The Grevin Museum in Paris, France, said it will fix the skin tone of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s wax figure. The announcement came after Johnson expressed concerns with the figure’s depiction of his skin color.
In a video posted on Instagram Wednesday, the museum’s managing director, Yves Delhommeau, said that after seeing the figure under display lights, “we got a big surprise.”
“His skin tone seemed too pale,” Delhommeau said. “And we suddenly realized we might have got it wrong.”
The issue was raised on Sunday when comedian James Andre Jefferson Jr. poked fun at the wax figure in a video posted on Instagram.
“That’s how Paris thinks he looks,” Jefferson said, sharing an image of the figure. “They turned The Rock into the pebble.”
“It looks like The Rock hasn’t seen the sun a day in his life,” Jefferson added.
The Dwayne Johnson wax figure is unveiled at Musee Grevin on October 16, 2023 in Paris, France.MARC PIASECKI/GETTY IMAGES / GETTY IMAGES
Johnson, who is Black and Samoan, shared Jefferson’s video on his own Instagram page, writing in the caption that he was going to have his team reach out to the Grevin Museum to “update” the figure, starting with its skin color.
“For the record, I’m going to have my team reach out to our friends at Grevin Museum, in Paris France so we can work at ‘updating’ my wax figure here with some important details and improvements- starting with my skin color,” he wrote. “And next time I’m in Paris, I’ll stop in and have a drink with myself.”
Delhommeau said that after the star shared the video about the wax figure with his 391 million Instagram followers, it attracted widespread social media attention.
“Painting on wax is very complicated,” Delhommeau said. “It’s a long process, like oil painting.” He explained that the artists worked on Johnson’s skin texture using photographs and that the star looked different from one picture to the next.
“We’re going to work on this amazing waxwork so it better represents him,” he continued. “It’s been a major task for the sculptor. We’re going to keep improving it! Long live Dwayne Johnson, who’s going to stop in and have a drink with us in Paris soon.”
Sculptor Stéphane Barret said in a news release on Monday that it was difficult to craft Johnson’s smirk using the chosen sample photo. The museum also said teams went to gyms in hopes of finding someone who matched Johnson’s proportions.
“It’s true that it’s always impressive to make people of this size,” Barret said in a statement. “We were lucky enough to find someone who physically matched Dwayne Johnson’s build and height. That really allowed us to get it right.”
