From the beginning, Matt Reeves didn’t want Colin Farrell to disappear behind a pile of prosthetics.

When his discussions with the actor began before filming “The 2022,” The BatmanThe primary focus was on the inspiration for Oz Cobb, rather than whether Farrell should resemble comic book depictions of the classic DC villain for both the film and the HBO series. The Penguin which premieres on September 19th.

“We talked a lot about Fredo. We talked about John Cazale in The Godfather, and the idea of ​​maybe giving him a penguin nose or somehow disfiguring Colin’s face to give the impression of someone who was overlooked, someone who had this ambition but was ridiculed and despised,” Reeves recalled to Deadline. “One day, (prosthetic designer) Mike Marino suddenly said, ‘Let me show you what I’ve been working on.’ Mike is an incredible artist and he made this sculpture. I’m telling you, the sculpture looks exactly like what Oz looks like now. It’s incredible. And I thought, ‘Wait, what?’ We had never said, ‘Let’s just take Colin and turn him into something we’ve never seen before.’ I said, ‘This is Colin Farrell. I have to tell the studio now that he’s not going to look like Colin Farrell.'”

Typically, when Hollywood asks an actor to change their appearance for a role, some semblance of their identity remains. Despite an absurdly fake nose and a little extra girth, Steve Carell was still recognizable in the 2011 film FoxcatcherAnd even with a fat suit (which in itself sparked controversy about why Ryan Murphy should have just cast an obese actress), there was no chance of confusion between Sarah Paulson as Linda Tripp in 2016’s The Last Man. American criminal history.

But nothing, absolutely nothing, about the penguin screams Colin Farrell. The pretty face that appears in Apple’s Sugar has been replaced by a frightened face, receding hairline and hooked nose. He speaks with a scratchy New York accent. He walks with a limp due to an unexplained childhood disorder.

One reader posting on Deadline says, “I thought there might be flashbacks to when the Penguin was young, but no. They should have just cast Alfred Molina, who the Penguin ended up looking like anyway.”

In other words, why cast a hot guy in an ugly role?

“Colin’s looks are not talented,” argues penguin Showrunner Lauren LeFranc. “I’m sure that doesn’t hurt. But he’s such a soulful actor who can do both comedy and drama, and that quality is still in Oz. I understand the question of why not just cast someone who looks like Oz. Of course, I’m pretty biased, but after that experience and seeing what Colin can do, I realized that Oz would be a very different character if he wasn’t played by someone as talented and specific as Colin. He’s a really emotional, incredible actor, and Colin’s charm is really such a big part of Oz. I actually see Colin through Oz a lot now. I can’t speak for Colin about how that feels, but I imagine it’s pretty freeing for him in some ways.”

In a way, yes. The Irish actor has been quoted as saying, “I never want to put that damn suit and that damn head on again,” and he openly admits to Deadline that he “didn’t enjoy” seeing himself as a beastly-looking villain.

“I’m not there,” he admits.

But Farrell also recognizes the benefits that such a drastic change brings to the interests of art.

“When I first looked in the mirror and saw Oz looking back, it was really striking,” Farrell recalls. “It was strange. Have you ever seen videos of cats looking at themselves in the mirror and seeing themselves for the first time? It was a little bit like that. It’s the first time I’ve done something like this, so absorbed and under such brilliant design and sculpting as Mike Marino. There’s a kind of essence of obsession. When you get into it, it tells you so much. You start moving differently. You start looking different. You start feeling powerful. Your actual face isn’t there. So you almost don’t exist in a way. It wasn’t like I ever forgot who I was or anything. But it was a huge permission to just throw paint at the wall with a kind of greed that I hadn’t had the opportunity to do before. Sometimes you might hold back, but there was no holding back this time. It took so much work out of my hands.”

HBO, on the other hand, had no concerns that fans did not want to see the Oscar-nominated actor look so untypical unsightly.

“I was never nervous,” Sarah Aubrey, Head of Originals at HBO Max, told Deadline. “We got a first look at Colin’s work as Oz in The Batman and knew this was a powerful performance… wild, funny, vulnerable, devilish. And all of that could be the fuel for an epic series.”

At the very least, Marino probably deserves a little recognition at the 2025 Creative Arts Emmys.

“I said to Mike, Colin is an extraordinary actor, he’s so subtle and so beautiful, and if I lose any of that and it looks like a guy is wearing makeup, it’s a total failure,” Reeves adds. “And Mike said, ‘No, no one will ever know he’s wearing makeup. His expressiveness will be all Colin’s. You’ll never know it’s makeup.’ And he kept his word. What was interesting was that once Colin got into the makeup and worked on his voice, it was like something clicked and a new person emerged, and that person was Oz.”