{"id":171244,"date":"2025-12-06T21:18:06","date_gmt":"2025-12-06T21:18:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/171244\/"},"modified":"2025-12-06T21:18:06","modified_gmt":"2025-12-06T21:18:06","slug":"robert-de-niros-transformation-in-frankenstein-hollywood-flashback","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/171244\/","title":{"rendered":"Robert De Niro\u2019s Transformation in Frankenstein: Hollywood Flashback"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tFrankenstein<\/a> had lived a long life in popular culture by 1994, but at the multiplex, Kenneth Branagh\u2019s film marked the classic Mary Shelley novel\u2019s first studio adaptation in decades. Expectations were high: The movie was the most expensive U.K. production of the year, budgeted at $45 million (roughly $100 million today), and THR reported just before the release that it \u201cshould be a monster at the box office\u201d on its opening weekend. Unfortunately, THR dubbed Mary Shelley\u2019s Frankenstein a \u201cmonstrous disappointment\u201d two months later, with poor reviews and weak box office leading to Branagh splitting from both his agent and manager at the time.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe innovative makeup used for the film\u2019s Creature, portrayed by Robert De Niro<\/a>, escaped the bad press. In fact, the team led by Daniel Parker earned the movie\u2019s sole Oscar nomination, though they ultimately lost to Ed Wood.<\/p>\n

\n\tBranagh and Parker spent nine months conceptualizing the Creature before filming, landing on a design that would leave De Niro fully covered in prosthetics whenever on camera. It kept him in the makeup chair for up to 10 hours a day \u2014 similar to what Jacob Elordi experienced on Guillermo del Toro\u2019s new version. In an interview with Fangoria in 1994, Branagh described their Creature as \u201ca butchered mismatch of different organs and body parts. He has two different eyes, he has a different brain and a body that comes from several different people.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThis proved an evolved visual take on the iconic figure, with De Niro\u2019s mournful performance matching Parker et al.\u2019s relatively tragic design. \u201cThe Creature actually heals over the course of the film,\u201d said Parker in the De Niro biography Untouchable. \u201cHe starts off with open wounds which have no blood, but then the wounds become bloody, gradually close and the stitches fall out. By the end of the film these wounds have become scars, so that we had to create six different stages that involved either color changes or sculpting changes.\u201d So if nothing else, call that Oscar nomination an apt recognition of a real team effort. <\/p>\n

\n\tThis story first appeared in a November stand-alone issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Frankenstein had lived a long life in popular culture by 1994, but at the multiplex, Kenneth Branagh\u2019s film…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":171245,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[146,4959,101328,85,46,30499],"class_list":{"0":"post-171244","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-frankenstein","10":"tag-hollywood-flashback","11":"tag-il","12":"tag-israel","13":"tag-robert-de-niro"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171244","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=171244"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171244\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/171245"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=171244"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=171244"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=171244"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}