Michael Westmore - Makeup Man: From Rocky to Star

Makeup Man

Makeup Man

From Rocky to Star Trek : The Amazing Creations of Hollywoods Michael Westmore

Michael Westmore

with Jake Page

An imprint of Globe Pequot

Distributed by NATIONAL BOOK NETWORK

Copyright 2017 Michael Westmore and Jake Page

All rights reserved . No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Information Available

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Available

ISBN 978-1-6307-6190-5 (hardcover)

ISBN 978-1-6307-6191-2 (e-book)

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

To my most beautiful and precious wife, Marion, my partner for life. I thank you for the past fifty-plus years together. Through your strength, encouragement, dedication, love, and our family, we are all better people. Like The Man of La Mancha with his many adventures and battles, Don Quixote was my hero and knight errant to my Lady Marion. I thank you for all of your support, and for never leaving my side. I thank you, Mrs. Westmore, for just being you. I will love you forever and always.

A TRIBUTE TO JAKE PAGE

In memory of my cowriter, friend, and adviser, Jake Page, and to his talented wife, Susanne Page. Thank you for the hours of guidance and hard work you contributed to organize my thoughts. When we met, Jake was already a prolific author and editor. In the year 2000 he was asked by Smithsonian magazine to write an article about my Hollywood career. Our collaboration quickly developed into a friendship. Jake Page was too modest to reveal that in his career he had written forty-nine books and hundreds of articles. He was a kind, witty, and generous man. This book is a tribute to his life and our friendship.

Jake, I miss you.

Foreword

When I scanned the first cast and crew list before shooting began on the pilot episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation , there were only two names I recognizedLeVar Burton and Michael Westmore. I am sure LeVar will understand and forgive if I say that it was the name Westmore that set my pulse beating. I had been a crazy movie fan since the late 1940s. I was one of those who sat through to the end of film credits until the screen went black. I had seen the Westmore name many times on many wonderful movies. But sometimes I wondered if there were lots of Westmores, or just one who couldnt decide what first name he liked best. There was Monte, Perc, Ern, Wally, Bud, and Frank. What a thrill for a nerd like me to hear the real story from the horses mouth. There was George, Mikes grandfather, who created the Westmore Hollywood dynasty in 1917. He was the father of the six named above, which included Michaels father, Monte. They were all makeup artists, and had at different times run most of the major Hollywood studios makeup departments.

I knew Michael had won an Academy Award for his work on Mask , and as I had only worked with a couple of Oscar winners, and never before in Hollywood, Michaels presence on the show added a glamour that was already buzzing around me each time I drove onto the historic Paramount lot. But if I might have been expecting superstar behavior from Michael, I was to be disappointed. Dedicated, modest, and friendly, he was happy to tolerate the impressionable fan who was playing Captain Picard.

Michaels work was outstanding. He inspired his coworkers, and his passionate professionalism set a standard for all of us actors. We respected and adored Michael. He was a natural leader, and his wit and perpetual good humor got us through many a long day, often into the early hours of the next day. Through our association with Michael, we were all touched with the magic of moviemaking at the highest level. He is, quite appropriately, an important part of the history of Hollywood, and I am proud to have shared a tiny part of it with him.

Patrick Stewart

Preface

I ask you, why would anyone want to document all the trivia that has occurred in ones career? First you must understand my heritage if you want to know why I have spent so many years contemplating and recording my busy life. I was born into filmdoms Royal Family of Makeup Artists. My grandfather, George, started the whole thing when he became a wig maker in England before the turn of the last centurythats 1900, not 2000. His specialty was to construct and style wigs for the crowned heads, barristers, and hookers. For the hookers he traded wigs for favors. Upon leaving the Isle of Wight in England with my grandmother, Ida, and the oldest children, they first landed in Canada, then went on to New York, where he opened a wig shop. There is a photo of him proudly standing beside his new sign. The family didnt stop for long, as they traveled down through New Orleans and then on to sunny Southern California. From England to California, Grandmother always seemed to be pregnant, giving birth to a total of eighteen children, of which six males survived. George opened a new wig shop and added to his credits some very impressive silent films, like The Three Musketeers and King of Kings , and stars, including Clara Bow.

Each of his six surviving sons, including my father, Monte Sr., became world
renowned makeup artists, setting the standards and styles for makeup around the world. Each one became the makeup department head of a major studio at a young age. To make everyones life more exciting, grandfather George got pissed off with his new wife, and committed a nasty suicide. Not to allow my grandparents to outdo them in numbers, all six sons were betrothed more than eighteen times, and some of the beauties were well-known actresses of the silver screen. Even my dad was married to my mom twice, and I became the twinkle in round two. Well! After being born into all this, why shouldnt I keep score?

I think every makeup project in my personal and work-related life has become a passionate adventure. In the middle of a conversation, a single word, name, place, or action will conjure up in my mind an entire past encounter which I am compelled to share. Im compelled to the point that I will have to interrupt the flow of the present conversation to interject my thoughts.

My studio career as a day laborer and trivia expounder started in 1958, when I was working during the summer between college semesters. My entry into showbiz started at the bottom, if that includes pulling nails out of reusable lumber, sweeping empty studio stages at eleven p.m., removing empty bottles from the Rat Packs dressing rooms, and picking up elephant poop. From there it was all uphill.

My career time also includes the eighteen years I spent at Paramount Studios, immersed in Gene Roddenberrys world of Star Trek . It was exciting, as each one of the more than six hundred television episodes and features I designed and supervised was a special moment in time.

Beginning in 1987, I was the makeup creator and supervisor of everything Star Trek . I held this position at Paramount for eighteen years. At that time I occupied a spacious corner office upstairs in the Dreier Building. Directly across the bustling street, known as Avenue P, was Stage 18 with its high, gray cement walls and huge, ancient doors. This exterior location was the setting for a scene in the 1950s movie Sunset Boulevard . This was the exact spot where Gloria Swanson, playing the fading silent star, is driven up in a 1929 classic Italian limo. Later inside the stage she performs her grand entrance and exclaims, All right, Mr. DeMille, Im ready for my close-up.