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Post by RhodoraO on Feb 17, 2017 18:47:25 GMT
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Post by RhodoraO on Mar 9, 2017 22:58:22 GMT
From The Hair Stories Behind American Hustle: [T]he film's first five minutes look like a how-to comb-over tutorial that Christian Bale created for Donald Trump. Film's make-up department head Evelyne Noraz: Christian [Bale] was very involved with creating his look, more so than any other actor. He asked to have more hair on the chest, to create a full hairy chest. His thought was that when men lose their hair on top, they have more chest hair. It was great. It was not my idea at all. We spent four hours on the chest hair. They would call us and say, “How long has Christian been in there?” but he didn’t care, he wanted it to be perfect. Hair Department Head, Katherine Gordon: Amy and Christian change their hair at least ten times in each scene. It was very hard on the actors and myself. I was changing it left and right every 30 seconds.
Christian’s hair was all of his real hair, except for a small hair strip we used once in a while. The process of creating Christian’s comb-over was intensive and took two days. The problem with creating a comb-over is that there really isn’t any model. In today’s world, the only comb-over is Donald Trump. We couldn’t replicate his haircut, because David O. Russell said it wasn’t long enough. The other problem is that Christian has a ton of great, thick hair. He’s the best thing since sliced bread.
In the script, David wrote specifically that he wanted the comb-over to open up. David wanted it to look high, but thinned out on the edges. David kept saying "Higher, higher," but I said, "There’s no hair to make it higher." In the end, I stuffed it and Christian made that part of his character. I also couldn’t thin it on the edges no matter how I did it. He’s go so much hair that it wouldn’t graduate down. I ended up having to build a little hairpiece on the edge. It was a really complicated haircut. In the end, he and I did it together, fully did it.
David also rewrote the opening so that it showed Christian doing his hair, so it’s actually Christian doing his hair on camera. People can’t watch this movie and think, That would never happen, because it did. It wasn’t that hard to teach Christian. Actors are really great at taking direction. I showed him how to do it twice. It took ten minutes. I prepped it for him and then we did it one more time. It took seven minutes that time. And then, he just did it on camera.
... After the movie, Christian said, “My daughter might want to cut off my hair.” His daughter is 7 or so. I said, “Okay, I’ll show her how to do it.” Basically, Christian had to shave his head. There was this one part of the scalp where there was no hair. It was just this big section, we called it "the island." I showed her how to cut his hair into chunks, using just clippers. It’s something anyone could do. She clippered as I was sitting there, and she shaved off all his hair. I’m sure Christian’s wife and kids couldn’t wait for that hairdo to go.
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Post by RhodoraO on Mar 10, 2017 2:33:26 GMT
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Post by RhodoraO on Mar 11, 2017 8:25:35 GMT
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Post by RhodoraO on Mar 22, 2017 14:32:35 GMT
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Post by RhodoraO on Mar 22, 2017 16:41:39 GMT
From a New York Times interview of David O'Russell: N.G.: How did you come to “American Hustle”?
D.R.: When I was working on “Silver Linings,” my old producer from “Three Kings,” Charles Roven, and Richard Suckle, who works with him, had been showing me this story that Eric [Singer] had written. And I immediately thought, Wow, look at these people. I knew I was in the ballpark of these people. The characters and the places had, to me, all the richness that I’ve done, but on a bigger stage. And I rubbed my hands together in anticipation over which actors I could approach to play characters that they’ve never played before.
N.G.: Just as you weren’t the first director to come to mind for a boxing picture, Christian Bale in “Hustle” is not the first actor you think of to play an overweight Jewish con artist from the Bronx.
D.R.: I knew Christian would not be able to resist this person. I went from the office of Roven and Suckle right to Bale’s house, and we would sit in his backyard, and our kids would play together, and we would talk about what we thought was really, really human and passionate [in the material] that interested us the most. And for us, it isn’t simply about the con games. What’s interesting to me is that every day is a kind of narrative — every day is a belief of how you embrace and live and enjoy your life or suffer with your life. I believe that every movie in a way is about narrative: What narrative is the character telling himself? Christian and I loved that this man was an artist, constructing his identity, not just at a superficial level but at a soul level. We would talk about him as a director of a theater company — as a director of his own life.
N.G.: Did you meet Melvin Weinberg, whom the character is loosely based on?
D.R.: Yes. But by then I kind of had my point of view, and we tried not to draw too much on the real person as much as on what we created. But Christian picked up an enormous amount. His whole posture changed. His whole being changed. He completely transformed the way he moved. He became three inches shorter. He sank into here [slinks down], which resulted in herniating a disc. He lost his neck. He gained 50 pounds. I said, “God, take it easy!”
N.G.: This gets back to the notion that your movies are now generated by particulars and details rather than ideas. Or rather, that ideas arise from the particulars. You obviously loved the world of “American Hustle.”
D.R.: Worlds are everything to me. When I would see my Bronx relatives or my Brooklyn relatives — we would visit them from Mamaroneck — I’d be on the outside of it, whether it was a bar mitzvah or a Catholic confirmation. My parents had renounced both their traditions. So I’d watch these events from the outside with great fascination. I said, “They had a ‘thing.’ They’re inside of a ‘thing.’ ” Some of my relatives in the outer boroughs became my greatest resource — because their worlds were so specific — and I now say, “This is magic.” Those people are living life so passionately. They’re living something real.
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Post by RhodoraO on Mar 22, 2017 22:01:36 GMT
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Post by RhodoraO on Mar 29, 2017 21:42:39 GMT
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Post by RhodoraO on Mar 29, 2017 21:48:47 GMT
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Post by RhodoraO on Mar 29, 2017 21:50:10 GMT
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Post by RhodoraO on Mar 29, 2017 21:54:03 GMT
A little tidbit from The Carpetbagger: LOS ANGELES – David O. Russell had a nickname for Christian Bale’s character in “American Hustle,” the combed-over, paunchy yet confident swindler Irving Rosenfeld.
“I called him the Badger,” Mr. Russell said. He pawed up his hands and started imitating a hunched over, animalistic creature. “He moves like a badger, he looks like a badger; he takes his glasses off and his little eyes – so vulnerable!”
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Post by RhodoraO on Mar 30, 2017 21:58:09 GMT
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