Engelen has been nominated for two Oscars for his work on Kenneth Branagh’s Frankenstein and Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes and won a BAFTA for the latter. He has been nominated for four other BAFTAs – for Cold Mountain, Gladiator, Batman and The Emerald Forest.
His other films include Seven Years in Tibet, Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace, Red Planet and V for Vendetta.
Q: When did your association with the James Bond films first start?
A: It was a long time ago. The first Bond I did was The Man With A Golden Gun with Roger Moore. And it was through Roger that it came about. I’d worked with him on a film called Gold in South Africa and through that association he then asked me if I would like to do the Bond with him and so I did. And that was my introduction to Cubby Broccoli and the outfit, as it were. In those days Barbara (Broccoli, producer) was a kid, she was about 12 or 13. And subsequently I did Moonraker and The Spy Who Loved Me and then that’s where it finished until Die Another Day when I was involved again.
Q: What was that first Bond film like?
A: It was terrific. My first job on my own was with Roger on Gold and as I said he asked me to do the Bond and I jumped at the chance. I remember we were on location in Phuket in Thailand and in those days it really was a backpackers place, there was no real tourist industry down there at all. So we stayed in little places, cafes, wherever and just got on with it. It felt like pioneering days. They had no experience of filmmaking down there at all so we just took everything down there with us.
Q: There are a few regulars in the core team and you’re one of them.
A: I think they do like to keep people together if possible. There’s very much a family attitude and it seems to me they use people from one to the next and it’s a nice feeling. They are big budgets and big films but you still have the feeling that you are working within a family.
Q: What was the approach for Casino Royale?
A: To state the obvious, Daniel’s not dark, which is what we’ve been used to with Bond, and that meant a completely new look and we wanted to make the most of that. And Martin (Campbell, director) was saying all the time that he wanted this to be a much more realistic Bond. We have a very physical actor here with Daniel so we wanted to capitalise on that and do as much stunt work as possible and use that in the film as much as possible.
Q: So for your job, was it a case of getting Daniel into the make up chair and seeing how certain things looked on him?
A: Well there’s nothing terribly manufactured about what happens to Daniel. There are no disguises as such on this particular Bond, it’s more about the extent to which he is beaten up or showing signs of progression through an action sequence so that was what we had to work out. And most of the time, unfortunately, we couldn’t shoot in continuity so it was trying to arrive at what he might look like having gone through the various stages that we were yet to shoot (laughs). So we were doing it back to front half of the time, we were doing the final look and then going back on ourselves. There are times when he has to look like he has been in the wars, because he does get beaten up a lot. It’s very unusual to sequence from beginning to end.
Q: And you’re obviously dealing with the rest of the cast too.
A: Of course. There were various characters throughout the movie. There’s Mollaka, a terrorist bomber who is one of the protagonists that Bond has to follow through this market which is quite an extensive make up job for me because he has a burn down one side of his face.
And initially this character had no fingers on one hand – presumably having lost them when a bomb went off by mistake. But he had all of this action to do, jumping from girder to girder and through cranes and goodness knows what, so we decided to make it more of a burn as opposed to losing fingers. And then we had Le Chiffre and we wanted to give him a bit of nuance..
Q: Something physical?
A: Yes, and it was Martin (Campbell’s) idea to give him a bit of a strange eye. We gave him a bit of a twitch and a bit of distortion in the eye. Le Chiffre is played by Mads Mikkelsen and I think that was a great piece of inspired casting. He was just excellent.
Q: But what about Daniel’s blond, blue eyed look. How did you approach that?
A: We tried to keep his skin colour down. If he’s tanned the eyes look even more extraordinary – that aquamarine blue really does shine out. But it’s a great characteristic and we wanted to use it which was the feeling that we all had right from the first tests with him. And his blond hair we left alone, pretty much. We would stabilise it if it got too blond in the sunlight.
Q: What do you make of Daniel in the role?
A: He is such a hard worker and he takes the whole thing very seriously and I mean that in the nicest possible way. He is a class actor and he is a professional – he gives me all the time I need and I’m sure any other crew member on the set would say the same thing. He is a very talented well regulated actor, I think. And I have to say he never had a bad word to say about anything and he was an extraordinarily easy person to work with. And I think he will make an excellent Bond. I think he can’t wait to let the public see what he has done with this. I personally can’t wait for the release of the film because it really will be an eye opener. I think it is a much more dynamic piece of work than you’ve ever seen from a Bond.
Q: What about Martin Campbell?
A: Yes. I admire Martin. I think he really got his head around it from the very first. He knew exactly where to take this and turn it into a rollicking ride and I think the film will look fantastic and will be money well spent.
Q: You had worked with Eva Green before on Kingdom of Heaven…
A: Yes, I did. Actually one of my team looked after her but I obviously saw her close up. I think as soon as she tested for Casino Royale everyone knew that she was something special. She played her character so well.
Q: What kind of look were you going for with her?
A: Nothing too dramatic, just trying to bring out the best which is not difficult because she is a very beautiful girl.
Q: How many people do you have on your team?
A: There’s six of us altogether on make up and hair and you have to delegate who will look after who. You have to have two of those people devoted to looking after the incidental actors and four of us concentrate on the principals. There are other films when you have more to do with make up.
Q: Had you worked with Daniel before?
A: Yes, I worked with Daniel for the first time on Tomb Raider and I also worked with him on Munich so he and I go back a fair way. And I don’t need an excuse to work with Daniel, as I said he’s such a lovely man.
Q: You’ve also worked with Ridley Scott before on Gladiator..
A: Yes, I like working with Ridley, he’s such a joy to work with and is such a visual director. He will illustrate what he is talking about – actually draw what is on his mind and that’s wonderful.
Q: I would imagine working on something like Frankenstein, which you did, must be the ultimate in terms of a challenge for a make up artist?
A: Yes, that was hard work . And certainly one of the toughest films, from a make up point of view, that I’ve worked on. And it’s impossible to have any other life when you are at work at 3am every morning preparing the actors for hours in the make up chair. It’s very hard. It is very demanding and you have people in the chair for hours at a time. And you have to get it on properly and people forget, you have to get it off properly too.
Q: Was that the most challenging film you’ve worked on?
A: Yes, it was, and I remember another one, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, which had a wonderful cast, Michelle Pffeifer and Kevin Kline and that was very exhausting because make up, hair and costume were very elaborate. A lot of characters and a lot of work. But these things are fun, too, and you do see the result of your work up there on the screen so it is very rewarding.