Skincare claims to be a fictional story but it is inspired by real-life events concerning beautician to the stars Dawn DaLuise
*Warning: this story contains minor spoilers for Skincare*
A new film starring Elizabeth Banks begins by declaring that it is fictional but inspired by real events.
Those real events are near unbelievable as it involved a beautician who endured a horrendous ordeal only to end up being accused of hiring someone to murder a rival.
Skincare, released on digital platforms in the UK on November 11, changes the names for all its characters from their real-life counterparts but much of what happens.
The film does well to keep the tension high, with Hope Goldman’s paranoia, played by Banks, emanating from the screen. However, the real ordeal is almost stranger than fiction.
Be warned, although the film does make some alterations, knowing the real story may spoil some aspects of the film for viewers.
The film itself is based on the life and experiences of Dawn DaLuise, an aesthetician, who owned a small studio in West Hollywood in 2014 at the age of 55.
According to CNN, she once claimed the likes of Jennifer Aniston and Sarah Michelle Gellar among her clientele. However, she began to receive disturbing phone calls and messages. They were all from strange men who claimed to be responding to explicit online advertisements on Craigslist.
These posts included DaLuise’s name, phone number and addresses both personal and business. They described sordid acts and fantasies she apparently wanted strangers to help her engage in. At least five men responded to the instructions of turning up at her apartment in the middle of the night leaving DaLuise sitting in the dark ‘praying they would go away.’
Fliers then started to appear on the streets in her neighborhood, near her ex-husband’s house, portraying fake scantily clad photographs of her.
A separate clinic had just happened to open across the street and the owner, Gabriel Suarez quickly became a suspect in DaLuise’s mind. Suarez mainly catered to treatments for men and probably wasn’t as much of a competing business as first feared.
Among the texts and the fliers, DaLuise’s tires were slashed and she then received messages commenting on how she looked each day. Her daughters were also caught up in the harassment.
DaLuise had shared her suspicions about her rival to Eddie Feinstein who stoked the flames and gave regular reports on what he had apparently seen. Feinstein was an acquaintance of Nick Prugo, a key player of the Bling Ring burglaries, which is the subject of his own film, directed by Sofia Coppola.
She had sent a text to Feinstein, claiming she ‘found someone to take Gabriel out’ and in March 2014, DaLuise was arrested, accused of a murder-for-hire plot against Suarez.
She spent 10 months behind bars while awaiting her trial, where a jury took less than an hour to acquit her of the charges. The person she allegedly found to carry out the killing was a former NFL player who testified in court that he was never asked to kill Suarez and he barely even knew DaLuise that well.
Attention turned to the police informant who alerted the authorities about the message. The informant, was Feinstein, who also went on to tell the police that the stalking accusations were all fake. Really, it was Feinstein and Prugo behind it all.
The pair were eventually sentenced to 350 hours of community service and three years of probation for stalking DaLuise. CNN reports that the still practicing beautician was left disappointed that she wasn’t consulted by anyone involved in the production.
This includes its director, writer and any of its cast list which boasts Banks alongside Lewis Pullman and Nathan Fillion. Although Banks reportedly did not know the true story behind the movie until ‘way later’ in the process, according to Entertainment Weekly.
DaLuise told CNN: “I feel like a mother figure wanting to shake my finger in (the writers’) faces and say, ‘You should have asked me for help, (the movie) would have been better than it is.’”
Meanwhile, DeLauise hopes her eventual documentary will fill the gaps the film leaves, as she says it only covers “20 percent” of her story.
“That movie was probably about 20% of my whole ordeal,” she said. “The audience has no idea about the follow up — the incarceration and whatnot. So, I’m a little bit more comfortable knowing that when my documentary comes out, people won’t even recognize it from the movie they saw. That’s my hope, because it’s so different.”
Critics have referred to the film as ‘bonkers’, with one branding it a ‘hidden gem’.
“Skincare is a hidden gem! The multiple themes shown in this film including jealousy, paranoia, and feminine rage, career driven, gender equality, and equal protection dominance. I enjoyed the vibrant tone and colors within the cinematography and script,” wrote one critic, as another said: “Funny, yet dark, with suspenseful aspects. An interesting film about image obsession, paranoia, and ego.”
Skincare is available on digital platforms from November 11
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