The Oscar-nominated makeup team takes us behind the scenes of the D.C. Comics movie.
From left, from Warner Bros./Everett Collection, Warner Bros/DC Comics/Rex/Shutterstock, courtesy of Warner Bros.
In 2015, Warner Bros. hired makeup artist Alessandro Bertolazzi for the most intimidating challenge of his three-decade career: making over the Joker, a pop culture icon, for Suicide Squad. Granted, the supervillain (played this time by Jared Leto) did not get as much screen time as the film’s titular team. But as the most-famous character featured in Suicide Squad, the 67-year-old, green-haired villain, who has appeared in thousands of comic books and been famously portrayed onscreen by Jack Nicholson and Heath Ledger, was the speculative fixation of many comic fans. (Bertolazzi was startled to discover that the Internet was already guessing how his Suicide Squad Joker would look before he started work on the film.) So, how did Bertolazzi prep for the much-anticipated makeover?
Bertolazzi gathered other inspirational materials, including everyday items—sawdust, wood, stone—photos, newspaper clippings, Internet images, and anything else that inspired him.
When it came time to put makeup brush to skin, Bertolazzi and the filmmakers made the decision to keep the Joker separate from the rest of the Suicide Squad cast by putting everyone in separate makeup trailers.
It was David Ayer’s idea to give the Joker a scar. Bertolazzi expanded on that idea by giving him seven.
Despite the intimidating challenge he faced, Bertolazzi was satisfied with how the studio trusted him to experiment and take the movie’s most prized character into his literal hands.