My Account  |  Sign up for our Mailing List  |  Cart Contents  |  Checkout   
Claude Thompson, Artist to Bob Hope and Richard Nixon, Dies at 89
Claude Thompson, Artist to Bob Hope and Richard Nixon, Dies at 89
Claude Thompson working on Mary Martin for a production of 'Annie Get Your Gun'
Photo courtesy of Local 706 

Posted: Tuesday September 11, 2012
Make-Up Artist magazine





Claude M. Thompson, a journeyman make-up artist who served entertainers and politicians, died Aug. 5 in Los Angeles. He was 89.

Thompson was born in Canton, S.D., May 24, 1923 and came to Los Angeles during the Great Depression. After a stint as a Navy pilot, he served as the NBC make-up department head in the late ’50s and early ’60s and received one of the first Emmy nominations for make-up on Alice Through the Looking Glass in 1966.

He also spent many years working in sitcoms and episodic television with The Dinah Shore Chevy Show, Let´s Make a Deal, Rowan and Martin´s Laugh In, The New Dick Van Dyke Show, The High Chaparral and Designing Women. He worked and traveled with Dinah Shore and Bob Hope.

Thompson made up many TV stars and politicians. His home contained personally inscribed photographs of Richard Nixon, Bobby Kennedy, Ronald and Nancy Reagan, Bob Hope, Lucille Ball, Elizabeth Taylor, Dean Martin, Dinah Shore and others, all thanking him for his work. Nixon allowed Thompson to make him up for the “Checkers” speech, but at the Nixon-Kennedy debate, Nixon told Thompson that make-up was not necessary. Nixon had, however, recently experienced health problems and had a dark beard shadow, so without make-up he appeared sickly and sweaty.

Thompson received his Local 706 Gold Card in 1990 and retired in 1993. He served the union on the Welfare Committee after his retirement.

Thompson died at home in his sleep on Aug. 5. He requested that his ashes be buried at sea by the Navy.

 
Subscribe To Our Make-Up Artist Magazine News Feed - RSS Help
Taking Age Make-up to New Extremes in Discovery's 'Curiosity' - Monday December 19, 2011
Taking Age Make-up to New Extremes in Discovery\'s \'Curiosity\'
For an episode of Discovery's Curiosity, called "Can I Live Forever?", make-up effects artist Danny Wagner and his team aged the forty-something MythBusters host Adam Savage to ages 65, 132 and 1,000.
2010 Primetime Emmy Nominations - Thursday July 08, 2010
2010 Primetime Emmy Nominations
On July 8, the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences announced the Creative Arts Emmy nominees. Click the full story to read the nominees in the make-up and hair categories.
Make-Up Artist Magazine Features Michael Jackson Retrospective - Monday July 06, 2009
Make-Up Artist Magazine Features Michael Jackson Retrospective
Following the recent death of Michael Jackson, Make-Up Artist magazine’s next issue (#79) will feature a retrospective of the King of Pop, featuring interviews with a number of make-up artists who worked with Jackson over the past three decades, as well as some exclusive, never-before-published photos.
Web Exclusive: Hellboy 2: The Golden Army, Young Hellboy - Monday August 04, 2008
Web Exclusive: Hellboy 2: The Golden Army, Young Hellboy
From a make-up perspective, the first major character to appear in Hellboy 2 is a younger version of the hero, seen in a 1955 prologue with Professor Broom (John Hurt). The Young Hellboy character was created by the Barcelona-based company DDT Efectos Especiales and played in a gender-bending twist by the company’s Montse Ribé.
 

Back in the Make-up Groove
Make-up Around the World
In a World ...
Fine Form
International Man of Make-up
Sultry Summer