When you hear the word "Wednesday" these days, nine out of ten times, it no longer refers to the day of the week. The word has become all about Netflix's new dark comedy series Wednesday, which follows angst-driven Wednesday Addams, played by Jenna Ortega, as she navigates teenage tribulations while investigating murders and discovering her new psychic abilities. It is the epitome of woah and woe (the word most found in each episode's title). From the plot to the aesthetics, Wednesday has become a sensation, breaking records of viewership for the streaming platform in just a week.
In the show, Wednesday keeps her looks simple, sticking to a black satchel and loafers as her uniform du jour. The fashion of the show, led by costume designer Colleen Atwood, has been dominating discourse since its premiere, but beauty is not far behind. This iteration of Wednesday may be varied sartorially, but it sticks to the tried-and-true when it comes to the protagonist's unmistakable goth glam: two iconic pigtail braids and the newly added bangs.
The show's deliberate modernization of the Addams family and simultaneous loyalty to the iconic Tim Burton vision and aesthetic is impeccable. To know more about how exactly they achieved it, Teen Vogue sat down with the show's hair and makeup department. Below, hair and makeup designer Tara McDonald and hair and makeup artist Nirvana Jalalvand discuss some of the key beauty looks from the series, how they achieved them, the challenges they faced, and more — including some product recommendations.
Tread with caution; spoilers ahead.
Wednesday's main look
"Wednesday's [main] look is certainly my favorite," says Tara, who also explains why the prospect of crafting the look was particularly exciting. "This is the first time a new generation was going to meet Wednesday and to meet her as a teenager because she has always been a child before."
Of course, Tara got the initial directions from Tim Burton himself. "[He] didn't want a dramatic goth makeup. The brief was more to create an everyday version of a goth girl, so my first thought was a 'just-bitten lip' sort of look." After two weeks of trying different colors, the team settled on MAC Cosmetics' lip liner in the shade Nightmoth, used strategically with the Dr. PawPaw lip balm to achieve "a stain."
While sharing even more behind-the-scenes insights, Nirvana chronicles her handy "lip pot" invention. "Lip pencils are hard to work with, especially if you don't want it to look like a lip pencil, and we couldn't find lip colors to match the pencil. So, I had to turn it into a lip balm by getting a pot, breaking down the lip liner, and mixing it with a clear lip balm, [essentially] making my own lipstick." Not only is Nirvana's "lip pot" noteworthy but so is the application to Jenna for Wednesday's signature look. "It was dabbed on so that it was more like a tint rather than perfectly defined," says Nirvana.
"Wednesday is not a girl you would think would be obsessed with makeup," Tara adds. "I was trying to find a way to make her look iconic with as little makeup as possible." As Allure reported, the base was achieved with some classics: Weleda Skin Food Light as prep and light layers of Estée Lauder's Double Wear Stay-in-Place Foundation in the shade Porcelain, applied with a trusty beauty blender and set with Make Up For Ever's HD Microfinishing Loose Powder. (In case you were wondering, Weds' lash product of choice is the ILIA Limitless Lash Lengthening Clean Mascara.)
Of course, we can't brush over Wednesday's daily hairstyle — two long, dark braids — which Tara confirms they added a "French-girl fringe" to in order to make her look more "current," effortless, and cool. Nirvana had previously shared on Instagram that the team added “[three] sets of wefts into each side of Jenna’s head and blended them into her natural hair, which [was] dyed darker for the show.”
Goody Addams
What we saw as double trouble (Wednesday and Goody) actually meant double the trouble for the hair and makeup team. While we were seeing double, we likely didn't realize that because Jenna played both Wednesday and Goody. These characters had entirely opposite looks and this would require strategy and planning on the beauty front.
Of course, like many drastic transformations, everything was possible thanks to a wig. "They wanted her to be blonde and instantly recognizable as Jenna in a previous life, so they got a blond wig," Nirvana explains. "We had to make Goody look ghostlike, and there were a few days where we had to switch between Wednesday's super dark look and Goody's ghostlike look, which could be time-consuming." Nirvana actually created her own wig cap by painting peelable layers of parting pieces on top of stocking caps, making sure to color them to match the hairline. "This is the best way to make a wig look natural in my experience," she says.
Tara also shares that there was another actor cast as Goody's double who also needed the full makeup and hair look experience every time they appeared on a scene — which added even more hours of prep. "Creating Wednesday's look would take just under an hour, whereas Goody's look would take closer to two hours," Nirvana shares, "but when we had to go from Goody to Wednesday, that was [the trickiest]. I had put so much product in her hair!" (Truly double duty!)
The Rave'N Dance look
Teenage dances are a timeless trope. In this case, timeless and monumental because who could possibly forget Wednesday's (now viral) teenage dancing queen moment, which Jenna later confirmed she wasn't 100% ready for and that "Mother Monster" Lady Gaga recently recreated? To recap, Wednesday wore a stunning black (of course) ruffled dress from Alaïa to attend Nevermore's Rave'N dance alongside Tyler Galpin (played by Hunter Doohan). Beyond Jenna's killer dance moves, the scene is epic for other reasons: her goth-gone-goth-glam look and, of course, the (fake) blood rain.
Nirvana, who shares this was her favorite Wednesday look, says this is the only time in the eight episodes of the series that Wednesday had a glossy lip. "We used the same lip liner, but we applied the Eight Hour Cream Balm by Elizabeth Arden with a brush because it is really moisturizing and holds its gloss quite nicely." To show that Wednesday "made a little more effort" for the dance, Tara explains that, in addition to the glossy lip, the team also added a little more to Wednesday's standard eye makeup by way of a smokier eye and individual lashes.
"I was looking forward to the blood rain since the moment I saw the script," Nirvana shares, right before Tara acknowledges that this was also the most challenging scene. "With filming, you do so many different takes, and we had to explain to the directors and producers at the beginning that it would be impossible to do different takes for this scene because blood would fall and destroy the looks. We couldn't keep taking the actors away to clean them up and then bring them back."
The blood rain took a village. The special effects department took the reins here. Still, the makeup and hair department also had to ensure everything was perfect for continuity, supported by the larger team and the prosthetics designer. "When the blood rain falls down, that was the special effects department," says Nirvana. "But when we see the characters after in the woods, we [the hair and makeup department] had to apply makeup blood to them and mimic how the blood rain fell on them based on photographs taken."
The blood might have proven to be tricky for more than one team, but there was one person who was loving it: Tim Burton. "[He] is obsessed with blood," Tara confesses — so much so that at one point, he took the fake blood from Tara to throw more at Marilyn Thornhill (played by Christina Ricci). "So, yes, he was temporarily part of the makeup department at points in time by way of the fake blood," Tara says with a chuckle.
Other noteworthy Rave'N looks mentions include Enid Sinclair (played by Emma Myers) and Bianca Barclay (played by Joy Sunday). Adapting to the dance's winter wonderland theme, the color palette for everyone's look (apart from Enid and her pink) was "icy." That meant pale blues, silvers, and frosted lips. Notably, popular girl and siren Bianca rocked a blue sequin mini halter dress and icy blue eyeshadow with jewels over her piercing blueish eyes.
"For Enid, pink was definitely her favorite color, and we wanted to do something slightly different," Tara says. “When I saw the costume, it had a slight '60s vibe, which is why we thought the pink bob would go well with it.”
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Generally, Enid is supposed to be the total opposite of Wednesday. "Tim wanted her to look really colorful and as if she dyed her own hair," Tara addd. (By the way, the dip-dyed hair is, in fact, a wig, and her colorful nails are a manicure with added special effects when she "wolfs out.")
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If you don't already have a newfound and huge appreciation for the hair and makeup department of Wednesday at this stage, we don't know what else will convince you. Thankfully, in addition to the aforementioned products, Tara and Nirvana shared that, overall, their most used products from the series were the Chantecaille Cheek Gelée in Happy and the ECO Style gel, the latter being used to make sure the layers in Jenna's braids stayed together.
What will the team have in store for season two of Wednesday? We aren't quite sure yet, but we sure are ready!
Buy all of Wednesday's beauty essentials below:
Want more like this from Teen Vogue? Check these stories out:
- Dissecting Wednesday's Style: 9 Key Looks from the Netflix Hit Series
- Jenna Ortega Breaks Character Over and Over in Wednesday Bloopers
- Jenna Ortega Wanted Wednesday & Enid to End Up Together
- Selena Gomez Just Got Rainbow Hair & It's Very Much Giving Enid
