The X-Files (1993) - Season 7

Continued from The X-Files - Season 6

Cheri Montesanto-Medcalf continued working as the makeup department's head, with John Vulich's Optic Nerve Studios continuing to supply the special makeup effects.

It was during the seventh season that Montesanto-Medcalf earned her second Emmy Award for Outstanding Makeup on a Series, thanks to the episode 'Theef'.

'Hungry'

Optic Nerve designed the makeup worn by Chad Donella's turn as the brain-eating mutant Rob Roberts. The makeup was a head appliance with specially sculpted ears, a forehead appliance and nose appliance, and completed with shark-like dentures and contact lenses.

A pair of false ears were also made for the shots of Roberts removing his disguise. Vulich explained the aim of the makeup's design.

'The character had to be passable as a human being and the disguise had to look slapped together. The makeup was complicated in its level of subtlety. We had to get something that was a dynamic monster, but at the same time, we had to do a little tweaking so that he would look like a human being.'

In another interview, Vulich elaborated, 'The hardest part about (the makeup) was hiding his ears. We had to hide his ears underneath a bald cap, and still put (false) ears on top of that, without making his ears look giant. There's a lot of little tricks, every illusion we could pull to make it not look like huge giant ears, we did.'

(A gross detail; the shot of the brains on the cooker did not use rubber props, but actual cow brains! No wonder they were frying so well...)

'Rush'

Optic Nerve supplied a grisly dummy head with a smashed in head, representing the aftermath of a high-speed collision.

'Orison'

This episode was a sequel to the second season's 'Irresistible', featuring the return of demonic serial killer Donnie Pfaster. Optic Nerve had to recreate Toby Lindala's makeup design for Pfaster's demon shape. Bryan Blair wore the makeup.

To recreate Lindala's design, Vulich requested Lindala send him photographs. Before receiving the photos, Vulich also searched the internet for photos of the demon's appearance, often finding them hosted on X-Files fansites!

A set of prop hands with severed fingers were also made for 'Orison'.

'The Amazing Maleeni'

Optic Nerve were tasked with the severed head effect in this episode. Vulich explained in a behind the scenes interview; 'We had to do a head cast of Ricky Jay, we had very little time to do this effect, maybe four or five days tops, which really isn't an adequate amount of time to do a fake head like that. Especially with the level of detail.

We had to do this on cue, so we did it with electromagnets. You can't see it but there's this metal plate hidden by all this gruesome stuff. And on the other stump is a very strong electromagnet, that would really hold while you shaked it. We just hit a switch (that turned the magnet off) that allowed (the head) to fall on cue, which worked surprisingly well!'

'Signs and Wonders'

Optic Nerve made a grotesque blistered skin appliance for Michael Childers to wear after his character was bitten by snakes. The appliance was fitted with tubes underneath that would squirt out goo, to show the venom being expelled from the sores.

'Theef'

Despite the more outlandish makeup effects in the series, it was actually Billy Drago's subtle makeup, as serial killer Orell Peattie, that Montesanto-Medcalf was most proud of, and rightfully so as it earned her a second Emmy award! Montesanto-Medcalf said in an interview;

''Theef' was one of my very favorite episodes for the makeup. When the Emmys came around, back in the day we were up against Buffy and there's a lot of big monsters and I said 'I want to put up Theef!' and they were like, 'Really? The makeups great but it's not like a big monster thing, we've done episodes with monsters in them!'. I said, the fine detail of making Billy Drago look that creepy and that realistic, I'm willing to risk not getting an Emmy because everyone else loved it so much. Luckily everyone also loved it too.

When we were designing the look for (Dragon), I said we have to make him scary, as people are more scared of, well, people! We could have went the monster route, but I thought he was creepier just having these weird things where I pulled his skin and added the eyelids. It was so subtle that in person, people that knew him were like 'What happened to him?' and I'm like 'Makeup happened to him! He doesn't really look like that!'.

Among the episode's assorted grisly makeups, was an anatomy skeleton with foam rubber applied to appear as a heavily rotted corpse.

'Chimera'

Optic Nerve supplied a prosthetic makeup that never made it past behind the scenes photos of performer Bullet Valmont; this makeup is different to the one that actually appeared in the episode, which was barely seen regardless.

The test makeup on Valmont was credited to Greg Funk, one of the Optic Nerve team. As of now I am unsure if there was two separate makeups or not!

'Brand X'

Optic Nerve sculpted a ripped face corpse head.

Sources:

• All Things: The Official Guide to The X-Files Volume 6 (Marc Shapiro, 2001)
  
• 'X-Files Fan Retrospective' interview with Cheri Montesanto
  
• Assorted 'Behind the Truth' featurettes.
  

Continued in The X-Files - Season 8