This article contains IndieWire’s preliminary Best Makeup and Hairstyling predictions for the 2024 Oscars. We regularly update our predictions throughout awards season and republish previous versions (like this one) for readers to track changes in how the Oscar race has changed. For the latest update on the frontrunners for the 96th Academy Awards, see our 2024 Oscars predictions hub.
The State of the Race
The Oscar shortlist has narrowed the field to the frontrunning “Maestro” (Netflix), “Poor Things” (Searchlight Pictures), and “Oppenheimer” (Universal), which are joined by “Ferrari” (Neon), “Golda” (Bleecker Street), “Killers of the Flower Moon” (Apple Original Films/Paramount Pictures), “Napoleon” (Apple Original Films/Sony Pictures), “Society of the Snow” (Netflix), and the surprising “Beau Is Afraid” (A24) and “The Last Voyage of the Demeter” (Universal).
“Golda” and “Society of the Snow” will likely also make the cut, with “Beau Is Afraid” and “The Last Voyage of the Demeter” as the potential wild cards.
Meanwhile, the nominees for the Make-Up Artists and Hair Stylists Guild Awards were announced on January 2. As they relate to the Oscar shortlist, “Maestro” was the big winner (period/character make-up, special make-up effects, and period/character hairstyling), followed by “Poor Things” (period/character make-up and special make-up effects), and “Oppenheimer” (period/character makeup) and “Golda” (special make-up effects).
“Maestro” is the one to beat for Kazu Hiro’s remarkable transformation of Bradley Cooper as legendary conductor/composer Leonard Bernstein. The Oscar-winning prosthetics guru (“Bombshell” and “Darkest Hour”) goes for his third win for his most complex work. Cooper’s transformation spans five decades and involved five stages (both in color and black-and-white). This required the actor-director to be made up at 1 a.m. every morning, taking two to six hours, depending on the stage. The work, in collaboration with Oscar-nominated makeup head Sian Grigg (“The Revenant”), Oscar-nominated hair head Kay Georgiou (“Joker”), and Lori McCoy-Bell (Cooper’s personal hairstylist) includes prosthetic makeup for the body, face, neck, arms, and hands. The debate about Cooper’s onscreen use of a long prosthetic nose appearing antisemitic was put to rest by Bernstein’s children, Jamie, Alexander, and Nina Bernstein. They found it appropriate to “amplify his resemblance” with makeup.
Yorgos Lanthimos’ “Poor Things,” a twisted Victorian “Frankenstein” gender-bender, stars Emma Stone as Bella, who’s re-animated by unconventional scientist Baxter (Willem Dafoe) with the brain of her unborn child. This results in a strange and surreal transformation from a traumatized woman to a fearless one who upends 19th-century roles and conventions. The team is led by Oscar-nominated makeup and hair artist Nadia Stacey (“Cruella”), Oscar-winning prosthetics makeup designer Mark Couler (“The Grand Budapest Hotel” and “The Iron Lady”), and prosthetics supervisor Josh Weston (“Suspiria”). Stacey, who also worked on “The Favourite” with the director and Stone, uses makeup sparingly but gives Bella long hair and never lets her wear it up. Kathryn Hunter’s Madame Swiney, who runs the Parisian brothel, is covered with more than 100 tattoos and has skin that looks bruised. Meanwhile, Dafoe’s grotesque face resembled the paintings of Francis Bacon with prosthetics, which took up to six hours to apply all of the pre-made pieces and make them seamlessly fit.
Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” boasts impressive work for turning Robert Downey Jr. into the elderly Admiral Lewis Strauss (during the innovative large-format black-and-white sequences). Downey, who’s a strong Best Supporting Actor contender, portrays the antagonist to Cillian Murphy’s physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, the “father of the atomic bomb.” This is a film about faces, and Downey looks quite distinguished aged up with white hair and makeup embellishment. The team was supervised by the director’s go-to head of makeup Luisa Abel and hair lead Jaime Leigh McIntosh. There’s also a strong prosthetic component when Oppenheimer imagines the impact of the radiation fallout on the faces of his Manhattan Project colleagues.
For “Golda,” Helen Mirren underwent extensive prosthetic makeup and wore a body suit to become Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir during the Yom Kippur War in 1973. The team of makeup and hair designer Karen Hartley Thomas, prosthetics designer Suzi Battersby, and prosthetic makeup artist Ashra Kelly-Blue applied contact lenses, a custom-made wig, eyebrows, fake teeth, silicone eye bags, a fake nose bridge, and a fake neckpiece.
With “Society of the Snow,” J. A. Bayona’s true-life survival thriller about the 1972 plane crash in the Andes with the Uruguayan rugby team, the challenge was obviously dealing with freezing temperatures. The team led by makeup designer Ana López-Puigcerver, hair stylist Belén López-Puigcerver, and Oscar-winning special makeup effects designers David Marti and Montse Ribé (“Pan’s Labyrinth”) embraced a combination of reality, prosthetics, and digital. The primary work involved the progressive deterioration of the survivors, who were young men affected in different ways by fear, cold, hunger, fatigue, and sickness. In addition, crafty prosthetics were used to recreate fake corpses constructed with silicone using molds of the actors.
As for the rest: “Beau Is Afraid,” Ari Aster’s three-hour arrested development adventure, starring Joaquin Phoenix in a variety of despairing and damaged looks, in addition to old-age makeup, was led by the team of Colin Penman (head of makeup) and Félix Larivière (head of hair). Michael Mann’s “Ferrari,” starring Adam Driver, who was aged up 21 years to play the 59-year-old Italian racing legend in the summer of 1957. The team was led by Marco Pompei (head of makeup) and Marcelle Genavese (head of hair).
“The Last Voyage of the Demeter,” which explores the origin story of Dracula, starring 6′ 7″ movement actor Javier Botet as the legendary 400-year-old monster, required the ingenuity of Oscar-nominated make-up artist Göran Lundström (“House of Gucci” and “Border”). His work spanned five stages, most of which were inspired by “Nosferatu,” and culminated with the final bat form. They relied entirely on in-camera lighting and prosthetics. The process involved re-painted appliances made from silicone that were glued to Botet’s head, fitting together like an elaborate jigsaw puzzle. His body was dressed in a foam latex suit that matched the look of silicone head appliances.
The Osage Nation is the centerpiece of Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon,” which depicts the 1920s fact-based Oklahoma crime drama about the serial murders of Osage Indians to steal their oil-rich territory. All of the crafts benefited from Osage consultants, which included the team led by makeup department head Thomas Nellen and key hairstylist James Eaton. Lily Gladstone’s Mollie Burkhart, the key Osage character, experiences an arc reflected in both costume and makeup/hair design.
Ridley Scott’s “Napoleon” recounts the rapid rise to power of Napoleon Bonaparte (Joaquin Phoenix) from military leader to Emperor while raging a romantic war with the love of his life: Empress Joséphine (an unrecognizable Vanessa Kirby). Makeup designer Jana Carboni (“House of Gucci”) and hair designer Francesco Pegoretti (Oscar-nominated for “Pinocchio”) have the epic challenge of transforming their 19th-century faces along with dealing with the soldiers involved in the six legendary battles.
Potential nominees are listed in alphabetical order; no film will be deemed a frontrunner until we have seen it.
Frontrunners
“Golda”
“Maestro”
“Oppenheimer”
“Poor Things”
“Society of the Snow”
Contenders
“Beau Is Afraid”
“Ferrari”
“Killers of the Flower Moon”
“Napoleon”
”The Last Voyage of the Demeter”
