How Did Lily James Transform Into Pam?

In preparation for the miraculous transformation into Pamela Anderson for the Hulu series Pam & Tommy, Lily James studied hours of Pamela Anderson in Baywatch episodes and interviews.

To physically transform, she sat for hours in a makeup chair every day while the hair and makeup teams recreated Anderson’s features.

Prosthetics were used not only to help make James’s face look more like Anderson’s but also to recreate her chest.

In an interview, Pam & Tommy makeup artist, David Williams, revealed that James wore a forehead prosthetic to extend the space between her brows and her hairline.

The prosthetic also covered James’ natural brows, which were then replaced with lace eyebrows in a pencil-thin shape that Anderson helped to popularize in the 90s.

The chest prosthetic was meticulously sculpted to look exactly like Anderson’s, which Williams said took three or four times to perfect. James also wore mouthpieces that recreated Anderson’s smile and pouty lips.

After the prosthetics were applied, James then had her face and body contoured with makeup to further transform her into Anderson.

She wore blue contact lenses and had four different blonde wigs created especially for the series to match Anderson’s bleach blonde hair and spare James’s natural brunette hair from having to be bleached.

The entire process took about four hours each day in the makeup chair.