“He suffered, you know …” for 100 years, this legendary face never stops viewers, but how was it created?

The authentic genius of Pantomime, Lon Chan, who is rightly nicknamed “1000 faces”, was one of the most diverse actors at the dawn of cinema. Long assimilation- for criticism and society, for the registration of torture, dysfigurated and often grotesque characters, Lon Chan, despite the fact that the authentic chameleon actress was a rich almost 160 films throughout her short career.

Gangsters, clowns, historical, Asian, pirate characters … He was able to play everything, to become a trademark on which he was the only representative. He was helped by the deep knowledge of makeup, even if he signed an article that relates to this art very prestigious Encyclopedia Britannica.

From the narrowing of the oppression, his extraordinary work on the roles of compositions was especially inspired by the creators of the whole generation of professional cinema, such as Tom Savin or the inevitable and legendary Rick Baker, seven times for the fabulous work of Oscar.

“Make me terrible and suspicious!”

In 1925, with Eric, the ghost of the Paris Opera, Chan was in his career. “I have been working for years, I continued to experiment with makeup after someone else.” The camera returned to Virgil Miller, who made Chan in several films before the Ghost of the Opera House. “He said,” Virg, make me terrible and suspicious, but at the same time make sure I love the public. He always wanted love. “

This is Lon Chan, who creates his appearance, recalls a mediocre face. The secret around this soothing kind was well preserved before reviewing the movie. Guaranteed effect: Viewers are absolutely scared.

It is said that even the actor Mary Philbin, who portrays the opera singer and the object of the ghost of the film, did not know what kind of actor makeup look. Only when he removed his mask that finds it while the cameras turn. His reaction, paralyzed, does not fully act in acting …

Here is a sequence, legendary.

“I got the head of this role in death without wearing a mask”

“We believe that I have developed a magical process to distort my qualities and my members. It is art and not magical.

It was the use of drawings in good shades and good places, not in the obvious parts -which gave it a complete illusion of horror ” Lon Channy will say in the comments about it A fascinating post The film’s historian Scott McCukuin wrote about the movie.

Add: “My experience, as a scene stage manager, who is great and varied before I got into the cinema, taught me a lot about the light effects on the actor’s face and the tips of a little cheat.

To create its terrible mutilated face; Lon Chan used as a colorful blackboard of the famous illustrator and artist Andre CastanieWho worked on the illustrated version of Gaston Leroux’s book.

The outlines of her cheeks were reinforced from the inside, to add pillows to her cheeks, and a prominent skull increased her forehead to a few inches to a few inches to mark her skull. Its bald crown was surrounded by flattened hair threads.

Finally, the Chan dragged and emphasized the fur on his forehead, taking care of the hiding place where the cranial hat joined his forehead. His ears, on the other hand, landed on his face.

“He suffered. You know …”

When you say that Chan was completely in the service of his art, it is not a vain formula. And he was ready for that.

“He was affected. You know. He had two wires on his nose that raised him. Sometimes there was terribly bleeding. We never stopped. Said Charles Van Enger, FIM Photography Director, quoted in the American Film Site article.

100 years later, the effect produced by the fabulous creation of Lon Chaney is still as strong. Moreover, for nothing that this adaptation of Gaston Leroux’s work, among the abundance, is often considered to be the best.