According to Dowds, there were two key elements in creating Tammy: the beauty side and the prosthetic elements. "It was super important to me that we never lost sight of the beauty aspect of Tammy's makeup," she says. "Combining prosthetics and beauty can be challenging at the best of times, but I believe more so when recreating Tammy; her look was 'large' in real life, and combined with prosthetics I was always aware of the risk of crossing a sometimes very fine line between being authentic, and going over the top in an untruthful way."
Justin Raleigh, the film's prosthetic makeup designer, says that when he's designing prosthetics, he tries to find the "hallmark elements" that are similar between the actor and their character. "Obviously, with Tammy, it's her cheeks; she has these big round cheeks, and Jessica has a very sculpted, sort of angular face, so that's a key hallmark element," Raleigh explains. "You don't want to completely lose your actor, but you need enough to transform them into the other person." Aside from enhancing Chastain's cheeks so they resembled Bakker's, the prosthetic work included filling in Chastain's chin dimple, pulling her nose up a bit, and changing her lip line.
Jan Crouch Without Makeup Wig
Keeping a balance between authenticity and avoiding caricature was an important focus for the team. If an eyelash fell on Chastain's cheek or her mascara was smudged, and it worked for the scene, they might keep it. But since Bakker's appearance was often fodder for late-night talk show hosts, Dowds was "very conscious" of not perpetuating that with her makeup. "You never want the audience to be taken out of the film because something that you have done pulled them out of it, or something became so distracting," he says.
To bring Tammy Faye's iconic look together, costume designer Mitchell Travers worked closely with the makeup team to make sure that the body padding matched the proportions of the prosthetic sculpt. "We also used clever jewelry placement to help hide prosthetic seams on the neck and ears," Travers tells Allure. "I collaborated with the hair designer to make sure that all of the looks were carefully considered head to toe. Tammy was the type of woman who'd match a scrunchie to her shoes, or a silk head scarf to her purse. She really believed in a full look!"
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