Bill Skarsgård is no stranger to physical transformation for a performance. After all, the Swedish actor is best known for playing Pennywise The Dancing Clown in IT and IT: Chapter Two, which was a character that required an intense amount of makeup and prosthetics to bring to life. In the upcoming horror movie Nosferatu, he is back at it again playing the grotesque vampire Count Orlok – but even with his previous experiences under his belt, he was still apparently put back on his heels when writer/director Robert Eggers first presented what he had in mind for the new incarnation of the iconic monster.
Eggers spoke about the actor’s initial reaction to the character design earlier this month during a post-screening Q&A with Guillermo del Toro in Los Angeles (the same screening that yielded the first public reactions to Nosferatu). While discussing his approach to bringing the iconic character to life, the filmmaker talked about working with prosthetic makeup FX designer David White and how Bill Skarsgård was taken aback when he first saw what was being ideated. Said Eggers,
David [White] is so talented; it was so much fun to work on. But then when Bill [Skarsgård] first saw the bust, he was like, 'This guy didn't look like me when he was alive,' and he was pretty intimidated. But as soon as he put it on, I saw the moment when he was like inspired by the makeup and knew that he could do something with it.
Having seen the film, I can tell you that Bill Skarsgård is unrecognizable in the role of Count Orlok – with rotting, corpse-like skin, bald head, and a large black mustache disguising all of the man’s familiar features. I can understand why the actor may have been nervous about properly executing Robert Eggers’ vision (he has previously said he’s “never been more terrified of a role”), but when you see him on screen, it’s pure cinema magic.
Eggers further explained that while it took two hours for Bill Skarsgård to transform into Count Orlok for scenes where he is fully clothed (a.k.a. makeup being applied to just his hands and head), the actor had to spend six hours in a chair for sequences where he is featured unclothed (I won’t say more about those for spoiler reasons).
In regards to the Count Orlok design itself, the Nosferatu writer/director said that he did some of his own personal illustrations of the character during the film’s long time in development, but he gives a lot of credit to his collaborators for the final look. For example, it was David White who found a cool way to reference the vampire’s notably pointed ears from the original 1922 Nosferatu, in which the character is portrayed by actor Max Schreck:
I had thought a lot about it, so I did some digital paintings that are quite close to what Bill did, but obviously David White, it's his job, and he's so much more talented. He also came up with the idea to the reference the Max Schreck ears by having the ears be rotten away into points, which was very cool.
He also gave some special credit to Florin Lazarescu, who wasn’t a member of the makeup team, but instead is credited on the film as “Adviser, researcher, conlanger.” While Robert Eggers is known for his intense attention to detail, it was Lazarescu who convinced him that a certain amount of blushing was necessary to properly depict a classic vampire:
Florin Lazarescu, the Transylvania expert, said, 'You remember – I know everyone likes to ignore it – but you remember that often in the folklore, it says the vampire was red-faced. And I'm like, 'Fuck.' In the scenes where his face is actually red, it's like fire lit, so you can't really see it. But we have like blood pooling under his flesh in certain places to try to like reference that.
It’s something to pay attention to when you get to see the film for yourselves – and that opportunity is coming in just a little over a month. Also starring Nicholas Hoult, Lily-Rose Depp, Willem Dafoe, Emma Corrin, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Ralph Ineson, and Simon McBurney, Nosferatu will be arriving in theaters on December 25. To discover all of the features set for release between now and the end of the year, both on the big screen and on streaming, check out our 2024 Movie Release Calendar.
