Recently i got to speak to Howard Berger the amazing artist behind all the prosthetic looks in Oz the Great and Powerful out on Blu-ray and DVD now. He was such an amazing interview and a pleasure to speak too. From his favorite look in the movie to his love of Bert Lahr we talked about it all!
Q: What was the hardest part of keeping the prosthetics on?
A: To keep it on around the mouth it gets very twitchy.
Q: How long did all the transformations take?
A: We tried to keep them all under an hour and a half just for time purposes.
Q: Any problems with the prosthetics and the process while you were filming?
A: Yes actually Mila’s face didn’t take well to the glue we used so that was hard.
Q: How many prosthetics were used for the entire movie?
A: About 2700 altogether.
Q: Which was the most time consuming character to create?
A: The witch took the most time because it had to be just perfect.
Q: What was the atmosphere like on set?
A: great it was very family friendly. Everyone had their kids on set. I know that Michelle brought her daughter Matilda and it was just a really nice atmosphere.
Q: Which was your favorite character to work on?
A: Of course the witch was great but I also really liked the hag Evanora turns into at the end of the movie. Unfortunately Rachel didn’t get to wear the makeup we had a double in that scene but I did get to apply it on her in testing and it was perfect.
Q: How many witches did you go through before the finished product?
A: About 6 or 7 I would say.
Q:Are you familiar with the original stories about OZ?
A: Yes I am. I’m actually a huge fan so I fought tooth and nail to work on this project. I just had to have it.
Q: What was your favorite character from the classic movie?
A: I really loved the Cowardly Lion. Bert Lahr was brilliant and I loved his performance. I also loved the makeup they did for the lion I wish I had done it.
Q: Do you have any upcoming projects we can see?
A: Well I worked on Spider Man recently which was fun and I believe that comes out soon.
It was a pleasure to speak to him and i hope too again soon he truly is a talent!
Don’t forget to pick up OZ The Great and Powerful on Blu-ray and DVD now for more behind the scenes looks at Howard’s amazing work!