More than a brush with film

BAFTA Award-winning make-up and prosthetics artist Audrey Doyle discusses what it takes to bring human aesthetics to some of the other-worldly and other-timely roles Tom Hardy takes on

October 15, 2018 04:20 pm | Updated 04:20 pm IST

Audrey Doyle is on the move. With a BAFTA under her belt for her work on 2018 TV series Taboo , starring actor Tom Hardy with whom she has been working on many projects over the years, she’s had a whirlwind summer working on Venom and just finishing up Fonzo , in which Hardy plays an older Al Capone.

Currently, the Irish make-up and prosthetics artist is taking a breather as she speaks with me over the phone.

On crafting Eddie Brock

Venom is one of Marvel’s most visually memorable characters, so naturally the film followed suit. As a make-up and prosthetics artist, Audrey’s inputs were extremely important from the start. While the symbiote Venom itself was CG, Eddie Brock required a lot of work from make-up and prosthetics to detail this character journey. Enter Audrey.

Sitting down with director Ruben Fleischer and Tom, Audrey read the script and formulated what Eddie needed to look like. At this point, for her, it’s instinctual given she’s been in the business for 20-plus years. “We have conversations about the look. Tom is such a visual actor, it’s a collaborative process for both of us in developing the aesthetic of the character he is playing together. “I have the skill-set and experience to physically do this but Tom has great ideas for the look of the characters he plays. From those ideas, we go for tests, working from there to get what we need, working with different departments during the camera tests, from which I see what needs to be adjusted in terms of colour to adapt to different lighting and environments — that’s one example.” She owes the visual success of a film to the spirit of collaboration and she’s well aware of how competitive the industry is at the same time.

Those familiar with the initial relationship between Venom and Eddie Brock know it’s a journey fraught with physical illness on Eddie’s part. “A lot of the injuries Eddie sustains are make up and prosthetics. We obviously start off with a very healthy Eddie Brock, so as the relationship progresses, I’ve had to break Tom down, having him appear at different stages of illness and damage. So there was development in different levels of make-up. I found that this did sometimes affect the amount of time in the make up chair for Tom, because it is all time-constrained.”

Reading the script is important in understanding the unbalanced and volatile relationship between the two main characters Venom and Eddie Brock, however unreal they are. And keeping things realistic and in check is a priority. “Even though Tom Hardy and his voice are Venom, he is playing against himself in every scene. He recorded lines separately and he’d have a little earpiece of Venom’s lines playing through,” she says, “Visually, it’s Tom as Eddie Brock but in CG, it’s him as Venom. It was really Eddie Brock I was helping create aesthetically and characteristically. But taking in mind the relationship between Eddie and Venom, when Venom does something to Eddie, I have to create that impact.”

Wild card factors

So one would assume Audrey’s pretty familiar with Hardy’s face as a canvas… well, not really, she says, largely because he plays such diverse roles from project to project. “In Fonzo , I did have the challenge of making him look so different from any other character we’ve seen him play,” Audrey recalls.

One of Audrey’s most vividly recollectible projects is 2006 Mel Gibson film Apocalypto. For Mad Max: Fury Road , Audrey recalls standing in the blisteringly hot Namib Desert, so sometimes she often finds herself inspired by locations as well as script. “It all depends on the design of the make-up. We just finished Fonzo where Tom plays an older Al Capone. We were in New Orleans and Tom had a lot of prosthetics on his face because we had to age him quite a bit, plus there’s the Al Capone scarring. This is quite different from the prosthetics he had on doing The Revenant in the snow in Canada so it’s harder to work in the heat than it is the cold so there are a lot of climatic elements to consider.”

This image released by Sony Pictures shows Michelle Williams, left, and Tom Hardy in a scene from 'Venom.' (Frank Masi/Sony Pictures via AP)

This image released by Sony Pictures shows Michelle Williams, left, and Tom Hardy in a scene from "Venom." (Frank Masi/Sony Pictures via AP)

In films like The Revenant and Mad Max: Fury Road , the weather played either a helper or an inhibitor to Audrey’s work, but she triumphed through. Asking her how much she works with a given environment, she says a lot goes into making sure there’s continuity in her actors’ appearances between takes and scenes where required. “If he has a red nose from the snow, you have to make sure that redness is maintained along takes, and also keeping in mind the level of snow on his clothes, body tan — from the sun or make-up — or sweat and dirt. A lot of that is under your control.”

So we can thank Audrey for the Eddie Brock we see — in all his human states throughout the film. While she’s taking a break, for now, she’s always keen to mix it up with her projects; feature films and indie projects alike. Above all Audrey loves her work and learning new skills in her craft, every day is a school day, your constantly learning.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.