Turn body inside out [Interview]

To quote star Yvonne Strahovski, the fallout from new Peacock horror series Teacup is “so disgusting and astonishing.” As viewers of the first two episodes discovered (along with the three families trapped together in the series), crossing a seemingly arbitrary line has serious consequences. Like your body is tearing itself apart.

“Basically you turn inside out; Her bones are pulled and rebuilt and pulled to the line,” Carey Jones, makeup supervisor at KNB EFX, told IndieWire. “[Creator Ian McCulloch] sent me a Bible about the general feel of things, about how things should look, how they should feel, and the texture and taste of them. When I read this I was intrigued because it was something I had never done before. I’m a real nerd when it comes to old-school filmmaking and things like that, and this film had that feeling.”

Viewers saw this for themselves in the two-episode premiere of “Teacup” on October 10, when a frightened Claire tries to run home and finds herself on the wrong side of the border (and her bones on the wrong side of her skin ). The sequence is grisly and disturbing in an almost primal way and perfectly sets the stage for the rest of the characters.

In the video above, the creative team behind “Teacup” — including creator and showrunner Ian McCullough and executive producer James Wan, as well as Strahovski and co-star Scott Speedman — talk about bringing the horrific tale to life, adapting a sprawling novel into a tighter version , more focused story. But none of this would work if we didn’t believe in the reality of the world and the horror of what happens when you cross the line.

“Early on, we all decided that we wanted to do practical effects, special effects makeup, and prosthetic effects, and then enhance them using CGI,” Wan said in the video. “We have literally returned to being the fan children we are.”

“A lot of inspiration comes from nature, when you see a tree reaching for sunlight, which is its source of life,” added executive producer and director Kevin Tancharoen. “The bones stretch out towards the blue line, which is the source of life for them.”

Prompted by McCulloch to “light up the sky,” Jones and the KNB team sketched some initial designs to begin a dialogue with the “Teacup” creatives, but the final drawings came together surprisingly quickly in the photorealistic phase . “When it came back to me, there weren’t any big changes at all,” Jones said. “That was great, and then we got down to actually creating it.”

Fortunately, Jones emphasized, he was brought into the process early enough to ensure there were very few unexpected delays. “[The team] They got me there early enough where we could talk and they let me go to work,” Jones said. “We are often brought in after pre-production is complete and there is a rush. They also did the homework and knew how this process worked. We came up with the design before we went on set, picked the locations, did the casting and all that, which, as I said, is rare.”

This extra time paid off – as did the years of experience. Jones was aware of the time constraints of a television series and placed great emphasis on preparing the actors as much as possible. “We do a lot of painting on the actual unit before it ships, so it takes some time to apply,” he said. “There are a lot of tricks in this trade. And we know one thing: time on set is a commodity. So when we design makeup we always try to take this into account. A lot of it was just like that [the actor] We just put it on, almost like a costume under clothing, and then pre-painted arm pieces slipped over it and we glued the edges in place. After doing this for years, you come up with ideas that make the application a little more efficient.”

New episodes of “Teacup” premiere Thursdays on Peacock until the finale on October 31st.