Extreme makeovers: How did the stars of Capote, Breakfast on Pluto, and Transamerica go through such radical transformations to play their gay or trans characters?

by Michael Giltz
February 28, 2006

In Transamerica the difficult challenge for costumer Danny Glicker was making a small and feminine woman like Huffman convincing as awkward at being a girl. “Felicity has a gorgeous body and is so petite,” says Glicker. “When I first met her, I thought, How am I going to do this? She’s gorgeous! So we did lots of little tricks. I dropped her waistline slightly so her waist was sitting at her hips. Felicity has a gorgeous, tiny waist, but of course [her character] Bree has a more masculine waist.”

One big help came from trans people, specifically film consultants Calpernia Addams and Andrea James, who run a company called Deep Stealth to help in all facets of a person’s transition. “One of the things Andrea and Calpernia pointed out to me was that very often when you transition later in life, as Bree has, you haven’t been building your wardrobe your whole life,” says Glicker. “You have to go out and buy everything all at once. And when you go out on that sort of shopping trip, you have as many mistakes as you do successes.”

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