Billy Barty will be the first to tell you that spending as much time as he did behind the mask of Gwildor began to do bizarre things to his mind.

"After about 14 weeks of this, your ideas about what really is strange looking get turned around," says the 73-year-old actor of the time spent inside the makeup of his "Masters of the Universe" alter ego. "In fact, by filming's end, it had gotten to the point where people not in makeup were beginning to look strange to me."

But the grind of taking complex makeup off and putting it on each day, something that took several hours in Michael Westmore's care at each end, didn't dampen Barty's spirits about playing the multidimensional Gwildor.

"Gwildor is this technological genius who is always on the brink of a major new discovery, but has no idea where this discovery will lead him," Barty remarks. "He's an eccentric personality who knows everything and yet is not quite sure of himself."

Barty, who recently returned from Israel where he completed the fairy tale features "Rumpelstiltskin" and "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," has spent a good part of his acting career having his identity masked by latex or rubber.

The veteran of more than 1,000 TV shows, including his own series for children, "The Billy Barty Show," was nominated for an Academy Award for his performance in "Day of the Locust." Among other big screen credits are "Legend," "True Confessions" and "Foul Play."

Barty offers that films like "Masters of the Universe" are important and should be encouraged.

"We need more motion pictures like this one," he says. "We're bombarded with so much reality in our everyday lives that it has destroyed our desire to dream. Fantasies like 'Masters of the Universe' spark imaginations and encourage people to dream again."