William Tuttle

Who was William Tuttle?

William J. Tuttle was an American make-up artist. Born in Jacksonville, Florida, at a young age he was forced to leave school to support his mother and younger brother. After a series of odd-jobs and a brief stint in his own band, Tuttle moved to Hollywood, California to work under makeup artist Jack Dawn at Twentieth Century Pictures.

In 1934, Tuttle and Dawn moved to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Working as Dawn's assistant, Tuttle supervised the makeup work in such movies as The Wizard of Oz and Father of the Bride.

Tuttle created makeup for many of Hollywood’s biggest stars, among them Judy Garland; Gene Kelly; Katharine Hepburn and Esther Williams. Eventually he worked his way up to head of the studio's makeup department,

In the 1950s he would be responsible for the makeup in Singin' in the Rain, Forbidden Planet, North by Northwest and The Time Machine. He reused pieces he first created for The Time Machine in The Eye of the Beholder, one of his many Twilight Zone contributions.

In 1964, Tuttle received a special Academy Award for his work on George Pal's 7 Faces of Dr. Lao; this was 17 years before makeup became an official Oscar category. Later work included Logan's Run and Young Frankenstein. Tuttle is the subject of the 1968 MGM short The King of the Duplicators where he demonstrated some of his work.