- You know what this look is
- What?
- Lady Godiva.
- Without a horse.
- On an imaginary horse
[man chuckling] - Imaginary horse.
- Yes, and she's riding and she's riding.
[upbeat funky music]
- Hi Vogue, I'm Natasha Lyonne.
- And I'm Ted Gibson.
- And today, we're gonna be doing something
that we think of as a kind of,
if Stevie Nicks and Bernadette Peters
took a bunch of LSD,
had a baby and then went down the rabbit hole
into wherever Alice in Wonderland lives.
Is that correct. - Can I do that?
- Honey? You were born to do it. Okay.
[upbeat funky music]
- What I love about Natasha's hair,
in particular, is that she has many different textures.
And what I love to do is I love to add texture.
I love to give volume.
So as I take one side down
as you can see it on the other side,
Natasha's hair is a little bit shorter.
- Uh oh. - So what I'm
gonna do for you today is
I'm going to teach you my technique in doing hair extensions
because it is not Hollywood's best secret any longer.
What I wanted to do is I wanted to come through
and soften up Natasha's hair
with her own curl pattern
and kind of blend it a little bit
with the actual hair extension.
- Marcel, who does the hair on Russian Doll was like
why don't we tip it further into red,
also because we knew Rebecca Henderson
was gonna be sort of like the platinum blonde
and then Greta Lee had sort of brown hair.
And in order to be functioning Charlie's Angels
we needed one of each.
I had like a thing where, you know,
like to sort male rock stars in the '70's or something,
always used to have that kinda shag, sunglasses
and then you don't even notice what the person looks like.
And that's what I like.
I like being half a half a muppet.
And so some somehow the the red hair
really just gelled it all together.
- I believe that a woman is more loyal to her hair colorist
than she has to her haircutter.
- Interesting, really?
- Uh huh.
I think because there's something
about getting the right shade for a woman
that I think is really important.
And when you tap into that, it changes everything.
- With Ted and I, the first time we met,
I was actually with Molly R. Stern was doing my makeup
and Molly and I have been,
sort of like, like best friends, sisters.
I think we were doing James Corden
and I never met Ted before,
but when I walked into the room,
it was like Molly and Ted,
and the three of us just spent the next hour and a half,
like, laughing hysterically for no particular reason,
playing all these songs,
singing along with the songs.
The vibe between Ted and Molly and I, was so special.
It just sort of nothing mattered in that moment
because it was kind of,
the air in the room was just good.
And then after that day I was like,
I just tried to have Ted
come with me everywhere all the time.
And luckily you would say yes,
even though you're one of the
busiest men in show business.
- Oh, I guess, it is Hollywood.
- It is Hollywood. [Ted chuckles]
- If you decide that you're
going to go buy some hair extensions,
they can be slightly off if you want them to be.
They don't have to match exactly.
Because if you know that if you have hair color
or if you color your hair, you know that as it's
on your head and it grows out and grows out and grows out
it gets a little bit lighter on the ends.
So it's very important to know that you don't
have to have it specifically, exactly the same color.
You can tweak it just a little bit for yourself.
I'm adding texture, I'm adding movement.
I'm giving it just a little bit of softness
because what I want to do,
is I'm gonna put in the next hair extension
that I'm gonna show you in just a second.
So with hair extensions, you can buy them with clips.
These are clip-ons;.
- Interesting. - You can see.
Now when you purchase them
you can get seven, seven in a pack.
What's important to know is that there are rows
that have three clips on them.
There are rows that have two and some that have one.
What I did in the back, Natasha,
is I used the ones that are three to put in the back.
Because the head is a little larger in the back.
And then on the sides, I'm gonna use the twos.
I'm going to take a section diagonally
from the front hairline,
basically right above the eyebrow
All the way back,
to the back of the head.
I'm gonna clip that up.
Normally, on someone that has finer hair,
I would come back and use my tail comb
and back comb this area
so that when I put in the hair extension into that,
so it would hold.
I don't necessarily have to do that
because Natasha has enough texture.
So as I apply it,
clip it in place.
- You know what this is reminding me of?
When I was like, I don't know, maybe 12.
I was in New York and I was,
maybe at Gristede's or D'Agostino's or something.
One of our major supermarkets.
And I remember that there was a checkout lady
who had like soft curly hair down to her ankles.
- Down to her ankles.
- Yes, and I thought to myself at the time
that's what I'm gonna do with my hair.
You know, my mom, I remember used to do,
like, brushing out my knots
and I remember a lot of,
like, crying. - Did it hurt?
- Yeah. - Yeah?
- And then also in high school they would
make so much fun of me that I was like,
I never brushed my hair or something.
'Cause it was curly.
And I was like,
no, I brush it in the shower with the conditioner on.
- And what part of New York did you grow up in?
- Cause I don't - Well,
I was mostly, like Upper East Side,
- Okay. - And
- So, in the city?
- Yeah, but I think that
because I was a scholarship kid with a single mom,
they thought I was an easy target.
It was kind of like this source of pride
when I was a little girl.
But when I got to this weird uptight high school
it was suddenly like a symbol of being different.
- Yes. - And that it was a real,
you know, like that means there's something wrong with you,
otherwise your hair would grow out straight.
I always find that when I'm directing
and if I show up to a production meeting
and there's men there and I have straight hair,
that they tend to sort of accept me
as an authority, much easier.
- Yes. - And then
with the big curly hair, it's kind of like,
oh she has such wacky ideas.
[upbeat funky music]
- So what I'm doing now is I'm taking section by section
and I'm using my curling tong
and softening over Natasha,
the top of her hair,
and then coming back and using the iron
and rotating all the way around for only like two seconds
which gives me a softer curl pattern.
Do you see that?
And then that's what blends in with the hair extension.
And as I'm working,
I'm still concentrating on making sure
that I keep that frizziness.
I don't want it to be too curly.
The sexiness of it is the frizz
and the sexiness of it is how it feels and moves.
- The sexiness of it is very important to Ted and I,
we spend a lot of time focusing on that
because it's true that mostly that's
what we wanna be projecting.
So we come at that as a duo.
It feels like finally as a society,
we are starting to understand that this is,
like this wide spectrum
of what historically we've decided,
we had said was really narrow with regards to beauty
and that no matter what you looked like,
you were supposed to try to fit yourself
into this tiny little box.
And it was heartbreaking for so many people
because it does make you feel a certain type of way.
If you're seeing images constantly
that are just this homogenized,
- The same thing. - Single, single thing.
And you know that you're other,
but you're like struggling to say,
oh, my difference is kind of
what makes me special,
as opposed to sort of collectively
actually seeing that reflected in our images.
It puts my soul at so much ease,
when I think about little girls,
the idea that maybe they'll be able to spare themselves,
like just an inch of suffering around that.
That's so needless,
and also they're just such a more boring and lamer world.
Like, I don't wanna be a part of that.
[upbeat funky music]
- The fourth step I'm gonna talk to you about is product.
I think if you have naturally curly hair
one of the things that Natasha always says,
is that she uses a leave-in conditioner.
She runs a wide-tooth comb in the shower.
I think that you want to make sure
that every strand of hair is saturated with product.
Now, when I diffuse Natasha's hair,
when I'm getting her ready.
I use several different products in order to
create that really nice, beautiful curl pattern,
that she's used to having.
One of the products is I use a spray-on detangler
and then I use another product
called Shooting Star Texture Meringue
that actually gives a little bit of control
and a little bit of shine,
which I think is really important.
[can squirting]
Curly hair absorbs light.
So women usually that have curly hair are looking
for something that's gonna be shine enhancing
because of that absorption of light.
And if you have straight hair, it reflects light.
So as it reflects light,
you always have light and shine.
Curly hair girls,
it's always important to have a cool water rinse.
It's a secret, a cool water rinse,
before you get outta the shower.
- Ted, I kinda wish you'd told me this a little bit sooner.
I also am learning a lot of secrets today.
I feel like I should have been privy to them.
But it's fine.
Life is a process.
- It's a process. [Ted chuckling]
- It's a process. - It's a process.
- Ah, look at this.
Diana Ross would be proud.
- What? - Yes,
I'm ready to go on stage.
I have a big concert tonight.
- Ain't no mountain high enough.
- Ain't no mountain of hair high enough.
Do we just need a little bit more?
[Ted chuckling] More, more, yes.
We're just about there.
Do you think they'll think it's too short?
- Do you think?
- Yes. I want them to almost think where's body hiding.
[Polaroid snapping]
[upbeat funky music]