The Evansville Courier & Press reached out to and interviewed McManus Woodend, who performed the character from 2009 to 2018. Woodend, who’s presently engaged on his PhD in literacy and musical and visible thought, quipped that a few of his pals didn’t initially consider that he was the caveman, till he confirmed them visible proof of the prosthetics used to rework his facial options into the Neanderthal-like character. He mentioned that the prosthetics took three hours and an hour to placed on, and an hour and a half to take off.
Woodend mentioned it felt like he may get away with something whereas he was in costume and full prosthetics.
“Then I was just like everyone else and that was for the better,” he informed Evansville Courier & Press.
While he appeared in six function movies, Woodend’s portrayal because the caveman is his most well-known position. He defined that he landed the position after beating out about 1,000 different actors who auditioned for the position. At that point, Woodend was working at Full Sail University in Winter Park, Florida as a movie business outreach liaison.
Woodend’s first portrayal of the caveman character was a part of a marketing campaign tie-in between GEICO and Discovery Channel’s actuality present, Deadliest Catch. According to him, he traveled to Homer, Alaska for the shoot. What was imagined to be a one-week shoot felt like two months, Woodend commented, when the crew needed to take care of a blizzard and an avalanche.
It was through the D.C. Food and Wine Festival that Woodend because the caveman made his first public look in character. Recounting the expertise, he mentioned that had the chance to talk with cooking character Paula Deen on the pageant, who informed him he was “so lucky” that he will get to placed on make-up and “everybody loves [him]” and take it off with out problem, whereas she “[doesn’t] get to take off [her] makeup.”
Woodend would play the caveman character till the 2018 Winter Olympics at Pyeongchang, South Korea, the place the character final appeared. He is now a instructor and believes that he’s taking after his dad and mom, who’ve been lecturers for 30 to 40 years.
“It’s undoubtedly in my blood,” he mentioned. “I’ve a variety of pals within the instructing occupation.”