Wanna See a Dead Body?

An immortal line uttered by Jerry O'Connell in what became a very respectable hit for 1986- Stand By Me.

Many times I get asked about how to build a dead body, or more often than not, how much it costs. Unfortunately, I often have answers that come back more as Zen meditative questions than answers:

"How dead does it have to be?"

"Natural causes, or murder?"

"What kind of murder?"

"Male or female?"

"Under water or land?"

"Eaten, beaten, or mauled?"

Honestly- it's not me being a smart alec or looking to pad the bill like an extra piece of foam rubber under a shirt!

Decomposition of any "post life" creature can be sectioned in time limits and variations of decay. Depending on what the Director's vision of the show's look is going to be, it'd be my job to come up with that look on the dearly departed.

Fact is, The Director's vision should have me somewhat worried at times- one questions what goes through a sane person's psychee to come up with visuals of our mortal coil- post mortem... The concept of sanity also seems to be reletive even more so when I'm told "I don't know what it should look like- that's your job- make me something dead..." Just that instruction alone will stretch the limits of your social calander...

More often than not, for home excursions into the undead, I strongly suggest you use make-up and living talent simply because of the cost.

If you've just got to have "chunkly skeletons", you can go the "Halloween" route and pick up reletively decent looking plastic skeletons- then with mold making latex [usually purchasable from ceramic stores] and a good ole' roll of tissue, add your chunks based off of those components- just realize that if your victim in the show stood 6 foot 2 inches- the skeleton is only going to reach about 5 foot- so consider having your characters find... ummm, "pieces" of their crime scene victim to get around such problems!

In order to serve you best, I'm trying to develop readership, so really the best way to get information to you is to answer questions- so...

"Wanna see a Dead Body?" Give me your questions from the comments button and I'll answer them geared toward your home budget and eye for, uh... "Detail".

Russ