From 83 to Bob Biswas, here’s how prosthetic in Bollywood movies is created to aid modern-day storytelling-Entertainment News , Firstpost

What sort of meals is served on a movie set? Who picked out the work for the hero’s bed room? What does an Govt Producer do? Karishma Upadhyay’s month-to-month column Bollywood Inside may try to reply these and different questions you might need about all issues Bollywood however have been too shy to ask.

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On the highest flooring of an outdated constructing near the Sabarmati riverfront in Ahmedabad, is Soiled Fingers Studios. In numerous areas of the house, one would possibly discover a severed head, a child frolicked to dry, a pregnant stomach being colored, and subsequent to the milk carton on the kitchen counter, a burnt hand.

Led by Zuby Johal and Rajiv Subba, the staff right here, that features engineers, sculptors, painters, and machinists, creates prosthetic make-up and props for movies and reveals utilizing silicone, fiberglass, marble, glass, and metallic casting. The tryst with prosthetic design and make-up occurred by fluke for the 2 Nationwide Institute of Design, Ahmedabad alumni however they haven’t seemed again since their break within the films with Anurag Kashyap’s Gangs of Wasseypur 1 & 2 (2012).

Prosthetic make-up is just not new to Bollywood. There’s a well-known story of Zeenat Aman sticking an ‘omelette’ (a bit of latex with a burn scar) on her face, and displaying up at Raj Kapoor’s residence to point out him that she could be good for Satyam Shivam Sundaram (1978). For Chehre Pe Chehra (1981), make-up artist Shashikant Mhatre created a unique search for Sanjeev Kumar who performed a double function within the movie, full with facial hair, leathery pores and skin, and buck enamel.

As budgets and inventive ambitions grew, producers started hiring make-up artists from Hollywood. Kamal Hassan’s transformation in Chachi 420 (1997) was courtesy American artists Michael Westmore and Barry Koper whereas Oscar-winning artist Christien Tinsley was credited with Amitabh Bachchan’s look in Paa (2009). 

Kamal Haasan in Chachi 420

Prosthetic work is broadly divided into three classes – prosthetic make-up that transforms an actor like Rajkummar Rao right into a 324-year-old oracle in Raabta; props like useless troopers in Padmaavat; and motion sequences like blood gushing out of a wound. “Take AK vs AK (2020) for instance. The story is ready over one evening however we shot it over three months. Anil (Kapoor) will get harm via the evening so when there’s a wound, it’s important to work out not simply how a lot blood will come out in that immediate but in addition how that wound will heal via the evening. It’s a must to preserve continuity,” says Johal.

In recent times, with actors and administrators wanting their characters to look completely different and the demand for a movie or present to look sensible, using prosthetics has elevated dramatically.

In simply the final two months of this yr, we’ve got Bunty Aur Babli 2, that had Saif Ali Khan and Siddhant Chaturvedi in disguises that included patches on their noses and cheeks, and bald caps. In Bob Biswas, a number of further kilos and a wig helped Abhishek Bachchan morph right into a youthful model of the character that Saswata Chatterjee made in style in Kahaani (2012). And later this month, we’ll see Kabir Khan’s 83, the place delicate modifications have been made to everybody to make them as shut as attainable to the World Cup-winning staff led by Kapil Dev. 

Get into the Pores and skin

All of it begins with the script. When Diya Annapurna Ghosh knew she was going to make a spin-off movie on Bob Biswas, the eerie undercover killer who turned iconic regardless of his transient display time, it was understood that the actor enjoying the titular character would wish to resemble the unique. “Abhishek’s look is supposed to be as near the unique Bob from Kahaani as attainable, proper all the way down to the glasses he wore and the checked shirts. When it comes to prosthetics for him, we solely wanted the wig as a result of Abhishek had placed on the load that was required,” says Ghosh. She roped in British make-up artist Simone Beyleveld, somebody she had labored with earlier than (Badla, 2019, the place she was an assistant director), who not simply created the wig but in addition did all of the bullet wounds and blood work for the movie.

Abhishek Bachchan in and as Bob Biswas

Gaining access to the script is so integral to the method that Johal insists that she “gained’t work with individuals who don’t share their script.” “I have to know the precise conditions that prosthetics is required for,” says Johal, including, “If somebody simply tells me that they want a useless physique after which on the day of the shoot, I’m instructed that the ‘physique’ died as a result of drowning, the model I’ve made won’t work as a result of it’s not made of fabric that may float.” These particulars are necessary as a result of there are a variety of constraints when working with prosthetics. In contrast to common make-up, the place an artist can instantly begin over, with prosthetics ranging from scratch means ready days for the piece to be moulded and painted.

It’s a related course of for Nationwide-award successful make-up artist Preetisheel Singh D’Souza, who prefers to be known as a ‘character designer.’ “Whereas I’m studying a script, I begin desirous about what a personality ought to appear to be. It comes from his setting, his upbringing, and occupation. Gone are the times when an actor would look the identical as a middle-class father, a coolie or a don. I mix prosthetics with magnificence work (hair and make-up) to design the entire look,” says D’Souza, who studied on the Cinema Make-up Faculty in Los Angeles, and runs Da MakeUp Lab along with her work and life associate Mark D’Souza.

Ranveer Singh as Alauddin Khilji in Padmaavat

When she obtained the script for Padmaavat, her first intuition about Ranveer Singh as Sultan Alauddin Khilji was ‘beast mode.’ “That look is a mixture of little particulars, like his physique hair wasn’t shaved, and the beard is lengthy and scraggly. There are scars of all lengths on his physique, and his complexion is sun-kissed.” D’Souza’s credit additionally embody Bala (2019), Chhichhore (2019), and Haider (2014), and he or she additionally has a number of Akshay Kumar movies (Bachchan Pandey and Ram Setu) on the flooring.  

As soon as a glance is locked, an necessary step is explaining to the actors concerned the period of time they’d spend within the make-up chair. “Some actors are simply inherently excited concerning the course of. I bear in mind after we labored with the late Rishi Kapoor on 102 Not Out (2018), he was very curious concerning the course of. After that movie, each time he signed a movie, he’d name and say ‘let’s do one thing completely different,’” shares Singh. How lengthy the method takes is determined by how unrecognisable the actor goes to be on the finish. In Bob Biswas, Bachchan’s character has a bald patch in the course of the scalp. As an alternative of giving the actor a bald patch after which including a wig, Beyleveld merged the 2. “I feel we saved a variety of time doing only one piece. This could take about an-hour-and-a-half day-after-day to placed on,” provides Beyleveld. 

Rising to the Problem

Most make-up artists work with silicone, a cloth that isn’t breathable and retains warmth. Add to this our tropical local weather, and it’s clear that working with prosthetics is difficult, specifically when transformations are as drastic as Amitabh in Paa, 102 Not Out, or extra just lately, Gulabo Sitabo (2020). Simply earlier than the latter’s launch, Bachchan blogged about taking pictures in Lucknow’s scorching warmth with a number of items of silicone caught with medical glue. He wrote, “.. the prosthetic make up is at all times a difficulty throughout scorching climate .. it tends to soften away the sticking glue and destroy the prosthetic .. ample care on set was taken then to maintain the face cool .. its a requirement from the make up division .. one which I abhor .. the cooling methods on set , sure present the air conditioned air , however then with the frequency of photographs the continual out and in of the cool into the warmth is a foul precedent for me .. both I stay cool or stay scorching .. and if this may be referred to as a metaphor, a determine of speech, it’s utterly unintended .. !!”

On the opposite aspect of the spectrum are movies like Kriti Sanon-starrer Mimi (2021), for which D’Souza common a pregnant stomach within the type of a corset. “All she needed to do was zip it up.”

Amitabh Bachchan as Auro in Paa

Bollywood continues to have a foreigner fixation throughout departments on a film set, and prosthetic make-up isn’t any completely different. “We’re nonetheless so enamoured by foreigners. So administrators and producers consider that they’d do a greater job,” says Johal, not mincing her phrases. D’Souza agrees, “The automated assumption is {that a} foreigner could be higher than an Indian technician.”

However each women, who haven’t simply years of expertise but in addition have labored with large names like Kashyap, Vishal Bhardwaj, and Sanjay Leela Bhansali, consider that issues are altering. “Since journey turned restricted due to COVID, we’ve been getting a variety of work, each movie and sequence,” provides Johal, who’s taking a look at near a dozen releases over the subsequent yr, together with Shakun Batra’s untitled movie starring Deepika Padukone, Ananya Panday, and Siddhant Chaturvedi, Homi Adajania’s sequence Saas Bahu aur Cocaine, and Abhishek Chaubey’s sequence Soup.

Writer of Parveen Babi: A Life, Karishma Upadhyay has been writing about films and film stars for nearly 20 years. On Twitter, she goes by @karishmau.