In Which I Appear in a Feature Film

Here's a fun little story to start this off:

I was driving my friend, who's prone to car sickness, on the freeway in heavy traffic.  She was feeling nauseous, and rolled the window down to get some fresh air.  I wasn't a fan of this, since I get cold super easily, but since she was feeling sick I didn't make a fuss.  Suddenly she started breathing really heavily, then, gulping, said, "Oh my god."  Knowing what was coming next, I frantically reached behind me into the back seat, where I knew I had a tote bag full of binders.  I grabbed the fabric of the bag and jerked it upside down, dumping the contents onto the floor of the backseat.  I handed her the bag just in time, as she proceeded to noisily puke in it multiple times.  She had to hold the bag out the window for the rest of the car ride.  It was gross, but thank GOD she didn't puke in my car!!!  It actually brought to mind playing Family Feud online with other P.A.s during down time at work on "The Suite Life."  One of the categories was "Things You Don't Want Your Friend to Do In Your Car" and one of the answers we didn't think of was "Vomit."  We laughed when that answer was revealed, thinking it would be horrible but could never happen.  Well, apparently it can.

Anyway, on to the part where I'm in a movie.  I had dinner with my friend Julia on Tuesday night.  She's an actress and she told me about a job she had the next day as an extra in a movie.  She convinced me to go with her and participate in the shoot.  Since I'd be going with a friend, and I want to have gap year adventures, I agreed.  There was really, really bad traffic getting out to the studio (in this neighborhood just south of downtown), and I was afraid of being late, but nothing had happened in the 10 minutes between the call and my arrival, so it was all good.  So yeah, Julia and I got to the studio and filled out some release forms so we could appear in the movie, and also so they'd have our names to give us credit, which was the only form of payment for the background actors in this movie.

Now, about the movie.  It's called "Dispatch," which I think might be a working title, but anyway, it's directed by a guy named Steven Sprung and it's his first movie.  I think it's about limousine drivers or a limo dispatcher, but the scene they were shooting while we were there was a movie premiere.  Julia and I got selected right off the bat to play fans at the side of a red carpet cheering the celebrities.  I was wearing a purple shirt with white and purple stripes, a nice black vest (waiter-ly), and tight jeans but the costume lady had me change into some grey dress pants I brought that have black pinstripes so it would look "kinda funky."  It ended up being cute.

The extras coordinator (or possibly one of the Assistant Directors) led us out of the extras holding room, around a long building, and to a soundstage where a fake red carpet and press area had been set up.  We were clumped on the non-red-carpet side of the velvet ropes and those of us who had left our cell phones in the holding area were given prop cell phones to pretend to take pictures with.  One guy also had the idea that we could be asking for autographs, so they distributed paper and pens to a few of us extras.  After getting some footage of us screaming (silently!) for the celebrities (who hadn't arrived yet, I guess it was just B-roll or something), and this guy (I think one of the limo driver characters) holding a tiny dog and waiting for the star of the movie (within the actual movie) to arrive at the premiere.  Then they sent the extras on a break so they could block the next scene with the actors.

During the break Julia and I discovered the craft services table, which was wonderful since neither of us had eaten dinner beforehand.  We also started talking to the other extras, particularly a girl named Ashlee.  She's from Minnesota and came to L.A. for pilot season to pursue her acting career.  She's only 14 but very mature for her age.  She's only in 8th grade, doing school online for now, and next year she'll be at a performing arts high school.  She left at 10-ish (during dinner) since she can't work past 10 with her underage work permit.

Anyway, in terms of shooting our job was to stand by the edge of the red carpet, and get excited (silently) when the faux celebrities walked by.  There was a media area set up at the end of the carpet where they had a fake entertainment news show set up.  First the director and producer (married couple) of the movie came out of their limo and were interviewed by the entertainment news show anchors.  The woman who played the producer is the woman who played Grams on the show "Charmed."  Then this really busty woman in in TINY halter dress and knee-high boots walks by, ignoring the interviewers.  The little red dress literally looked like a shirt.  The actress playing that woman said she would NEVER wear something like that on an actual red carpet (which is good, since no one ever should).  Then the female star of the movie arrived in her limo, took the dog from the man waiting for her, and walked over to where the entertainment news interviewers were interviewing the director and producer.  Then we broke for "lunch" (at, y'know, around 10:00).

After dinner (pizza), those of us who were still there did more "fan"-ing.  By this point I had pulled out my actual camera and was taking actual pictures instead of fake cell phone pictures.  After the break the scenes were an old Hollywood veteran arriving at the premiere (this guy), then the lead actor pulling up all dirtied up in a yellow cab.   Then, finally, we got to be the crowd waving at the camera and trying to get on TV while the entertainment news presenters signed off for the night.

During this second half of the night we met a girl who also goes to Chapman (like Julia).  She's not a film student, but she does make short films.  She mostly wants to be an actress though, although she's a trained EMT and loves rock climbing.  Anyway, she wanted me to maybe be in a short film she's making this weekend, based pretty much entirely on my hair color, but I'm pretty sure I won't be able to do it even if she follows through on that offer.

So, yeah.  We ended up being there until almost 2AM (or possibly later?), standing up for most of the time, so our legs were TIRED.  But it was an interesting night.  Hooray adventures.

ALSO, I have new pictures up on picasa, from the shoot and some selections from other things I've been doing since I got back to L.A. from NYC.  CHECK IT OUT.