Fans of the original Roseanne series got a bittersweet reminder of a former character on the reboot recently thanks to an episode featuring a tribute to Glenn Quinn. If you watched the sitcom’s initial run on TV, you’ll hopefully remember the Irish actor for playing Mark (Glenn Quinn), the boyfriend-turned-husband of Becky, played by Lecy Goranson and later Sarah Chalke. In the reboot, Mark is now deceased. His death is addressed episode four of the series when Becky (Goranson) admits that she’s struggled with moving on in the aftermath of Mark’s untimely passing. In real life, Quinn’s life ended early, too.
In 2002, Quinn passed away at the age of 32. Autopsy reports later ruled his cause of death as an accidental heroin overdose. “We all had great affection for Glenn,” executive producer Bruce Helford told reporters at the 2018 Winter Television Critics Association press event. “We really wanted to say something.” Helford also confirmed that Mark’s death will be addressed “a couple times in the course of the nine episodes.”
If you were a big TV fan in the ’90s and early 2000s, Roseanne probably wasn’t the only place you spotted Quinn onscreen.
Before his tragic passing, Quinn was known and beloved for his role as Allen Doyle on Angel, the Buffy spinoff (above). He appeared for a handful of important episodes, and playing Doyle was actually the last film job he booked before his death. In addition to his performances on Angel and Roseanne, he also popped up in Fair City, Covington Cross, and Dr. Giggles. Although he’s gone, we can’t wait to see how else the show continues to honor the late actor in future episodes.
Despite working in beauty, I am slightly haircut-averse. I may still be hanging on to the trauma of accidentally getting micro bangs when I was 14, and I’ve just generally gotten too many bad haircuts over the years when all I wanted was a trim. All that is to say: if I’m going to get a cut, it needs to be worth it.
For the last few months, I’ve been letting my hair grow out as much as it could, without any layers or face-framing pieces. I just wanted to let it do its thing. After a while, though, it was starting to look lifeless; no matter how I styled it, it read as flat and boring. I came to the conclusion that having it all one layer wasn’t doing anything for my fine hair. So I decided to brave the salon chair and try out the latest hair trend: the mermaid haircut.
I made my way to Benjamin Salon for an appointment with its titular owner, Benjamin Mohapi. Keep reading for his take on the mermaid cut and to see how it transformed my lifeless hair into a ‘do worthy of Ariel herself.
Experts Featured in This Article
Benjamin Mohapi is a celebrity hairstylist and owner of Benjamin Salon in Los Angeles.
What Is a Mermaid Cut?
The mermaid haircut is a version of long layers, with an emphasis on creating lots of movement through the hair. “The goal of the mermaid cut is to maximize flow,” says Mohapi. “You want it to feel full and maintain volume but you want to move and hold a feeling of seamlessness as it does so. Just like the waves of the ocean, this is a style that should never be static. It should always be in motion, swelling and crashing with every step.”
The mermaid cut differs from something like the butterfly cut because it needs a bit of length to work. Mohapi says anything past the shoulders will do, but the ideal length for the mermaid cut is mid-back.
POPSUGAR Photography | Aviel Kanter
If you want the mermaid cut, it’s important that your stylist understands how it differs from a classic long layer haircut — the layers should flow back from the face rather than being face-framing. “The classic long layer would maintain weight in the baseline at the front but this is not the case with the mermaid cut,” says Mohapi. “The perimeter flows continuously from front to back and contains no horizontal shape. It’s all flow.” He says that if your stylist isn’t familiar with the cut (and doesn’t want to Google the trend), just ask them for “a beautiful flowing long layer without weight at the front.”
My Mermaid Cut Results
I couldn’t be happier with my mermaid cut — I finally feel like I have a “real” haircut rather than just a lifeless pile on my head. I love that Mohapi was able to keep so much of my length while still making those flowy layers come across. I’m in my sea creature era a
