A bit about Madame Tussauds

I couldn’t find any reference to my particular wax figure on the web but I did find out some interesting facts.

• It can take up to 4 months and cost up to $125,000 to make a figure!
• Their clothing is often bought at celebrity auctions increasing the authenticity
• It takes up to 5 weeks to insert a full head of hair. There can be over 10,000 real human hairs on one head, albeit my Humphrey was quite bald. I wondered if he was really that bald, or if there was a cost saving measure in place. The hair is regularly washed like real hair once in place.
• Special attention is taken to duplicate the eyes and bring them to life, often using red silk threads to mimic the subject’s real veins!
• Several thin layers of oil paint are absorbed into the wax giving it the translucently of human skin, even using knotted rope under the skin to simulate veins.

Elizabeth Taylor, Marlon Brando, Humphrey Bogart and Grace Kelly Life casts courtesy hollywood-elsewhere.com

Many more facts can be found at Madame Tussaud’s online here: http://www.madametussauds.com/London/About/SculptorsBlog/

I was unable to find much on values of used figures and they rarely come up for auction, but I did find a Charlie Chaplin that went for $5,000 - so they don’t really hold their value monetarily, but if the subject did a sitting, the public archival/history value is priceless especially if the subject sat for the sculpture.