In our Halloween episode Milena and Megan get spooky with 1950s monster movie special effects artist Milicent Patrick & prolific serial killer/chemist Giulia Tofana









Milicent Patrick







Happy Halloween everyone! Sure, here in America the scariest holiday is right around the corner – Election Day – instead of facing that nightmare of a reality we’re getting spooky. Today we’re covering a forgotten woman of Hollywood’s Movie Monster history, animator, illustrator, actress, and special effects artist Milicent Patrick.



While sexism plays heavily in her career, we cover what it took to make a monster (hint: over 170,000$), how to get hired as a makeup artist at Universal and how bad bosses get what’s coming to them.



Selected Works



Milicent sketching creature designs, shown with Bud Westmore







Image of the 1954 Gil-man, aka the Creature from the Black Lagoon. Milicent contributed to the creature design and custom paintwork for the mask



1955 photo of Milicent sketching Kirk Douglas while on set of ‘Man Without a Star’



In addition to her makeup effects and acting, Milicent also provide illustration works. Above, samples from The Westmore Beauty Book Milicent illustrated





* Creature from the Black Lagoon Movie – Film that Milicent worked primarily on during her career as a special effects artist * Hearst Castle – Ridiculously American mansion commissioned by publishing tycoon William Hearst and designed by America’s first woman architect Julia Morgan* CalArts – Where Milicent attended school, when it was still Chouinard Art Institute. After school went on to become one of Disney’s first women animators * Bud Westmore – Head of Universal’s make up department for over 20 years, hired Milicent. By all accounts major butthole of a boss



Wanna Know More?



Check out:



* The Lady from the Black Lagoon by Mallory O’Meara* The Fantastic Mystery of Milicent Patrick by Vincent Di Fate







Giulia Tofana



1903 painting The Love Potion by Evelyn De Morgan. No records of what Giulia looked like have survived



It’s Rome, 1640. You’re a upper-class woman with piece-of-shit husband.