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Barry alum Anthony Carrigan spent a touch more time in the makeup chair than most of his Superman costars.
The actor, who previously dabbled in the DC Comics playground with Fox’s Gotham TV series, transforms for this summer’s event movie into Rex Mason, a.k.a. Metamorpho, a metahuman with the power to transform his body into any element.
“It’s things that were glued on me, but then they painted on detail, and then more things were glued onto that,” Carrigan tells Entertainment Weekly. “I’m not kidding when I say that I was glued in, I was sewn in, I was completely enveloped. I was tied in…roped in, basically. But all in service of this incredible costume.”
Metamorpho is one of multiple metahumans (super-powered beings) who pop up in Superman, which stars David Corenswet as Clark Kent/Kal-El, Rachel Brosnahan as Lois Lane, and Nicholas Hoult as Lex Luthor. Unlike folks such as Guy Gardner (Nathan Fillion), Hawkgirl (Isabela Merced), and Mister Terrific (Edi Gathegi) 鈥 all members of the super-team, the Justice Gang 鈥 he wasn’t born with his abilities, nor were they acquired by choice.
“I think the reason why [writer/director and DC Studios co-head James Gunn] called me in specifically was because I really understood on a human level this idea of feeling different, feeling like something that has happened to you feels like a curse,” says Carrigan, who has alopecia areata, resulting in hair loss. “That was this unspoken thing that James and I understood. Then, once I really started to ask him questions about it, there was this sense that he really wanted someone who was quite tortured with what was going on. The really human quality of struggling with that, I think, comes through.”
Superman will feature “certain elements” that allude to Metamorpho’s backstory, Carrigan mentions鈥 including the presence of Stagg Industries, a company pulled directly from DC Comics that plays a part in the character’s origins. However, fans will meet Metamorpho “in full swing of who he is.”
Adding to his tragic nature, the character arrives in the film’s narrative when Lex, hellbent on destroying the Man of Steel, forces Metamorpho to transform his body into kryptonite in order to keep Superman weak.
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“You’re in a situation where it’s having to hurt someone, having to be an agent of the bad guy. And at the same time, there’s this struggle to want to be good,” Carrigan explains. “What the film does brilliantly is it puts you in this situation of, ‘Oh! He has no choice.’ He has to be doing this, and you see how painful it is.”
A self-proclaimed “big fan of practical effects,” Carrigan says his Metamorpho transformation required about five-to-six hours in the makeup chair. “It’s worth it,” he adds. “It’s worth it because you can actually feel the texture of something. Your brain notices the difference.”
How did he cope with that process? “Maybe it’s just the fact that I grew up with two older sisters who would sit me down and put whatever makeup they wanted on me, but I just go into a completely…I don’t know, tranquil state. I am just having a good time. The hardest part, I think, is the last hour.”
Superman opens in theaters July 11.