bender. And then we have an incident that
we talked about in our Asian Fetish episode where Annime Wong,
(35:29):
who was sensational, was passed over by Louise Rayner to
play Olan in The Good Earth and Rayner won an
Oscar for this role. This woman she was made up
to look Asian, and it was considered, I mean, it
wasn't considered. It was a huge sensation at the time.
And Annime Wong was offered another role in the film
(35:51):
and she just turned it down because she was done
with the whole thing. Well yeah, I mean this whole
the whole yellow face painting white people as Asian people
thing was such a big business in Hollywood, for for
Hollywood makeup artist. Because you've also got in Katherine Hepburn
as Chinese woman Jade Tan and the Dragon Seed in
nineteen sixty two Shirley McClain's My Geisha. It has a
(36:13):
plot that actively revolves around a whole yellow face ruse.
And in nineteen sixty five, William J. Tuttle, who we
mentioned earlier, received that honorary Oscar for his work transforming
actor Tony Randall in the movie The Seven Faces of
Dr Law, in which Randall play is sort of an
ambiguously Asian medicine man. Yeah, that's the doctor Allow. One
(36:36):
of the Seven Faces is that doctor Allow. And going
back briefly though to Katherine Hepburn and Dragon Seed, which
I had never heard of before. Um, there was a
blog post I was reading about it over at Turner
Classic Movies dot com and it was saying, how through
a contemporary lens, it's a little bit conflicting because the
plot itself and the character of Jade Tan that Cheaper
(36:59):
Trays is was ahead of its time in some ways
that it definitely has like feminist undercurrents running through it,
and we know as well that Katherine Hepburn herself was
very much a feminist, but all of that is kind
of erased by the discomfort that, oh she's she's dressed
up as a Chinese woman. But even more recently, this
(37:21):
made me think about the Hue and Cry over Zoe
saw Donna being given a prosthetic nose and having her
skin tone darkened in order to start in that highly
controversial Nina Simone biopic. So from this less Rosie angle,
this is another impact though of makeup artist free, where
it's like, okay, makeup art Street is so not just
(37:44):
about makeup. It's about beauty norms and film technology and
even reflecting our race relations and outright racism at the time. Yeah.
And so when we do take into consideration and how
these early makeup artist jobs were so multifascinated in terms
of incorporating both yes, art, but also science and technology,
(38:09):
and they were professionalist, it's really no surprise, like we
said that this is a predominantly male industry from the
early era. Yeah, and if we even transition from more
of the beauty makeup artistry that we would typically think
of into more special effects makeup, I mean, kind of
less surprisingly, it's still all dudes across the board. And
(38:32):
just as a heads up, I mean, if you're a
special effects makeup artist, you are part modeler, sculptor, painter, chemist, beautician.
I mean this again is kind of a I mean
it's a stem type job as well. And if we
look at who the legends are in special effects makeup, again,
it's all dudes. And it's just like, it's so funny
(38:53):
to me, like reading all of this, because we stereotypically
think of girls, little girls being the one who like
dressed up, play dress up and put on makeup and
all this, but clearly you have all these boys who
are dreaming about it as well. Although when it comes
to special effects makeup, this is when we get into
the grotesque schools and goblins and monsters, um. But one
(39:15):
of the first guys who really made a name for
himself was Lawn Cheney, Man of a Thousand Faces, who
is a silent film star during the era when like
you come to set with your makeup arty on, and
he did all of his own special effects makeup and
was kind of obsessive about it. And he once said
(39:36):
that as a man's face reveals much that is in
his mind and heart, I attempt to show this by
the makeup that I use. Can you imagine like a
leading dude film star saying that today, like Bradley Cooper
talking about how his makeup communicates who he is. I
wonder how all of his like perfectly quoft hair swoops
(39:57):
communicate who he is? Well, you know what I gotta
give to b C. He was. He was a very
stagy guy. He has a very stage heavy background and um,
you know he doesn't seem to gender hung up. Okay,
now I'm thinking too much about Bradley Cooper gets me
off on a tangent. We've also got the name Jack Pierce.
He's the makeup artist who turned a Boris karl Off
(40:17):
into Frankenstein's monster with that tall, misshapen head and the
screws and this and that creepy, creepy and fun fact
about why Frankenstein is green or Frankenstein as a Frankenstein,
It's not because Pierce wanted him to be green because
he was on black and white film, but because the
(40:38):
green would play off to create that particular shade on
the black and white film. So now when you see
a Frankenstein Frankenstein monster costume and it's green, that's why interesting. Well,
a name that should sound familiar. Bud Westmore, he of
the Westmore Makeup Dynasty, worked with Chris Mueller and designer
(41:01):
Militant Patrick to make the frog suit for gil Man.
Gil Man was super creepy. Looking creepy but also hilarious
and also sounds like like a frat bros nickname. Um.
And I also want to note that Bud Westmore was
a makeup artist for red facing Rock Hudson in his
(41:25):
starring role as Tazza, son of Cone Chiesi, in which
he played a Native American, so they just reddened his
skin and gave him some quote unquote native body paint
too good. Um. But then John Chambers is the Oscar
winning special effects artist behind Planet of the Apes, and
we have Dick Smith to thank for freaking everyone out
(41:48):
by making the little girl in the Exorcist the little
Girl in the Exorcist. And then finally in makeup, It's
finally added as a competitive category the Oscars and Rich
Baker wins it for the first time for an American
werewolf in Paris. Well, screw an American werewolf in Paris.
(42:09):
I want to talk about how Rich Baker was responsible
for Michael Jackson's wear cat in the Thriller video. I
can't even tell you how many times little Caroline like
on a stick day, would watch the making of Thriller
video that my parents taped off of TV for me.
Watched it over and over again. This is maybe my
(42:31):
new favorite fact about you. Yeah, oh my god, Like
I have it steered into my brain. The scene where
they're putting the yellow contact lenses into Michael's eye because
they were like giant hard contacts and he's like crying
and they've got all the sailing solution trickling down his
face and everything. But yeah, watching them apply and and
of course I didn't connect it until just now, and
(42:53):
so yeah, in addition to all that, all that contact Messa,
I could just like feel the pain watching who I
now know is Rich Baker apply that, like where cats
face and you've got Michael Jackson underneath, like layers and
layers and layers of makeup and prosthetics. You felt like,
oh my god, how's he even breathing under that? Because
they had to do the full cast of his face
(43:14):
and he had straws in his nose. And now I'm
just narrating the making of thriller video. I just love
imagining you watching it though as you're sick. That for
me was just the PBS and of Green Gables series.
Wait different you and I. Sometimes they asked some difference faces. Um,
(43:34):
but even today Hollywood makeup artistry. It's still having to
catch up to changing industry standards and technology because hello,
h D film demands a whole new kind of makeup.
And side note, HD film apparently brings out the ages
(43:56):
jerk in some Hollywood folks, as cinematographer Bill Row, who
maybe Bill Row is a fine man, but he did
tell the Today Show quote, you watch a basketball game
in h D and then you wonder what a close
up will look like on a forty year old woman,
Bill Row, Bill Row, just go take a seat, Bill,
(44:19):
go to time out. Well, now actors and other people
in Hollywood are having the same reaction to HD that
people did back in the day when we transition to color.
I mean everybody's like, oh my god, you're gonna see everything. Yeah,
and I personally then this really doesn't have anything to
do so much with makeup artist free But watching especially
television shows in HD and even movies, it's not I
(44:41):
don't like it. Really it looks too real, like you're
too close. Uh huh. I feel like I'm watching a play.
And if I want to watch a play, I got
it with theater. Yeah, I prefer not to do that.
I would go see your spring play, thank you. But
in addition to the whole h D is you, makeup
artists also have to deal with the whole thing of
(45:03):
reality TV, so actually being in people's living rooms and oh,
you're a real person, but you've still got a look
like a glamor pus for the TV camera, a glamour puss,
I mean yeah, And that is one of the reasons
why the Kardashians makeup artist Joyce Vanelli is considered one
of the most influential makeup artists in the world. But
(45:27):
I feel like she's in sort of like a different category.
But she did talk to broadly about how when she
decided to get into reality friends of hers in Hollywood
were like, gross, that is, you know, that's some D
level stuff. But now she's the makeup artists of the Kardashians,
so she's doing a okay or should I say k
(45:49):
okay wow wow wow wow um. And much like other
types of special effects in post production and visual effects
in Hollywood, studios want this stuff cheaper, faster, but still
somehow better, So you've still got the same outsourcing issues
and opting for cheaper c g I instead of those
(46:12):
old school special effects makeup or they're just gonna pay
less outright. And this is the thing that drove seven
time Oscar winner Rich Baker, he of Michael Jackson thriller
video fame, to retire. This made me so sad because
he had this like huge warehouse where he would develop
these creatures and all of these masks and models and
(46:34):
all of his makeup, not unlike I like to think
Max Factors Lab that he developed all of his makeup in.
But Baker said, I like to do things right, and
they wanted cheap and fast. That is not what I
want to do. So I just decided it is basically
time to get out. No more wear cat faces. Honestly, Caroline,
(46:54):
I think you gotta try that next Halloween. Oh god,
I would get way too claustrophobic. I don't like math
col Rich Baker, I know. But the thing that I
was trying to cobble together in my mind is I'm
reading all of this is sort of what does it
mean in terms of how Hollywood beauty standards, especially what
(47:16):
we consider I mean, but it's not just beauty, it's
the beauty and grotesquery as well of how that filters
down to us as an audience and as consumers and
as people looking out at us in the mirror. And
I mean, in some ways, I think that Hollywood makeup
artistry in terms of the like Max Factor, you know,
(47:38):
painting Greta Garbo's face and like everyone woman in America
trying to mimic the look, I feel like that's a
thing of the past, especially with the rise of reality
stars and also beauty bloggers because Michelle Fan just to
name one name, is probably you know, more of a
household name than even Max Factor. So I don't know,
(48:00):
like I don't entirely know what to think about this
very surprising history of makeup artistry and how even trying
to get a snapshot today of what it looks like
just for film it was a little bit tough. I
feel like makeup artists still don't get the recognition they deserve. Well. Also,
I mean it's a different type of recognition because you
(48:23):
have Max Factor who was developing all of these products
and technologies that eventually inspired women all over the world
to look a certain way or try to look a
certain way with his products once it hit the larger market.
Now you have all the products at the ready. You
can walk into a Sepphora with your v I b
Rouge card and buy all the makeup in the world. Um,
(48:45):
but now you're being inspired by, like you said, beauty
bloggers and people who are making their tricks of the
trade readily available. Yeah. Although I mean like the innovations
never stop. I mean I feel like every week there's
some new contoy orring tip I just can't figure out. Yeah,
I'm currently in the middle of trying to figure out
what type of makeup primer to switch to. I need
(49:06):
to switch to something for sensitive breakout proNT scan listeners suggestions,
but I'm so hopeful to hear from some makeup artist listening.
I mean, this clearly was a very limited snapshot of
the industry. It's really just some early Hollywood history. Um,
but hopefully gives you a little a sense of your heritage.
(49:30):
And also, I mean, just for for me and my
perspective on it, my appreciation for the impact of makeup
artistry has certainly broadened. So listeners, send us your letters.
Mom Stuff at house stuffwork dot com is our email address,
or you can also tweet us a mom Stuff podcast
(49:50):
or messages on Facebook. And we've got a couple of
messages to share with you when we come right back
from a quick break. With the holidays almost here, you
don't even have time to go to the post office
and deal with all of that traffic, the parking, carrying
all those packages and inevitably dropping them all over yourself.
It's going to be packed with everybody mailing those last
(50:12):
minute gifts. So do what the pros do and you
stamps dot com instead. With stamps dot com, you can
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Stamps dot com. Let's you buy in print official US
posted using your own computer and printer. It's so easy
(50:34):
and convenient, And right now you can sign up for
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a special offer. It's a four week trial with a
dollar bonus offtware including postage and a digital scale. So
don't wait. Go to stamps dot com before you do
anything else. Click on the microphone at the top of
the homepage and type in stuff that's stamps dot com.
(50:56):
Enter stuff and now back to the show, And we've
got a couple from our witch is Halloween week. I've
got one here from Brittany, who writes, I was just
listening to your Witches episode and it reminded me of
a moment I had over the weekend. I was dog
(51:18):
sitting and somehow ended up watching a marathon of Hallmark
Channels the Good Witch movies. In the end of the
first movie, should I say spoiler alert? Are you playing
on watching a Hallmark Channel original movie and being surprised
by the ending? The town's sheriff is defending Katherine Bell's character,
the town's quite lovely new resident Witch from the Uppea
(51:40):
mayor's wife who claims that this herb shop owning woman
is going to bring evil to the town. The sheriff
actually uses a line saying that she quote may not
look like us, but that doesn't make her bad. This
is a white cis gender man talking to white cis
gender people about a white cis gender woman. I actually
(52:00):
laughed out loud apparently, which is are how Hallmark deals
with diversity instead of actually dealing with diversity. I love
the podcast and Happy Halloween, Brittany A believed Happy Halloween
to you. I know it is a long ways away
from Halloween, um, but that letter made me laugh out
loud as well. Well, I have a letter here from Chelsea.
(52:24):
She is one of several people who have written in
telling me to get on those books and movies about
Harry Potter. So, Chelsea, I can only say that I'm
working on it. Um, she says, I've been interested in
which is both fictional and historical, since I could read,
as you mentioned in the episode, Hermione grangers on a
(52:44):
lot of which lists. However, I think because of the
content of the episode, because you were looking at films
and TV shows, you missed some great points about what
makes the witches in the Harry Potter series so appealing.
In the early books, Hermione is described as having bushy
hair and buck teeth, and while there are a few
times she dressed for special occasions, her focus is on
her studies, elf rights, justice and friendship. She is strong, smart,
(53:06):
kind and hard working. She never takes the lazy root
and it's someone Harry admired. Hermione, alongside Luna McGonagall, Jenny
Molly Weasley, and of course Lily Potter, have been established
as strong female characters who stand up for themselves and others.
The Harry Potter series is often underestimated as a children's series. However,
these were the women I grew up with. Is my
strong female role models. Maybe this is because I've always
(53:29):
been a feminist, but always because I noticed straight away
that the female characters and the novels have equal parts
with the male characters, and there are very few instances
of gender di vibe. While they use magic for everything
from domestic chores to protection from evil forces, the female
characters and Harry Potter represents the strength and equality that
I know I crave in my literature and reality. Maybe
it is in part that the series was written by
(53:50):
a woman, but I think that the Harry Potter series
has some of the best and well rounded female characters
who are great role models for all readers. I know
Hermione certainly had an impact on me and also on
my young cousin. Chelsea goes on to say sorry for
the long email. I've only just caught up to recent
episodes and wanted to share my thoughts with you and
maybe convinced Caroline into reading the books too. So thanks
(54:11):
for the encouragement, Chelsea, and thanks for writing in, and
thanks to everybody who's written into us. Mom stuff at
how stuff works dot com is where you can send
your letters and for links all of our social media
as well as all of our blogs, videos, and podcasts
with this one including our sources so you can learn
more about the history of Hollywood makeup artistry. Head on
(54:33):
over to stuff mom Never Told You dot com for
more on this and thousands of other topics. Because it
how stuff works dot com
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