"Cloud Atlas" production notes [PDF] - VisualHollywood

CLOUD ATLAS (2012) PRODUCTION NOTES
Jocasta in 1936 and reappears again when she's a party guest in the Cavendish piece."
Likewise, jewelry-maker Lorenzo Mancianti created the buttons of Ewing's waistcoat that catch Dr.
Goose's acquisitive eye, and later resurface as beads around Zachry's neck. The buttons had not only
to look like an amazing stone, but resemble the Earth seen from space, and capture a sense of timelessness.
Barrett adopted a minimalist approach to Sonmi's wardrobe, explaining, "Hers is a political and
emotional journey and Sonmi becomes a mythical icon in Zachry's future. To make her real and
then transform her into someone who means so much to others, we decided to present her almost
naked. We let her face be the focus."
In the rugged landscape of Zachry's world, Barrett's view was practical. "Living in a forest, the
characters should blend into the greenery for their own survival. I came up with the idea that they
would be a people who knitted and everything would be hand-spun or macramé. Living with the
daily threat of the Kona, they need to be mobile, and a spinning wheel is easy to pack."
Collaborating with Barrett and the Wachowskis on the Ewing, Sonmi and Zachry sequences was
hair and makeup designer Jeremy Woodhead. Working with Gayraud and Tykwer on the Frobisher,
Luisa Rey and Cavendish sequences was his counterpart, Daniel Parker. Each led their teams in
helping alter the ages, and sometimes the genders and ethnicities of the ensemble cast as they traversed
place and time. Their mandate was to change the actors' appearances without rendering them
unrecognizable. Even in the most extreme makeup, Woodhead recalls, "The trick was in finding
that balance, to disguise without obliterating their natural features."
Some of the metamorphoses required prosthetics, at which they are both expert, but, wherever possible,
they favored traditional makeup, wigs and hair pieces.
Working on the first and the last portions of the timeline, Woodhead took Tom Hanks from one extreme
to the other. "We wanted Tom to shine through in his final role as Zachry. With his Dr.
Goose character in 1849, I had more leeway to create a 'character.' I gave him a bald cap, thinning
ginger hair, sideburns, a false nose and great big teeth. He's still recognizable, but a million miles
away from the kind, strong, silent Zachry."
Parker prepared Hanks for his turn as tough-guy Dermot Hoggins, author of Knuckle Sandwich,
saying, "We created a nose that had been massively broken and gave him a shaved head, scars and
tattoos." Later, as an avaricious hotel manager in 1936, the actor acquired a mustache, a thickened
neck and a bulbous alcohol-soaked nose.
Among Woodhead's achievements was transforming Hugh Grant into a fearsome cannibal in white
mud wash, a process that, he relates, "took two hours, and included bald caps, a Mohawk, tattoos,
body paints and teeth. It's unlike anything Hugh has ever done before."
Additionally, Woodhead prepared Jim Sturgess as Chang in Sonmi's saga and transitioned Halle
Berry from a Maori to an aged Asian male, to the naturally luminous Meronym. He also helped Susan
Sarandon become the male Suleiman, gave Doona Bae's features a western look for her portrayal
of Tilda, and helped James D'Arcy and Hugh Grant assume their Asian roles.
It fell to Parker to turn Hugo Weaving into Nurse Noakes. "Making up a man as a woman—and
vice versa—is always tricky," he says. "Male bone structure is different from female, so it takes
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