All action extra!

[5129frederick]

I've always wanted to be a " noddy" - a film extra, where you see a couple of characters in the background of a pub scene, mumbling away saying nothing in particular, or part of a crowd, gawping at an "accident".  A couple of cousins have actually been film extras but it's an area that is  apparantly grossly oversubscribed where you have to enrol in an agency, pay your £30.00 odd and then sit at home waiting for things to happen which never do.

Has anybody out there had their fifteen minutes of fame after enrolling in an agency?

Has any big screen actor ever started off as a film extra?  Certainly I wouldn't be awe struck seeing big names.  I'd just do what I'm told and then go home at the end of the day.  Acccording to my cousin you are just treated as fodder by stars and film crew alike, but I wouldn't give a damn.

[mustard-tree]

Many years ago, I was in the film  Agatha but not seen

I got paid for the day, but it wasnt me they wanted, but my vintage motor bike.

We were given fake tax discs to cover the ones displayed

[5129frederick]

Cool.  My cousin, an ex policeman who couldn't stand the job was taken on as a copper!  The production team then saw his car, a Morris 1000, and promptly hired it for a further three days so he did rather well!  His brother was a page boy in the Slipper and the Rose.  I looked but I couldn't see him.  A film in which a load of German soldiers were seen marching down Whitehall had to be reshot because one dummy looked straight into the camera lens!  

An empty building opposite where I worked was used as Scotland Yard complete with it's revolving triangular sign.  I've forgotton who it starred, but Sherlock had to be dropped off and pay for his cab eight times before the producer was happy with it!  He wasn't, and neither was his "driver".  Some producers are hell to work with.  Real perfectionists.   

[peteryola]

I have never been an extra, but I have had documentary crews follow me around for a bit 2 or 3 times although I suspect none of the footage has ever been broadcast anywhere.

However, on the day of QE2's final sailing from Southampton, November 11th 2008, I was down there for the day and soon after arriving I took the Hythe Ferry over to get some close up photos.  Pretty much as soon as we had cast off ( it's only a few minutes crossing... ) there was a tap on my shoulder and I turned round to find a serious bit of camera gear aimed at me; turned out I was a vox pop and they were the French equivalent of the BBC.  They asked me quite a few questions ( I had at one time been a QE2 passenger ) with the camera running.

Pretty sure that got broadcast because some time later... I think as much as 18 months later... we were in Paris for a weekend as a surprise trip for the kids, went along to the Eiffel Tower, not pre-booked or anything, there were the usual long queues there - 90 minutes to buy a ticket, another 60 minutes to get in, but one of the tower staff came up to us and literally five minutes later we had our tickets and we were inside..... 🙂

[chickengrandma-2008]

My son was in one of those programmes where he bought a house at auction, refurbished it and sold it.  Of course I recorded it and kept it (on Sky) but when we had a repair man once,  he put a new box in so it was lost!  😞

[5129frederick]

I was a third the way through writing a full length novel when my computer packed up.  The fool of a repair man didn't know what he was doing and lost everything and then had the audacity to try to sell me a new machine which he had in his van for £200.00.  This was years ago.  As luck would have it I'd I'd printed some of it off but it laid dormant for a long time.  It took me a long time to get over it.  Thank God the one thiing I did manage to print off and have professionally ringbinded before that happened was my late father's autobiography.  Sadly he never saw the finished product but I made damn certain I finished what I'd started.  That was why everything was written in first person singular because I was writing itw for him.  Had I written it in third perso it would have been a biography which I was not prepared to do.  It took me weeks to proof read before correcting everything.  As a creative writer, I like to think he was "looking over my shoulder" approving of what I was writing.  I put so much into his autobiography and even now, sixteen years on, I still go quiet when reading it late at night by myself.  

[bankhaunter]

I once got press ganged into taking part in a series of television programmes.

It was interesting at first, seeing how it was done but they were long days and a bit boring after that.

Getting sozzled on champagne at the wrap party was okay though.