 
 Stargate SG-1 make-up artist Jan Newman has been a favorite of GateWorld's editors for a number of years, but this busy butterfly has kept herself so occupied that we have never had a chance to talk with her ... until now! GateWorld sat down and "powdered up" with the SG-1 make-up artist at this year's Gatecon convention in Vancouver, British Columbia! Originally from Australia, Newman has worked on MacGyver, all 10 seasons of SG-1, and the DVD movies Stargate: The Ark of Truth and Stargate: Continuum! Jan takes us back to her original run-in with the make-up profession before she had a chance to go off and become a flight attendant. We discuss the origins and complexities of the Jaffa tattoo, aging members of SG-1 in various episodes, and working with the likes of Christopher Judge, Richard Dean Anderson, and the late and great Don S. Davis. GateWorld's video interview with Jan Newman runs 27 minutes, and requires QuickTime 7.0 or higher. The interview is also available at GateWorld Play!
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GateWorld: For GateWorld.net I am David Read and I am talking with longtime SG-1 make-up artist Jan Newman. Jan, this has been a long time coming. It is a pleasure to see you at Gatecon.
Jan Newman: Thank You. Yeah, st time I saw you it was at [the] Continuum screening.
GW: The screening. That's right.
JN: Fabulous, fabulous.
GW: It was very good. Is that the last piece of Stargate that you've done?
JN: Yes, yes. I took some time off and, you know, hanging around.
GW: You told me about some of your other projects. What are you currently working on?
JN: I'm working as one of the many first assistant make-up artists, on ["Night At the Museum 2"], and it's a very busy show.
GW: Really?
One of Jan's most recent projects includes second unit for "Night at the Museum 2." | |
JN: We do main unit and second unit pretty much simultaneously, so we get a whole group of people ready and sometimes they come to our unit. Sometimes they go to main unit with the stars. We work with a lot of doubles. Dan Payne is one of our doubles.
GW: Right.
JN: Sometimes we have to double a double. [Laughter]
GW: A second double?
JN: A second double.
GW: Oh wow.
JN: Because its so busy. But, its lots of fun, I'm working with a lot of friends from Stargate in make-up time so I am very happy there.
GW: Vancouver's a small town. it really is. Was MacGyver your earliest work as a make-up artist?
JN: Oh, no.
GW: You've been in this business for awhile?
JN: I don't know how old you are, David, but I've been in here probably longer then you've been born.
GW: I'm 25.
JN: Oh ... [Laughter] No ... Anyway, yes I have been doing make up a long time. Should I say how long? No, I won't say how long.
Back in the late Seventies I did my first feature film. But I had done a lot of television. I actually started in opera doing make-up for the stage, which is a wonderful training area for make-up artists.
GW: Yeah, you can't look normal because the lights hit and you have to make certain things pop and people are sitting far away. How about I let you talk? [Laughter]
JN: They're sitting too are far away. No you're exactly right because you have to demonstrate the character from the back of the theater but also make them realistic. But, can you imagine going from television news to the opera in one night?
GW: In one night?
JN: You have to go back and forth, "Does that look right?" So yes, we use to go do the news in the afternoon and go to the theater at night and yes it was a wonderful, wonderful training experience. I recommend any make-up artist, who comes to me and says, "I want to be a make-up artist." I say, "Go and volunteer. Do stage, do theater, do face painting. And so that's a very good starting point. Lot of good schools now, because I didn't go to school to be a make-up artist. I was pretty much self-taught, but I had the opportunity to work with wonderful make-up artists in television and theater.
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Jan applies Christopher Judge's gold make-up for alternate timeline scenes in "Moebius." |
For me it was kind of a labor of love at the beginning. And then when I got my first feature film I actually got paid for it! [Laughter] It was a race car movie. A lot of noise. Then did several other feature films in Alberta. That's where I was training.
From there, I came out to British Colombia to see what the atmosphere was like and it was just booming at the time. I think my first job was on Hitchhiker. Then the next one was a couple of TV movies. I did one season of 21 Jump Street.
Then lo and behold two young men came into the city to do a television series. Michael Greenberg and Richard Dean Anderson were the two young men who came in with something they had already established in Los Angeles. I interviewed with them and I got the job. Little did I know that it was going to be such a wonderful experience.
GW: Long-lasting, and not just a lot of seasons, but you know, it's a part of our lexicography now.
JN: It is. It is! And you know, from those experiences it was probably one of the greatest experiences, shall I say, for doing second unit matching. Because they had a huge second unit and Dan Shea, of course, was with Richard, so we used to try and make him ...You know, Dan has got a weird thumb, so he doesn't look anything like Richard's hands.
GW: Yeah, there is a lot of hand modeling.
JN: So, part of our second unit was matching hands to do all of those MacGyverisms.
GW: Oh! So Dan was actually responsible for a lot of the tricky stuff.
JN: Dan did some. Richard had his own stunt man from Los Angeles. He didn't do any of that sort of thing. Bill Nikolai, who has been on Stargate, also did a lot of stand-in and second unit work as Richard's hand double. [He] was also a photo double and he was also Richard's photo double on Stargate.
GW: Oh, OK.
JN: Getting to know Vancouver very well, and knowing where all of the wonderful locations were, was a great experience. Wonderful, wonderful people, Steve Downing, the Executive Producer, and Michael Greenberg, were just wonderful people to work with. And of course, Richard.
" It was never anything in my childhood, trust me. I wanted to be a flight attendant."
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GW: Oh, of course.
JN: Then after that I just went back to doing feature films. I did "Intersection" and I did "Little Women". Then about that time, the Stargate franchise was coming to town.
I got called from Michael Greenberg's secretary, or somebody who was setting it up, to ask if I would be interested, because they wanted to get the same MacGyver crew back onto Stargate.
GW: Yes, This is a crew that works. Why break something, you know?
JN: That's right! So we did very well getting most of our crew together. And what an experience, what a wonderful 11 years really. Ten years of series and two feature films, what I would call feature films, because they are spectacular.
GW: Yeah, and they are not done yet. Brad, he's writing a third movie.
JN: Well, I may not be part of that. But, anyway it's been a wonderful experience.
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