The Dropout: Clips & Conversation
Amanda Seyfried trades in her luscious blonde locks for a messy bun and a black turtleneck for Hulu’s The DropOut. But how was she able to pull off this transformation into Theranos girl boss Elizabeth Holmes? At the El Capitan theater in Hollywood, the cast and crew behind the DropOut gathered for the Disney FYC Fest to break down how they recreated the world of Elizabeth Holmes.
To capture the iconic look of Elizabeth Holmes, The Dropout team took to research and conversations to achieve something that should be put together but is a bit off. EP Katherine Pope’s first conversation with Amanda Seyfried was about Amanda Seyfried’s “ great hair” and hair department head Vanessa Price was brought in with the daunting task to make it a frizzy mess of a tech CEO. Amanda allowed the team to take charge of her hair by first figuring out the frizz and then tackling that messy bun. This was done through a trusting relationship to cut and dye her hair. The hair serves as a backstory of Elizabeth Holmes and the journey she goes on in the series. Vanessa saw Elizabeth as someone who wanted to look put together and to secure that she puts her hair up but at the same time is someone who sleeps on her office couch and doesn’t use a hairbrush.
When putting together the fit of Elizabeth Holmes, costume designer Claire Parkinson wanted it to be askew from the beginning. In high school, she was put in ill-fitting and trendy clothes to portray her as an outsider. This became a throughline in every conversation around who she was. For Parkinson, she did the opposite of what she usually does: untailored clothes. The unflattering clothes tied into the nuance and subtly they were looking for to create an unnatural feeling. Among the crew, that famous black turtleneck represented armor.
Once the red lip enters her everyday makeup routine she becomes a different person. When she first talked to Katherine about the project, Make-up Dept. Head Jorjee Douglass was very excited about the red lip. While doing the research, Jorjee noticed that nothing was ever consistent with Holmes. The tech CEO would do whatever she needed to reach her goal and that made it fun for Douglass.
A major star of this series is the song choices. Back to Black was originally scripted into the series and Music Supervisor Maggie Phillips was asked if she could beat it. Music is used in the series as a time stamp and screams that era. That leaves few songs to choose from. Back to Black ended up being the perfect song with the lyrics going with her black costume and the soulful music.
The first step for Production Designer Cat Smith to craft the spaces was to hit the internet for Theranos office photos. She was lucky to have an insider connection through her scientist husband to get some Theranos insight. Smith wanted to add the weirdness of Elizabeth in the Theranos building. She added a subversive take on internet companies by taking her Theranos photos and making a superspace of it all from the green pods to the brainstorming space. The most important part was the Theranos machines. They needed to look like how they acted so the story was believable. Smith believed she wanted them to work and not seem like a scam from the beginning. The key to their look was looking at the older version of the machines and making it as believable as possible to make it look like it would work. The creators wanted to make sure the world felt real from a functional lab set to a weird crew tapping into their inner Elizabeth Holmes to make it as authentic as possible.
The limited series has a stacked cast of amazing performances. For Casting Director Jeanie Bacharach, the story is so surreal with thoughts of how people feel for this time it was important to cast grounded actors. Audiences needed to believe they could be academics and scientists. It was more about matching qualities instead of physical looks as well as making them unique.
The entirety of the series was beautifully acted with each element from hair to production thoroughly thought out to create a grounded world with a story that feels outlandish.