Memory Alpha
Advertisement
Memory Alpha
Real world article
(written from a production point of view)

Joel Harlow (born 15 February 1968; age 56) is an Emmy Award-winning special effects and prosthetic makeup artist and sculptor. Harlow and his team at Harlow FX designed and constructed two prosthetic figures of Porthos for use in the Star Trek: Enterprise second season episode "A Night in Sickbay": one to be suspended in the super-hydration chamber and one to be resting within the quarantine box. [1]

Harlow was the prosthetic makeup supervisor on Star Trek, for which he designed Vulcan, Romulan, and Klingon prosthetics [2] and was also responsible for Leonard Nimoy's make-up. [3] Harlow has received an Academy Award for his work on Star Trek, which he shares with Makeup Department Head Mindy Hall and Prosthetic Makeup Designer Barney Burman. The three also received a Saturn Award nomination for Best Make-Up for Star Trek and a Broadcast Film Critics Association Award nomination.

Harlow worked as the Makeup Department Head and Prosthetic Designer on the 2016 sequel Star Trek Beyond, helmed by Justin Lin. [4] He was nominated, with Richard Alonzo, for an Academy Award for Best Makeup and Hairstyling on this film in 2017. He also appears with his wife Cindy Harlow as a Vulcan couple at Yorktown. [5]

Life and career[]

Harlow was born in Grand Folks, North Dakota. He attended the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan, New York, during which time he began working on low-budget productions, including two of the cult Toxic Avenger films.

Film[]

In the early 1990s, Harlow began doing makeup effects work higher-profile films, including The Sandlot, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie, and Lord of Illusions (1996, starring Scott Bakula and Famke Janssen with, Joel Swetow, and Vincent Schiavelli. Harlow subsequently worked on such genre films as Anaconda, Virus, and Battlefield Earth (2000). Veteran Star Trek makeup effects artist Jake Garber – with whom Harlow previously worked on 1992's The Bodyguard and the 1995 films Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie and Automatic – supervised the prosthetics on Battlefield Earth.

A member of IATSE Local 706, Harlow worked under the supervision of Rick Baker on How the Grinch Stole Christmas (featuring Clint Howard) and Planet of the Apes (2001, starring Erick Avari, Cary-Hiroyuki and David Warner). These films marked the first two times Harlow worked with Star Trek's Prosthetic Makeup Designer, Barney Burman. Harlow then worked under Star Trek: The Motion Picture makeup artist Ve Neill on A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001, starring Haley Joel Osment and Jude Law). He also provided uncredited makeup effects for films like Magnolia (1999), Bicentennial Man (1999, starring Robin Williams), and Bryan Singer's X-Men (2000, starring Patrick Stewart, Rebecca Romijn and Famke Janssen).

Harlow's first project as makeup department head was Adaptation (2000, featured Jim Beaver and Gregory Itzin in the cast. He then became a key makeup artist on Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003) Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006) and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (2007) with Ve Neill (and all starring Lee Arenberg) and was the prosthetic makeup designer for the last two films of the trilogy. He was recognized by the Hollywood Makeup Artist and Hair Stylist Guild for his work on the first film, The Curse of the Black Pearl, while his makeup effects for Dead Man's Chest received a Saturn Award nomination from the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films. He was also the makeup department head on Battle: Los Angeles and Green Lantern (both 2011).

Harlow's other film makeup credits include The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions (both 2003, featuring Anthony Zerbe), Auto Focus, The Chronicles of Riddick (2004, starring Karl Urban), Constantine (2005), Domino (2005, featuring cinematography by Dan Mindel), War of the Worlds (2005), National Treasure: Book of Secrets (2007, featuring Bruce Greenwood), and Angels & Demons (2009). He also did prosthetics work on Charlie Wilson's War (2007, starring Rachel Nichols) and prosthetic sculpting for The Soloist (2009, featuring Stephen Root).

Harlow has been working as the makeup artist for acclaimed actor Johnny Depp, transforming Depp into the character of The Madhatter in Tim Burton's version of Alice in Wonderland. Harlow was also Depp's makeup artist on The Rum Diary (2011, co-starring Karen Austin, Aaron Lustig, and Bill Smitrovich), The Tourist (2011), Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011), Dark Shadows (2012), The Lone Ranger (2013) for which he received his second Academy Award nomination in the category Best Achievement in Makeup and Hairstyling in 2014, shared with Gloria Pasqua Casny, Transcendence (2014), and Tusk (2014).

Other work includes makeup design for Johnny Depp on Into the Woods (2014, with Chris Pine), Mortdecai (2015), and Alice Through the Looking Glass (2016), makeup design on Black Mass (2015, with Adam Scott), and as makeup department head on Sweetwater (2015).

Television[]

Harlow won two Emmy Awards for his work on two different television mini-series based on Stephen King novels, 1994's The Stand and 1997's The Shining. He shared the first award with Star Trek: Deep Space Nine makeup artist Camille Calvet, while the second Emmy was shared with Star Trek alumni Joe Colwell, Barry Koper, Ve Neill, and Jill Rockow. Harlow later worked with Ve Neill on numerous film productions.

In 2000, Harlow began working on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. He created Harlow FX to handle effects work on Buffy in 2001, although the company was later assigned to other projects such as War of the Worlds and Carnivàle. In 2002, Harlow received an Emmy nomination for his work on the Buffy episode "Hell's Bells." Three years later, he received another Emmy nomination for an episode of Carnivàle. Harlow has also worked on such television programs as House (starring Jennifer Morrison) and Mad Men.

External links[]

Advertisement