What’s a nice girl like me doing in a place like this?
April 3, 2007 (Press Release) --
Granted, I’m decked out in my finest evening gown and sparkling bling, hair and makeup done to perfection, sitting prettily and applauding in an orchestra seat in the Kodak Theater. But it’s hardly the glamorous gig you might imagine. I am an extra, or a "Background Artist" if you will, in a Robert De Niro movie, and I will inhabit that seat for 15 hours before the day is through.
Several days prior, an acquaintance told me they were shooting an awards ceremony scene for the film What Just Happened?, starring De Niro and featuring appearances by the likes of Sean Penn, Bruce Willis, Stanley Tucci, Catherine Keener, Robyn Wright Penn and a host of others. The story is taken from producer Art Linson’s book of the same name (he wrote the script and is producing the film), a sort of semi-autobiographical story of two weeks in the life of a troubled film producer.
It sounded like good, clean fun to me. I hadn’t done a film in about seven years, since I played an FBI agent in a Rutger Hauer-Paulina Porizkova film called Partners in Crime. I never had dreams of stardom – I just thought it would be interesting for a film critic and entertainment reporter to get hands-on experience in filmmaking. That film was directed by Jennifer Warren, who was surprisingly willing to talk to me about her experiences in film and television.
I wasn’t about to get within ten feet of director Barry Levinson on the What Just Happened? set, however. Not that he wasn’t an uncommonly gracious and patient director – it’s just that there were about 800 of us seat fillers at the Kodak Theater that day, and Levinson had actors like Sean Penn to deal with.
It was fascinating enough, however, to get a front row seat to watch the wild world of Hollywood extras, where people with PhD’s will work for $7.50 an hour, just to dip their pinky toes into the showbiz pool, of which they’ve been in awe since childhood. They came from as far away as Fresno, San Diego and Coachella.
Those who signed up for duty via BeinaMovie.com were paid nothing more than parking and lunch. Most were there from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. You could tell the people who do this for a living. While I was sitting there thinking, ‘When are we ever going to wrap?’ they were sitting there praying, ‘Please go overtime, please go overtime!’ You’re paid time-and-a-half for anything over eight hours, and I think double time when it gets past 12 hours. With lunch penalties, etc., it’s a pretty complicated formula, but the difference between $120 and $125 for 14 hours of work is marginal to me – I’d just as soon be at home making dinner, believe it or not.
There are those who do it just for fun, like the three elegant, retired neighbors who drive the short distance from the San Fernando Valley once or twice a week to be on films and shows like Grey’s Anatomy and Boston Legal.
Several days prior, an acquaintance told me they were shooting an awards ceremony scene for the film What Just Happened?, starring De Niro and featuring appearances by the likes of Sean Penn, Bruce Willis, Stanley Tucci, Catherine Keener, Robyn Wright Penn and a host of others. The story is taken from producer Art Linson’s book of the same name (he wrote the script and is producing the film), a sort of semi-autobiographical story of two weeks in the life of a troubled film producer.
It sounded like good, clean fun to me. I hadn’t done a film in about seven years, since I played an FBI agent in a Rutger Hauer-Paulina Porizkova film called Partners in Crime. I never had dreams of stardom – I just thought it would be interesting for a film critic and entertainment reporter to get hands-on experience in filmmaking. That film was directed by Jennifer Warren, who was surprisingly willing to talk to me about her experiences in film and television.
I wasn’t about to get within ten feet of director Barry Levinson on the What Just Happened? set, however. Not that he wasn’t an uncommonly gracious and patient director – it’s just that there were about 800 of us seat fillers at the Kodak Theater that day, and Levinson had actors like Sean Penn to deal with.
It was fascinating enough, however, to get a front row seat to watch the wild world of Hollywood extras, where people with PhD’s will work for $7.50 an hour, just to dip their pinky toes into the showbiz pool, of which they’ve been in awe since childhood. They came from as far away as Fresno, San Diego and Coachella.
Those who signed up for duty via BeinaMovie.com were paid nothing more than parking and lunch. Most were there from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. You could tell the people who do this for a living. While I was sitting there thinking, ‘When are we ever going to wrap?’ they were sitting there praying, ‘Please go overtime, please go overtime!’ You’re paid time-and-a-half for anything over eight hours, and I think double time when it gets past 12 hours. With lunch penalties, etc., it’s a pretty complicated formula, but the difference between $120 and $125 for 14 hours of work is marginal to me – I’d just as soon be at home making dinner, believe it or not.
There are those who do it just for fun, like the three elegant, retired neighbors who drive the short distance from the San Fernando Valley once or twice a week to be on films and shows like Grey’s Anatomy and Boston Legal.
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