<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is a time of apparent magic\u2026.\u201d This is how Christopher Nolan\u2019s The Odyssey<\/em> begins. A single line of text against a black screen, reminding viewers of (or introducing them to) Homer\u2019s mythological tale of gods and goddesses, spells and potions, monsters and mystical disguises. Nolan\u2019s film has all of that: the giant Cyclops and the six-headed dog; lotus flowers that, when eaten, erase your memory; Circe, the sorceress, who transforms Odysseus\u2019s men into pigs with her bare hands, in one of the most gut-wrenching scenes in the film (literally and figuratively). The director famously prefers in-camera effects versus CGI, so an integral part of creating this \u201capparent magic\u201d onscreen was through hair and makeup in the film.<\/p>\n Greek mythology is full of colorful, physical descriptions, often repeated over and over again. Depending on the translation, Athena is the goddess \u201cof the bright owl-eyes.\u201d Calypso is \u201cthe nymph with the lovely braids.\u201d When Athena de-ages Odysseus at the climax of the poem, she makes his \u201chair grow thick on top of his head and flow down in curls like hyacinth blooms.\u201d Hair department lead, Gloria Pasqua Casny, and makeup department head, Luisa Abel, had a lot of history to pull from, but they also had direction from Nolan to keep everything more grounded.<\/p>\n The director wanted \u201can earthy narrative,\u201d and despite the scale of the film\u2014including the 65 mm film it was shot on, the larger-than-life creatures, and the many complicated battle and boat scenes\u2014in Nolan\u2019s hands, the 3,000-year-old epic poem takes on an intimate, human quality. The way Casny and Abel designed the characters\u2019 hair and makeup has much to do with evoking that quality.<\/p>\n Below, we break down the the ways Casny and Abel helped bring Homer’s tale to life, speaking to them not only about their research and processes, but also how they added that little bit of magic that\u2014based on the response to the film\u2014is making society fall in love with the classic tale once again.<\/p>\n Styling the hair, the Ancient Greek way<\/strong><\/p>\n Both Casny and Abel looked to ancient Greek art and artifacts in their research for the film. Casny spent time in museums, and Abel examined \u201cpottery, murals, and paintings that showed what facial hair and people\u2019s faces look[ed like] at the time.\u201d Abel also looked into the type of cosmetics people would have had access to in ancient Greece, and \u201cwas able to test modern products that simulated the right colors but gave us a lightweight, flawless look that we wanted for IMAX.\u201d<\/p>\n While researching ancient Greek hair practices, Casny came across a few surprises. After a trip to the Brooklyn Museum, she \u201cfound that 3,000 years ago, there were curling irons,\u201d and the \u201cancient Greeks also had barbershops.\u201d Both discoveries informed her choices for many of the principal cast and background actors.<\/p>\n In Greek mythology, curly hair is talked about a lot<\/em>. It was a sign of vitality and beauty, heroism and divinity. In the book, Odysseus\u2019s hair texture is described as \u201ccurling hair like hyacinth petals,\u201d and while Matt Damon kept his natural texture for his turn as the wily warrior, many characters embraced and enhanced their natural curls.<\/p>\n Casny was particularly happy when Tom Holland, who plays Odysseus\u2019s son Telemachus, showed up with his natural bouncy texture. \u201cTom has great curly hair, and when he came in [for tests], I just shook his hair up and was like, \u2018You are not<\/em> cutting it or wearing it straight,\u2019\u201d she recalls. She used a bit of mousse (often R&Co) and argan oil for some extra zhuzhing on set.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u201cIt is a time of apparent magic\u2026.\u201d This is how Christopher Nolan\u2019s The Odyssey begins. A single line of text against a black screen, reminding viewers of (or introducing them to) Homer\u2019s mythological tale of gods and goddesses, spells and potions, monsters and mystical disguises. Nolan\u2019s film has all of that: the giant Cyclops and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2109,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beauty"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sasgai.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sasgai.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sasgai.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sasgai.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sasgai.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2108"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sasgai.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2108\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sasgai.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sasgai.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sasgai.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sasgai.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}