Watch Stranger Things’ Millie Bobby Brown Shave Her Head To Become Eleven

Millie Bobby Brown, the 12-year-old actress who portrays Eleven in Netflix’s Stranger Things, has posted a time-lapse video capturing the moment in which her long hair was cut to a pixie length and then shaved off for her breakout role.

In order to preserve the show’s many secrets, series creators Matt and Ross Duffer didn’t inform Brown until the final audition that they needed to shave her head for the role. Her mother wasn’t happy with the request, but Brown and her dad were able to eventually convince her that it was okay.

“I sat in the chair, and, one by one, they cut it off,” Brown told IndieWire. “I was like, ‘Oh no. What have I done? And they told me, ‘I want you to have the mind-frame of Charlize Theron in Mad Max.” And we did this sort of split-screen of her and me, and the resemblance was amazing! I thought, ‘Wow, that’s such an amazing way to put it, you know?’ It was the best decision I’ve ever, ever made.”

A love letter to the supernatural classics of the 80’s, Stranger Things is the story of a young boy who vanishes into thin air. As friends, family and local police search for answers, they are drawn into an extraordinary mystery involving top-secret government experiments, terrifying supernatural forces and one very strange little girl.

Stranger Things stars Winona Ryder, David Harbour, Finn Wolfhard, Millie Brown, Gaten Matarazzo, Caleb McLaughlin, Noah Schnapp, Natalia Dyer, Cara Buono, Charlie Heaton, and Matthew Modine.

Matt Duffer and Ross Duffer (Wayward Pines, Hidden) serve as writer, directors and co-showrunners of the series, and are executive producers along with Shawn Levy and Dan Cohen via their 21 Laps entertainment banner (The Spectacular Now, Night At The Museum, Real Steel, Date Night). Shawn Levy also serves as director.

The original series Stranger Things is now available to stream on Netflix.