|| The story of Westmores... ||

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The Westmores family is very well known for creating Hollywood beauty in the faces of famous actresses such as Bette Davis, Elizabeth Taylor, Sandra Dee and Farrah Fawcett. They have also created Mr Hyde. 

George Westmore was a hairstylist and wigmaker from England who has opened a salon in Hollywood at a time when actors did their own hair and make up. However, the make up was not their main focus at the time. 

Marvin, George's grandon stated:“ A lot of his customers in the salon were 'ladies of the evening' and he traded make-up lessons for hairstyling services,  and that’s how he learned to do beauty make-up”. 

Westmore’s six sons - Monte, Ern, Perc, Wally, Frank, and Bud - followed him into the craft.   They led make-up departments at other studios: Perc was the master of disguises at what would become Warner Bros, Wally was at Paramount, Ern worked at 20th Century Fox, and Bud at Universal studios.

“We actually all followed these same examples for decades and even now, you still use them when breaking down how to change the shape of a woman’s face - or a man, when developing a character,” Cabral-Ebert says.  

 Marvin Westmore says that’s what make-up artists do: help develop characters, tell stories and solve problems. 

Marvin's  brother Michael did the make-up on “Rocky,” the television series “Star Trek: The Next Generation," and won the Best Make-Up Oscar in 1986 for the movie, “Mask”. To create the “mask” he used photos of Dennis, who suffered from a bone-growth disease that deformed his skull and face and left his eyes more than three inches apart.  

“I said, ‘I need an actor with their eyes as far apart as we can get ’em.’ And then they hire Eric Stoltz whose eyes are real close together,” says Michael Westmore.  But he made a bridge that fit between the eyes  that created the illusion that they were far apart. 

Michael Westmore says over the years his family has worked in Hollywood, make-up techniques have evolved and so have the materials they use. But he says make-up artists are still part of moviemaking - even as more films use computer-generated images.

 “It hasn’t really done away with make-up,” he says.  “I mean, if they have Nicole Kidman doing a part or something, they put a nose on her.”

Source: 

*Brian, W., 2014. Oscars 2013: Westmore family continues to make-up Hollywood, one generation at a time, 2013. Available at: <http://www.scpr.org/programs/take-two/2013/02/21/30608/oscars-2013-westmore-family-continues-to-make-up-h/> [Accessed 9th October 2014]