American Horror Story
As one of Ryan Murphy ’s prized stars , Sarah Paulson has been givena bounty of interesting and challenging charactersto play overAmerican Horror Story ’s nearly ten - year campaign . Arguably , her most notable persona on the show to appointment was when she played get married twins Bette and Dot on Murphy ’s long - running hit horror anthology series .
Paulson ’s Bette and Dot were two of the chief characters in time of year four ofAmerican Horror Story , titledFreak Show . The sister were enter to join the ranks of the"freaks " in the local circus . Their vastly different personality and motives make them to constantly jar through out the season .
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Playing one complicated lineament is often plenty of work for a performer . Paulson , however , had to keep the challenge of playing two difficult characters at the same time . The process of sew together her carrying into action as Bette and Dot together to exist in the same prospect was anything but simple .
Sarah Paulson’s Scenes As Bette & Dot Were Very Complicated
Whenever a set of conjoined twins are featured on screen , each twin is typically played by a different performer . Murphy made the very conscious alternative to have Paulson play each baby in parliamentary procedure to present her with a different acting challenge . Of course , the two - for - one role did flex out to be quite the challenge for Paulson and many others as well . Every scene Paulson filmed forAHS : Freak Showended up taking between 12 - 15 hours to take . The first dance step in the process was creating two molds of Paulson ’s head — one to represent Bette and one to represent Dot . She needed to wear custom dressesto accommodate skylark two head at once . When she was roleplay one twin , she ’d be wearing the other sister ’s mould on her shoulder . In accession to that , she would wear an spike piece that would feed her the paired Gemini ’s dividing line so she could respond consequently .
Just as she did n’t want another actress playing one of the twins , Paulson did n’t want another performer to read her dialog off - camera for her . Paulson pre - record all of Bette and Dot ’s respective duologue so she could play one twin ’s telephone circuit in her ear while she was perform as the other . She was firmly planted in the role of each sis , and borrow specific tones , attitude , backstories , and facial expressions for each . Part of the ground for the recollective minute required to film all of Paulson ’s scenes was her pauperization to take all separate aspects of Bette and Dot and consistently keep up with them for every closemouthed - up , medium pellet , and master transcription of Dot and Bette .
The time and effort paid off . Murphy pass away on to praise Paulson ’s performance as perhaps the best thing he ’s ever seen her do — andPaulson has a lot of groovy rolesunder her belt . After contract a brief suspension fromAmerican Horror Storyin time of year nine , Paulson ’s reappearance to the serial has been herald for time of year ten . As the show presently has no remainder in peck , fans will likely be eager to see if she top her meticulous performance as Bette and Dot inupcoming season of the show .
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