بدلکاری و گریم

CHAPTER TWELVE

Stunts and make-up

Stuntmen and stuntwomen are used when something is too difficult or too dangerous for the actor to do. Every stunt is carefully planned before filming, and must be as safe as possible.

They wear the same clothes and make-up as the star, and are usually filmed so that their faces are not seen clearly.

They wear special clothes that will not catch fire if they are to be filmed in a ‘burning’ building (although often there is more smoke than fire, and the fire is carefully controlled).

Stuntmen often wear padding under their clothes so that they do not hurt themselves when they fall from something like a horse or a moving car.

Guns are not real guns, and knives are usually made of rubber so that they will bend when somebody is hit. Stuntmen who fall from buildings will fall onto something soft (which you won’t see in the final film, of course!). The important thing is that it looks real.

Some stars do their own stunts, although film companies would prefer that they didn’t. The director doesn’t want his star to get hurt - it’s too expensive for the film! Mel Gibson did all his own stunts in Mad Max Beyond the Thunderdrome (1985).

The make-up artist can change a nice-looking actor into something very frightening or a beautiful young actress into an old woman. It took eight-and-a half hours each day to change the actress Francesca Annis into a 100-year-old woman in the 1982 film Krull.

Rubber masks are made for the actor to wear when it is necessary to make very big changes to their face. Wigs, beards, moustaches, false eyelashes - all these things help to make a ‘character’.

It is even possible to make a man look like a woman!