“I always look at people and am like, I wonder how they’ll embalm.”

But sometimes people won’t bring in pictures, so we just sort of go for what, in mortuary school, we called a “natural appearance.” We try not to say the word sleeping, because they’re not sleeping — they’re dead.

Autumn Whitefield-Madrano’s interview with makeup artist and mortician Daniella Marcantoni is fascinating and unexpectedly touching. Daniella is also a spokeswoman for Funeral Divas — a group whose founder is the “Beyoncé of the funeral industry.”