Trevor Newlin: Embodying the Xenomorph in Alien: Romulus
Trevor Newlin shared his incredible experience performing the Xenomorph in Alien: Romulus.
Since 1979, the Alien franchise created by Ridley Scott forever engraved itself into pop culture–and since the first film, several installments have brought a blend of horror and action to the silver screen. Although each iteration has had compelling protagonists, it is undeniable that its titular character is at the center of it all. The Xenomorph’s lore has expanded and evolved over the years, but no sequel (except maybe for James Cameron’s Aliens) has been able to bring that heightened level of fright that Scott’s film introduced all those years ago. Credit must be given to the visionary, biomechanical alien design of H.R. Giger that was brought to life by only a handful of creature performers. With the rapid technological progression of CGI, recent Alien projects have required less and less human efforts for the Xenomorph, arguably diluting the fear factor–until Uruguayan filmmaker Fede Álvarez decided to take the franchise back to its origins in Alien: Romulus. Setting the movie between 1979’s Alien and Aliens, Álvarez found the sweet spot for a new tale with the perfect combination of practical and digital effects that, with the legendary artistry of Legacy Effects and the outstanding creature performance by Trevor Newlin, rebirthed the terrifying Xenomorph.
Trevor Newlin’s collaboration with Legacy Effects began on The Mandalorian Season Two where the suit actor portrayed a background Wookiee. Three years later, after performing in a yeti suit for a national commercial for Amazon, he received a call that forever changed his career trajectory. Embodying the Xenomorph in Alien: Romulus was a big undertaking that required an extensive amount of research, which Newlin explained started with Bolaji Badejo, the original performer in the first Alien film: “I went back and watched any footage I could find. I watched his screen test, and I don’t even know how many times I’ve watched Alien. It starts with him, of course, because his performance is iconic and it makes the Xenomorph what it is today. From there I went to Carl [Toop – the suit actor in Aliens], then Tom Woodruff Jr. who kind of spearheaded the franchise for a very long time with [special effects designer] Alec Gillis alongside him. With AVP, I watched a lot of Tom’s stunt work then also a little bit of Goran [D. Kleut] from Covenant … even though they CGI over a lot of it, there’s still footage of him in the suit moving around and doing different things.” Newlin added, “I took a good piece of all of that, I would say mostly Badejo and Woodruff because I knew that Fede really wanted to bring back what made the Xenomorph weird and freaky and human but not human at the same time. Also, Alien: Isolation was a massive inspiration for the film, so I watched a bunch of documentaries about how they made the AI for Stompy, how he moved to further enhance what I was going to be doing.”
“A lot of my movement became crawling … As opposed to being bipedal, I became a quadruped, which was different and interesting because we had not planned for that. I think what we put together with Legacy Effects, myself and Fede [Álvarez] was a really unique blend of [Bolaji] Badejo and some of what Tom [Woodruff] did with the other Alien films and AVP franchise.”
The Xenomorph research aided Trevor’s performance, but didn’t necessarily define it. Newlin revealed that Fede Álvarez wanted to bring a more animalistic nature to the alien, and whereas Badejo’s embodiment was mostly humanoid, for Alien: Romulus the director wanted the creature to crawl more: “They had the animatronic and bunraku, and the only thing that was able to crawl out of the three was me, so I got to be used a lot more than what was originally planned in the film. We workshopped the crawling right there offset while they were filming. On top of that, the heads for the Xeno were built for standing, so for me to be able to crawl, they had to rig them a different way. A lot of my movement became crawling … As opposed to being bipedal, I became a quadruped, which was different and interesting because we had not planned for that. When you get on a set, things change in an instant, and you just roll with it. I think what we put together with Legacy Effects, myself and Fede [Álvarez] was a really unique blend of [Bolaji] Badejo and some of what Tom [Woodruff] did with the other Alien films and AVP franchise.”
Stepping into the Xenomorph suit in and of itself was not a challenge. The creature performer explained that the process took around 20 minutes, and he would be in it for the entire day–with the option to remove certain pieces to make it more comfortable. However, when it came to filming, the main challenge was without a doubt visibility. He said, “Normally, there’s stunt heads that are involved in these situations, but ours were fully animatronic. One of them had a little opening in the neck to give me a little vision for certain stunts for safety purposes, but most of the time I was looking right out of the mouth of the Xenomorph, and if the mouth was shut, then I was in a little cave, hanging out. Thankfully, the mobility in the suit was really good. There were no limitations, which was awesome for being such a massive undertaking of what I’m wearing on my body.”
Alien: Romulus introduced a new stage of the Xenomorph life cycle: the cocoon. The alien’s rebirth to adult form was a dangerous and difficult sequence to film, said Newlin. A meticulous collaboration between Legacy Effects, director Fede Álvarez, and the suit actor was imperative in order to successfully execute the scene in only a couple of takes due to the tearing of the embryo. Newlin shared, “A lot of people won’t realize that for me to go through that cocoon, we had multiple things happen: we had a person working on the ooze, another puppeteering the mouth, someone holding the tail, and two people pushing me through the cocoon, because you had to apply force to that embryo to break … It was a legit birth!” He then confessed that the most challenging part of the cocoon sequence was being upside down for several takes after the embryo was broken. The actor recalled almost passing out, which eventually led the filmmakers to shooting the scene a lot faster: “Being upside down is already a lot on a human being, and adding to it is the head limiting your visibility and the flight harness taking your breath away. Funny thing is that when I was doing my research, I found out that when Badejo shot the scene where the Xenomorph kills Brett in the first film, he almost passed out. They brought in a stunt double, and he did pass out doing that scene. After all these years the Xeno head still causes the same issues that it did back in 1979 [laughs]!”
From big to small moments, Trevor Newlin shared that his favorite one was a quick shot of the Xenomorph in the hive, popping around the corner: “They couldn’t get the animatronic hand up there, so it’s me standing on the dolly of the animatronic with the glove on, giving life to that hand. I remember Alec Gillis telling me at that moment, ‘That’s the real stuff right there.’ That’s when you know you’re a suit actor, doing this type of stuff. There is never a disconnect between the puppeteer team and me. We are always working in collaboration.”
The suit actor ended the interview by reflecting upon his incredible experience working on Alien: Romulus–hoping that this is just the beginning of his embodiment of the Xenomorph in the franchise: “It’s an honor to portray one of the most iconic creatures in cinema of all time, to be one of those very few people that have done that.” If you want to learn more about Trevor Newlin’s creature performances, then make sure to follow him on Instagram.
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