Working on prosthetics for Universal hit Bride of Chucky, Paul Jones Effects Studio had the fun of delivering a stomach-churning image for a scene in which affable human Bride of Chucky star John Ritter gets a face full of nails, courtesy of everyone’s favorite misanthrope, Chucky.

The design for the nail-face was from the script and director Ronny Yu. ‘We figured that just having nails in his skin was a bit boring, so we put nails in his gums as well,’ says Jones. ‘It gave a nice kind of twisted effect to his mouth.’

To accomplish the look, the studio made a dental piece for Ritter to wear and cast the actor’s face with the mouthpiece in place to create the facial distortion. The shop sculpted all the skin prosthetics and used plastic nails, painted to look like metal. The nails were on small plastic bases which were glued on the skin, with foam prosthetics surrounding the base and blending up into the face.

Dentures were made to match the actor’s teeth, with nails embedded into the fake gums, and when in place, the dentures pushed the mouth into the same position as that of the live cast.

It took about a week and a half to create the makeup and about two hours to apply. The shop also created a Ritter replica using the live cast, resculpted and with real nails embedded in a silicon skin on top of a fully armatured body.