Whether he’s playing super soldier Bucky Barnes in the Marvel Cinematic Universe or former President Donald Trump in The Apprentice, Sebastian Stan knows his face is front and center for many of his roles.
“As an actor, this is what we got, and we’ve got to use it somehow,” he told Yahoo Entertainment, gesturing to his face. “I think it’s important to keep growing and expanding. It’s easy to get comfortable … and then it just gets boring and you want to find a challenge.”
Stan took on a challenge by starring in A Different Man as a shy actor named Edward who undergoes a medical treatment to eliminate his facial difference, radically changing his life. When he meets Oswald, a charismatic man with the same condition he had, Edward becomes obsessed.
Oswald is played by Adam Pearson, an actor with neurofibromatosis, which caused his face to be covered in tumors. A Different Man writer-director Aaron Schimberg told Yahoo Entertainment that he crafted the role of confident and popular Oswald specifically with Pearson in mind, and it would never have happened without him.
Schimberg’s goal was to have Pearson play a version of himself taken to “wild extremes” — showcasing his acting ability in a different kind of role from the shy, timid ones in which disabled actors are often typecast.
“Oswald is like me, but with the volume turned up to 11,” Pearson told Yahoo Entertainment. “I reckon if I was like that all the time, my friends would find me and sock me … but it was fun to be loud and be gregarious.”
For the scenes set before Edward’s facial transformation, Stan was sculpted into several layers of makeup and prosthetics — but that’s just the character’s outer appearance. Stan said that speaking candidly with Pearson about his experience living with neurofibromatosis helped him really get under Edward’s skin.
Stan also went through the script with Kaleb Yohay, a doctor who specializes in neurofibromatosis, and spent time scouring YouTube for testimonials from other people with the condition. He also spoke to a woman named Elna Baker, whose 2016 segment on This American Life details her experience with drastic weight loss that rendered her unrecognizable to her neighbors.
“[Baker] talks extensively about how that impacted her life and sense of self, and it was helpful for me to hear her point of view about that because there are a lot of similarities between our stories,” Stan said. “I had a lot of help.”
To Pearson, many scenes in the film showcase what it’s really like to live with a facial difference. One of the most striking examples is how people act overly familiar with Edward’s pre-transformation character, as if they’ve met him before. He was able to draw parallels between that tendency and what Stan might have experienced as a celebrity.
“I said there are two ways to lose your anonymity in society — that’s either to have a disfigurement or become famous,” Pearson said. “I’ve completely shot myself in both [feet] on that.”
Schimberg, who has a cleft palate, said working with Pearson on the set of his 2018 movie Chained for Life helped him stop fearing judgment about his own facial difference. His goal for the film isn’t “to teach anybody else what to do” within the industry, though he offered some advice.
“I think when you have more people behind the scenes — more writers and directors with disabilities — you’re going to have more well-rounded portraits of disability,” he said. “I would tell film executives to hire more of those people.”
Ultimately in making this film, Schimberg wanted to see himself represented.
“I’m not saying some directors have no right to portray disability, but if it comes from a personal place, it’s going to be more truthful,” he said.
