Updated: May 07, 2022

"Here's a little history for you Ape fans/collectors:

(The Makeup)

The makeup is easily the most amazing part of the Planet of the Apes Saga. Key actors would spend hours before filming each day on set to have makeup applied. Makeup consisted of a pliable foam latex appliance attached to the skin with a variety of hair and other such items affixed to it. The appliances were so life like they enabled realistic facial impressions to be conved through these false skins. Because of time constraints and expense not all of the actors wore makeup. Many of the background characters wore pullover masks. In theory these actors would be in the background and their less realistic masks would be not visible to the viewer. But clearly in Beneath the Planet of the Apes the characters wearing makeup are seen clearly next to the ones wearing masks in many scenes. Pullover masks were made for the Chimpanzees, Gorillias, and Orangautauns; however the Gorilla ones are far more common as far more Gorillias were needed in vast battle scenes in the second Apes movie. The actual latex rubber facial appliances are sometimes seen forsale. Usually they are without the hair or fur. One should be careful not to confuse the originals from the movies and tv show with the ones marketed as part of commercial makeup appliance kits. In addition facial appliances were made for a special 30th anniversary Apes gathering and they are often easily confused with originals from the movies.

(The Costumes)

The costumes in the first, second, and last Planet of the Apes film were all the same. The gorilla soldier costume consisted of a dark leather vest, gloves, leather boots, a leather ammo strap, and an undersuit composed of paints and a shirt. Background Gorilla costumes were used in abundance in the second Apes film Beneath the Planet of the Apes. These costumes are constructed of a cheaper vinyl material for the vest and gloves; in additionn the ammo strap is not composed of real leather pouches but rather just folded over pieces of leather to simulate the effect. The background Gorilla costumes were intended to be used in scenes with vast numbers of Gorilla soldiers and in a way that they were not clearly up front with the main Gorilla costumes. However in several scenes during the various Gorilla soldier marches into the mutant layer one can see the main leather gorilla soldier costumes clearly side by side the cheaper vinyl ones. The vinyl vested gorillas usually all wore the chepear pullover mask. The orangautan and Chimpanzee costumes in the first second and last Planet of the Apes films were the same.

In Conquest of the Planet of the Apes the Ape costumes were entirely different. They were all jumpsuits. The Gorrilla's wore red jumpsuits and the Chimpanzees wore the green ones. These jumpsuits are similar to the style of jumpsuits used in various other Tweenith Century Fox productions of the late 60's and 70's such as Time Tunnel.

(The Weapons)

As with almost every production the vast majority of the weapons used are nonfiring. The ape weapons that fired were in essence real firearms hidden within a metal shell that was painted with a woodstroke finish. Almost all of the fring Ape guns have that near all wooden apperance which is due to clever painting of the metal shell. Several styles of guns were used by the Apes. At least two styles of rifles and one pistol style were used. Stunt rifles were constructed especially for use in Beneath the Planet of the Apes. Such stunt rifles are composed mostly of wood with a crude strap attached to them.