Joey King Looks Unrecognizable as Gypsy Rose Blanchard, Girl Who Murdered Her Munchausen Mom

For the role, Joey King shaved her head and wears wide-framed glasses and false teeth

Is that you, Joey King?

The actress shared new photos of herself in character as Gypsy Rose Blanchard for the upcoming Hulu true crime anthology series The Act — and she’s nearly unrecognizable.

To transform herself for the role, King shaved her head, and she wears wide-framed glasses and false teeth. In a second photo, she sits in a wheelchair while wearing a pair of pink pajamas.

Season 1 of The Act tells the real life story of Gypsy Rose, the young Missouri woman who murdered her abusive mother Dee Dee Blanchard after her mom manipulated her into portraying herself as terminally ill for almost her whole life.

Dee Dee, who will be played by Patricia Arquette, allegedly began to abuse Gypsy soon after she was born up until Dee Dee’s 2015 death. In an attempt to escape her mother’s harmful hold, Gypsy ultimately murdered her in 2015 at the age of 23 and is serving 10 years in prison for second-degree murder.

Experts have said that Gypsy was the victim of Munchausen by proxy, a rare form of abuse in which a guardian — in this case Gypsy’s mother — exaggerates or induces illness in a child for attention and sympathy.

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Rich Polk/Getty

“Getting into the emotion and getting into the character of Gypsy was something I was so excited to tackle, but I was also admittedly super-nervous for,” King told Entertainment Weekly of taking on the role. “Transforming into Gypsy was one of the most challenging but most rewarding things I’ve ever done.”

The Act premieres March 20 on Hulu.

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