Jonathan Bailey reveals had to wear a 'big old toupée' in Wicked after Bridgerton role damaged his hair
Bridgerton star Jonathan Bailey has revealed that he had to wear a toupée for his upcoming role as Fiyero in Wicked after his hair suffered damage from consecutive projects.
The British actor shared that his brunette locks took a beating when he first had to perm it reprising his role as Anthony Bridgerton in the third season of the Netflix series.
The 36-year-old actor had no downtime between shoots, moving directly from the Regency-era Bridgerton to the 1950s-set miniseries Fellow Travelers, where the on-set hairstylist had to straighten his already damaged hair.
He told Naomi Watts for Variety's Actors on Actors: “I had four days holiday in between finishing in Canada and finishing Bridgerton and then I had four days of Christmas and then went straight into Wicked.
“I went on holiday and my hair looked like coral like — as in, it was underwater, just floating around.”
Stunned by his admission, the Oscar nominee, 55, asked: “Oh, my God! How do you even have any hair left? Did it not fall out?”
To which Bailey replied with a smile: “I had a big old toupée!
“That's a big spoiler alert, but yeah, it's a toupée [as Fiyero in Wicked]. I'm in the choreography so it's flapping about!”
Wicked: Part One stars Cynthia Erivo as Elphaba, a green-skinned witch who becomes the Wicked Witch of the West, and her unlikely friend Glinda the Good Witch, played by Ariana Grande.
Wicked is a prequel to The Wizard of Oz and explores the events that happened before Dorothy’s journey on the yellow brick road. The musical, which premiered on Broadway in 2003, is hugely successful; it earned more than $1 billion (£820,000) in total revenue on Broadway in 2016.
Fans of the long-running musical have had their first look at the movie adaptation, with the trailer debuting during the Super Bowl.
Wicked: Part One will be released in the UK on November 27, 2024, a month earlier than anticipated. Wicked: Part Two, the second and final part of the production, is expected to follow a year later on Friday 26 November, 2025.
Director Jon M Chu last year announced on social media that the film would be in two parts, explaining that it “became impossible to wrestle the story of ‘Wicked’ into a single film without doing some real damage to it.”
Aside from Wicked, Bailey is expected to start filming his role in Jurassic World 4 in Thailand.
