Check Out TV’s Most Killer True Crime Transformations

Embodying a real-life figure is no small feat—especially when that person is a murderer.

But Renée Zellweger makes it look criminally easy on NBC’s new limited series The Thing About Pam, premiering March 8. Like so many actors before her—from Darren Criss in American Crime Story to Hayden Panettiere in Amanda Knox: Murder on Trial—Zellwegger completely transformed into a true crime figure. 

The Oscar winner donned a body suit, prosthetics, and a bobbed wig to portray convicted killer Pam Hupp, whose case garnered national attention after a Dateline episode and corresponding podcast were released.

The makeover process was intense, with Zellwegger telling E! News that it initially took the team a whopping four hours to complete. But once they got the hang of it, she added, “we whittled it down to around two.” 

“They have a mind of their own, you know?” Zellwegger said of the prosthetics. “If everybody cooperates —the cheeks are feeling like playing nice, the nose, and everything. But yeah, it took about a couple of hours.”