Posted by terrance | Filed under The Devil's Carnival

With theatrical makeup, especially prosthetics, removal can be as intensive as application.  The brief time spent in a makeup removal chair—dousing the afflicted areas with thinning agents and chemicals—is often merely phase one of what is days of picking glue and paint chips from your skin and hair.  Although sometimes irritating, I find this stretch of character shedding enjoyable: uncovering hidden gobs of glue lurking behind an earlobe, or impressive, florescent stowaways up a nose hole, is akin to finding money under a sofa cushion.  These finds should be shared and treasured with family and friends.

Years ago, I acted in a play that ran on weekends.  Every Saturday, I'd be lacquered with facial prosthetics for the role.  By Friday of each week, I'd finally have picked off all the sticky scraps and residual bits from the former week's show only to have the process repeated for curtain.

Even bush-league makeup attempts, like my 2011 Halloween costume—where I used spirit gum to glue a dozen-or-so plastic cockroaches to my face—was not without sticky side effects.  Halfway through the evening, most of the prop roaches had come loose from the glue and fallen from my face, yet traces of the over-the-counter adhesive endured on my derma into the first week of November.

On my upcoming musical film project, The Devil's Carnival, gummy fun with makeup reached a new zenith.  Not just for me, but for most of the cast involved.  Fans of REPO! The Genetic Opera: if you enjoyed Pavi's many masks and Amber Sweet "losing face", prepare yourself for The Devil's Carnival, 'cause you ain't seen nothing yet!

On TDC's set, I watched people who'd never worn contacts having their eyelids held open—A Clockwork Orange­-style—as plastic discs were squeezed into their sockets. Carefully colored clowns struggled to eat for fear of smearing their painted pouts.  The air was so thick with makeup fumes and carnie cosmetics that our makeup trailer looked, shook and cooked like a meth lab.  It was awesome!

Five days into filming, my skin had a negative reaction to the makeup I'd been wearing (I can't reveal what character I'm playing yet, but suffice it to say that the makeup application for the role was a tad more intensive than GraveRobber).  The reaction caused the soft skin around my eyes to hideously swell.  I looked like I'd lost a fight or rang bells in a cathedral for a living.  It took a couple of days for my face to normalize.  My only regret is having not taken a photograph of the odd transformation.

In the meantime, please enjoy this new production art as The Devil's Carnival introduces J. LaRose as The Major and Emilie Autumn as The Painted Doll.

There's more exciting TDC updates coming your way soon, so stay tuned!