Tony Todd in his Alpha-Hirogen garb with Robert Picardo (as The Doctor) in the Star Trek: Voyager epuisode "Prey." Photo copyright of UPN.
In today's Sci-Fi Blast From The Past, Tony Todd talks about the costume and make-up used to transform him into an Alpha-Hirogen when he guest-starred in the Star Trek: Voyager episode Prey.
Because they often track their prey under the most adverse of conditions the Hirogen wear protective armor-plated suits with a helmet and breathing apparatus fitted over their mouths. Todd not only had to slip into such a costume on a daily basis but also had to sit through a lengthy makeup process to transform him into the lizard-like alien.
"Boy, was that suit uncomfortable,” he recalls. “It was a complete latex outfit that weighed at least one-hundred-and-twenty pounds. I had heard that an actor before me had had difficulty breathing and, granted, he was three-hundred pounds, but the costume was cumbersome and you literally could not sit down in it. They had a board propped up for me to lie on and a hose built into the back of the costume that allowed them to inject concentrated studio air up my back. They did that twice and it was really something else,” laughs Todd.
“The makeup process took about six hours but the gentleman who did it, Scott, is cool so the time flew by and it wasn’t as arduous as it could have been. Again, you sit there as this metamorphosis slowly takes place and it certainly helps you get into the alien mode.
“Fortunately, part of my theatrical training was with masks so I’m never intimidated when I have to wear heavy makeup or prosthetics. Some people will say, ‘Oh, no one will recognize me,’ when, in actuality, if you’ve worked with masks you understand how freeing they are. It’s like wearing a word processor on your face with full edit functions. All the extraneous human ticks and behaviour are taken out and you’re left with the meat and potatoes in which to help create your character. I hope that makes sense. It’s all part of the process for me.”
One of the attributes of a good hunter is stealth but, according to Todd, his character was anything but graceful. “Usually after make-up I’d go back to my trailer and wait there until they called me for a scene. They would then literally have to send two PAs [personal assistants] to get me. Now, I have wide shoulders anyway but on top of that my costume had all this padding. It took us until the fourth day of filming to figure out the best way to get me out the door. Before that the poor PAs looked like Laurel and Hardy trying to catch a piano going downhill,” he laughs.
“There’s a scene that takes place twenty minutes before the end of the episode in which Tuvok [Tim Russ] shoots the Hirogen with a phaser. The gravity is not working on this particular deck so my character is supposed to float after being hit. They hung the camera by bungee cords to achieve that weightless look but, as for me, they laid me down on a pair of truck inner tubes to give me that bouncy quality. This was the very first thing we shot for the episode, so it was a rather amusing way to start off,” says Todd.
Steve Eramo
As noted above, photo copyright of UPN, so please no unauthorized copying or duplicating of any kind. Thanks!
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