The Substance actor Margaret Qualley said it took a year to recover from the after-effects on her skin from the prosthetics used in the film.
In an interview with the Happy Sad Confused podcast, the actor said she had to deal with skin irritation and acne that took a long time to subside.
It even got to the point where director Coralie Fargeat had to find a way to film Qualley's character without including the acne problem.
"They couldn't shoot my face anymore," she added. "At the end, when they're shooting up my skirt in the beginning credits, and it's like the palm trees all around, and they have these long lenses from the bottom, that's just because my face was so f***ed up."
Interestingly, she used the dilemma to her advantage while shooting for the Yorgos Lanthimos film Kinds of Kindness since one of the four characters she played has acne. "So, you know the character that has all that acne? That was just my acne from the prosthetics. And I was like, 'Oh, this is kind of perfect. I'm playing all these different characters. For one of them, we'll use all my crazy prosthetic acne.' It took me probably a year to recover physically from all of it."
A body-horror drama led by Demi Moore, The Substance did considerably well at the box office, impressive given the uncomfortable subject matter. The film combined a sci-fi concept with satirical elements to tell the story of an ageing celebrity who attempts to "regain" her youth after her producer lets her go as he begins to seek younger talent half her age. Demi Moore won her first Golden Globe award for her performance.