The popular celebrity wax sculptures are created at Madame Tussauds’ Vienna museum in London and take roughly three to four months — and $264,338.75 in U.S. dollars — to complete.
Madame Tussauds’ wax figures tend to be a hit among celebrities and fans alike, but while some completely capture the essence, others seem to miss the mark. The latest in the latter lineup? Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.
The Grévin Museum in Paris debuted The Rock’s wax statue on Oct. 16, and observers were notably confused about its missing color. Social media users instantly pointed out that the figure lacked Johnson’s skin tone and ignored his mixed Black and Samoan heritage.
The “Black Adam” star assured his 392 million Instagram followers that he would have his team reach out to the Grévin Museum staff “so we can work at ‘updating’ my wax figure here with some important details and improvements, starting with my skin color.”
Madame Tussauds has since apologized and promised to update Johnson’s wax image tone.
Complex reported the Johnson statue’s lack of likeness reminded rap music fans of a wax depiction of New Orleans rap legend Lil Wayne that debuted in the summer of 2022 at the Hollywood Wax Museum in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee — and is still on display there.
Lil Wayne’s figure, which was widely decried for its tone’s noticeably lightened difference from his actual skin color, has now going viral, over a year later, prompted a response from the rapper, who wrote Monday on X: “Sorry wax museum but dat s—t ain’t me!”
“You tried tho,” he continued, “and I appreciate the effort.”
According to their website, all wax sculptures it displays are created at Madame Tussauds Vienna in London. The construction takes roughly three to four months, involves at least 10 different artists, and it costs around €250,000, or $264,338.75 in U.S. dollars.
The creation procedure necessitates an extensive, highly skilled crew for its several phases, including taking over 500 specific measurements of the head and torso to ensure sculptors can construct an identical celebrity double.
The initial process is to sculpt the figure, then it moves on to the molding stage. Step Three entails gathering all of the details needed for the face and head, and all of the phases come together to form Step Four: Making the final figure.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Madame Tussauds received flak in last February for their Zendaya wax figure, which her admirers believed resembled everyone except the “Euphoria” star.
Tussauds mishandled its Beyoncé wax figure in 2017 but rectified the situation with a better, more accurate one in 2019.
Rihanna has also had several wax statues created in her image for Madame Tussauds museums, some much finer than others.
While Madame Tussauds doesn’t always get their depictions just right, there are some Black celebrities who’ve had frighteningly lifelike representations of themselves crafted from wax, including popular actress Angela Bassett, rap icon Missy Elliott, singer-actress-show host Jennifer Hudson and stage and screen talent Billy Porter.
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