Pamela Anderson Didn't Know Her“ Last Showgirl” Costar Dave Bautista Was Bald During Filming

Pamela Anderson's costar Dave Bautista went through quite a transformation to film The Last Showgirl.

During a Wednesday, Jan. 8, appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, Anderson, 57, told host Jimmy Fallon that she didn't realize her costar was bald until she saw him without his character's wig.

"He's such, like, a gentle giant," the actress said. "I didn't know that he didn't have hair. I saw him with the wig and then I saw him at the party and I was like, 'Oh my gosh.' He's wearing diamonds and pearls and this suit and I was like, 'Where's my gentle giant?'"

In the Gia Coppola-directed flick, which hit theaters on Jan. 8, Anderson plays Shelly, a veteran Las Vegas showgirl who is mourning the end of her long-running show. Bautista, 55, plays the venue's producer, Eddie.

The Baywatch alum also told Fallon, 50, that she spoke to real Las Vegas showgirls as part of her research for the role. "I had the showgirls come to my house," she recalled. "I had tea with them and we talked showgirl stories, like what they did after the show, all the showgirl dos and don'ts."

Her performance in The Last Showgirl has received critical acclaim, earning her both Golden Globe and SAG Award nominations.

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In an interview with Bustle published Jan. 7, the actress' costar Brenda Song shared that Anderson's makeup-free lifestyle influenced the rest of the cast on set.

While the actresses sported heavy glam as showgirls, Song, 36, said that they wore no makeup on their faces whatsoever for the off-stage scenes.

“The first day we tried makeup on and Gia was like, ‘It doesn't feel real.’ And Pam was like, ‘These women don’t have time for it,’" Song recalled. "And Pamela being Pamela, she goes, ‘I’m not doing it. You guys shouldn’t do it either.’”

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“I wanted to just how Shelly would be if she's going to the grocery store,” Anderson told PEOPLE. “I just wanted it to be raw and real, and I was ready for that and prepared for that and excited about that.”

The actress also shared that she would turn away from the mirror while getting ready to film each day.

“I didn't want that to be in my head at all about the way that I looked, unless it was in the showgirl mirrors [in the movie],” she explained.

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