Dick Smith, the Oscar-winning ‘Godfather of make-up’ who amused and fascinated moviegoers by devising unforgettable transformations of Marlon Brando in The Godfather and Linda Blair in The Exorcist, among others, has died. He was 92.
Smith, the first make-up artist to win an Academy Award for lifetime achievement, died in California of natural causes. His death was confirmed by Sue Cabral-Ebert of the Make-up Artists and Hairstylists Guild.
Smith transformed the middle-aged Brando into the jowly patriarch Vito Corleone, the teenage Blair into a terrifying demon, and William Hurt into a mass of protoplasm for Altered States.
Smith won an Oscar in 1985 for his work on Amadeus, where he turned F. Murray Abraham into an elderly man as Mozart’s rival Salieri.