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Professional shapeshifter Alexis Stone loves conjuring celebrities from beyond the grave. For Halloween, the performer and makeup artist transformed himself into Michael Jackson. A few weeks earlier, he played the late fashion designer Thierry Mugler. But the inspiration for Stone’s latest prosthetic makeover wasn’t just alive: She was standing right next to him.
Glenn Close is a familiar muse for Stone, who cast her in costume as “101 Dalmatians” character Cruella de Vil in 2023. On Monday night, the actor was upstaged by her strange counterpart at the Season 2 premiere of “All’s Fair” in New York. “I think seeing a six-foot man impersonate you is an out-of-body experience,” Stone said in a phone call. “It was ironically Glenn who reassured me, rather than me reassuring Glenn.” It was the first time Stone had come face to face with someone he was impersonating. He called it a “visual problem.”
It was actually a diagram of Glenn, with clear overlaps: both were dressed in nearly identical custom Fecal Matter looks inspired by the brand’s September show — a brand Stone said had “Cruella ways.” Close wore a burkina fabric coat dress, while Stone wore the matching blazer and skirt. The two had the same shade of icy white bob, not to mention their blush placement, lip shade, and tight smile on camera.
Unlike Close, Stone is not part of the “All’s Fair” cast. The stunt was commissioned by series director Ryan Murphy, also behind other costume TV series like “American Horror Story,” “The Beauty” and “American Love Story.” “If there was anyone who could help facilitate this, it was Ryan Murphy,” Stone said. “He really understands the complexity of bringing these characters to life.”
These kinds of headline-grabbing appearances have become Stone’s raison d’être and a key part of his business model. After making a name for himself online with his full body transmogs, Stone gained attention from the fashion community. In 2022, renegade designer Demna—another sort of stunt master with a subversive reverie for celebrity culture—discovered Stone while he was creative director at Balenciaga and sat him front row at his March show in Paris, dressed as the character from Robin Williams’ 1993 film Mrs. Doubtfire. Stone’s arrival as the chubby matron instantly went viral. Since then, he has attended several Balenciaga shows before Demna joined Gucci, as well as shows for Jean Paul Gautlier, Diesel and Boss – without ever dressing like him. No detail is too small for Stone and his team to recreate: from custom-made contact lenses to the perfect iris shade, to the custom-made prosthetics and perfumes that give it character.
At Paris Fashion Week in March, Stone went from VIP guest to model after walking in the Matières Fécales show. The collection, titled “The One Percent,” was presented as a critique of the bourgeois class. Stone was dressed like an aesthetically-conscious conservative housewife with a crisp button-down shirt, A-line skirt, peroxide blowout, and fake facelift sutures. In addition to designing her own makeup, Stone also created the gruesome post-surgery prosthetics worn by the other models.
The budget required for these realistic reenactments is similar to that of a traditional TV show’s costume department, even reaching into the six figures, he told CNN in 2025. In a sign of the times, Stone’s transformations take place primarily on social media — a costly investment in virality. But even though these moments feel decidedly modern, the fact that Stone’s prosthetics are real and not AI-generated already makes his work a dying art. “People’s brains adapt very quickly to seeing artificial images,” said Stone, who added that he felt an urgency to get the physical contraption up and running. “The future of practical effects is really uncertain right now.”
“I really like making the impossible possible,” he continued. “Glenn is number 22 or 23 in terms of (the number of my) transformations. I keep some of that in my personality.”
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