One of the witcher titles on the TV program 2024Marvels Agatha all the time didn’t shy away from campiness and that was especially evident during episode 7. In this episode, several of the main characters dressed up as iconic characters, with Kathryn Hahn‘s Agatha Harkness, styled as the Wicked Witch of the West. When I first saw the episode, I fell in love with the look. However, after speaking to the head of the show’s makeup team on behalf of CinemaBlend, I’m even more impressed with how everything came together.
I had the pleasure of joining the conversation Agatha‘s Cindy Welles and Vasilios Tanis, who led the hair and makeup teams, respectively. During our conversation, I couldn’t help but ask how they managed to put a new spin on the Wicked Witch of the West’s iconic look for “Death’s Hand in Mine.” Tanis – whose credits include Marvel Cinematic Universe WandaVision And Spider-Man: No way home – confirmed that two people had to apply that makeup and revealed the personal touches added to update the look:
That makeup took two people. It was myself and Addison Foreman who did the special effects. He actually applied the silicone devices. And I wanted her to have the essence of Agatha, even though she’s going to be playing a version of the Wicked Witch of the West. So part of that, for me and for Kathryn, is because she has the utmost confidence in me and my aesthetic. We work together on both WandaVision and Agatha simpatico, and we all agreed that (the character) should have Agatha’s color palette, which is purple, which is the color of her purple. So I really focused on a different type of color palette. I didn’t want her to be all green, green lips, green eyes, green, green, green, green, green, green. I wanted her skin to be green so that you could actually assimilate that she is the Wicked Witch of the West, and the costume gets that point across very, very well.
I bet I’m not the only one who’s seen it The Wizard of Oz and others Oz related movies over the years. And in most of those productions, the iconic witch has a black ensemble and an all-green face. I thought it was incredibly clever that Vasilios Tanis and his team tried to use Agatha’s purple motifs, not only to stay true to her character, but also as a way to convey a fresh take on the evil witch. Going that route may seem obvious on paper, but it’s hard to say when you consider that some makeup artists may feel tempted to pay tribute to what came before, to a mistake.
Most versions of Oz’s infamous witch tend to portray her as relatively grotesque. However, that is not what the Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania artist wanted to do. As he further explained, he wanted to inject a significant amount of pure ‘beauty’ into this interpretation. He explained that to me and also how this fits with what is known about Agatha Harkness as a character:
I also wanted to add an aspect of beauty and a kind of vanity to it. Because she’s such a big character, and you could tell by the way she portrays that specific character in that specific episode. You know, it’s a very big character. So everything was more animated, more exaggerated. Her chin was more exaggerated. Her nose was more exaggerated. Her skin color was completely changed and exaggerated. So I felt like there had to be an element of beauty to it. So I went for a more dramatic flair, you know, and added her color palette of purple to the green, which I thought worked quite well in the mix of pink and, you know, just a little more like a spooky palette to to reflect the weirdness and greatness of Agatha in that particular episode.
Honestly, I’m exhausted just thinking about the painstaking work that went into this. And while this is far from the most important aspect of it all, it’s also intriguing that the debut of this version of the iconic Oz character coincides with the release of the Bad amendment. So it’s great that Vasilios Tanis made an attempt to make the Witch of Harkness different from the jump:
I wanted it to stand out. I wanted to stand out. I didn’t want to be a complete replica of every version of the Wicked Witch of the West that we’ve seen in pop culture. I wanted it to be different. I wanted to create a dramatic contrast to everything else you might see in an actor portraying that type of character.
Episode 7, which also featured Maleficent, Glinda the Good Witch, and the witch version of the Evil Queen, was incredibly entertaining. It was also heartbreaking because it was the tragic death of Patti LuPone’s Lilia Calderu. Nevertheless, the producers were able to find some light in the darkness, and I would certainly argue that the hair and makeup efforts are among the highlights. I hope others take notes when it comes to making the Wicked Witch of the West and more progress.
You can stream Agatha all the time in its entirety now using a Disney+ subscription. Be sure to read on now that the series is over upcoming Marvel shows.
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