A Starving Artist's Extra Credit

Due to my big fat experience on the Bored to Death-set and just because I'd simply never done it before, I figured What the hell and submitted myself for a gig as an extra.

And I got it.

...

Now that I have spent two 17 hour-days back-to-back on a set in such a position, I should like to give you a run-down of exactly what this all looks like:

1) Call the casting services at 9:30pm to get your call-time for the next day...and thereby find out that it is at 5:40am at a random corner in the upper-chunk of Manhattan.  Meaning that you need to wake-up by (realistically) 3:30am.  You should sleep...

2) ...But you can't because you're (A) wound-up and (B) have to pack a million pounds of winter coats and possibilities for "Minnesotan-winter funeral attire".  Decide what that term means, dig out your thickest coats, find whatever pairs of matching gloves that you can...and then sleep.

3) ...Almost.  Check the weather report for further preparedness:  it is going to be at least 90-degrees tomorrow.  Well, shit.

4) Pass out on the couch at midnight.


5) Wake-up like a shot at 3:30am, run around to make coffee and look as "camera ready" as this hour allows.

6) Call a cab at 4:30am...because you realize that attempting such a hike on a train this early could take potentially two hours. 

7) Thirty-five dollars and 65 minutes later, you are on a bus bound for Connecticut  (Connecticut?)  --and pass out in the world's most awkward fetal position.

8) An hour later, the bus stops, your limbs are all asleep, you have the fabric pattern of the bus seat imprinted on your poorly make-upped face, but you need to roll onto the set.  Now.

9) You're in the holding tent...behind a large funeral home.   There is coffee, and fruit, and comfy-looking chairs (ish)--and yelling.  Everyone is yelling.  Dear god, how is this possible--how is this much yelling even possible this early?  You run to get your wardrobe approved--because you're afraid that you'll get your throat slit otherwise.

10)  While doing so, you're asked if you have anything "cuter-looking, like any cocktail dresses".      
       Well, they said Minnesotan-winter funeral attire so, I have layers of stuff and all those coats and everything so...
        "So no?"
        ...No.  Oh man, no.  I don't.
        "OK.  No.  That's ok, we'll...think of something."
        ...Shit.

11)  While sitting in the holding tent making sweet sweet love to your coffee (while sitting there in your fitted cute black borrowed-cocktail dress...and black hulking winter boots...unfortunate...) the PA who scares you and sounds much like Rosanne Barr begins to squawk:
       "EXTRAAAAAAAAAAS!!! LISTENNNNNNNNN:  you canNOT!  SIT!  On the LEFT SIIIIIIIIIIIDE of the TENT!  That is for CREW and PRINCIPALS ONLYYYYYY!!!!  YOU GUYYYYYYYYYS NEEEEEEEEED to BEEEEEEEEEEEE on the RIGHT SIIIIIDE!!!!!"
       Instantaneously, people try to protest:  there's not enough room, we need to spread-out, what if there are people in our bunch who are claustrophobic and feeling overly congested by the number of winter coats lying around...
       "You GUYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYS!!!!! NO!  No.  RIGHT side ONLYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!  ONLY the RIIIGHT SIIIIDE!  Pick up your STUFF, and MOVE IT RIGHT NOWWWWWWWW and MAKE SOME ROOM!   It is NOT HARRRRRRRD!!!!!"
       Shuffling, sneers and mumbles abounding.  You then realize that you are but one in a herd of entitled-feeling cattle in a very small pen...and that this is going to be a long long day.

12) At 8am, the first group of extras is called to set.  You are not among them, so you take this opportunity to work on your crossword puzzle.

13)  At 9am, the second group is called to set...wash, rinse, repeat.

14)  At 9:45am...the same.  You find a new crossword puzzle and a much larger cup of coffee.

15)  At 10:10am:  "You GUYYYYYYYYYYS!!!! ANYone who has NOT been CALLED, GRAB YOUR COATS and your APPROOOOOOOOOOOVED GLOVES AND SCARVES ETCETERAAAAA and LINE UP!  OUTSIDE!  THE FUNERAL HOME!!!  RIGHT OUT BACK THERRRRRRE!!!! OUT! SIIIIIIIIIDE!!!!  QUICKLYYYYYY!!!!"
        Eager and highly-caffeinated, you fly like the wind.

16)  At 10:35am, you are still standing outside of the funeral home in your longest woolen winter coat and further winter attire...your phone says that it is already 84-degrees outside.  A number of the women standing around you begin to complain.
       "Ugh.  They would have never had us stand around like this on 30 Rock."
                 "I know, right?!  They're so nice there.  Not here."
       "When were you there last?  Last season?"
                  "Ummmm, no.  Last week.  I did The Good Wife for a day, and then 30 Rock."
       "Oh.  Nice.  I mean, I shot there for two days a couple weeks ago, too.  It was great."
                  "Oh."
       "Yeah..."                  
                           "Boardwalk was brutal last week.   Like, bru-tal."
                  "I'm suuuuuure.  Not like this, though, right?"
                           "Ugh.  No.  No way.  NOTHING like this.  Not at all."
        "Nothing is."
                  "I know."
                           "Ugh, GOD!  I know."
...
...Ohhhh boy.

17) At 10:50am, you are ushered on to set, and spend the next half an hour getting filmed walking back and forth across a hallway.  The woman walking across the hall with you grips onto your elbow (like she's punishing you, or attempting to guide you somewhere...or both) and continually yells at you to walk slower.

18)  You are given new positions and told to take your coats back to the tent, "This scene is funeral-cocktail attire only!"
       Your former scene partner throws her coat at you.
       "Take this to the tent for me,"  fluffs her hair, stomps away.  Like the wild lady-beast that she is.
       ...

19)  You begin another half an hour of walking back and forth across a hallway...from a different angle.
        The lady-beast leers at you whenever possible, and you attempt to avoid having an awkward stare-down with her.
        Another woman with an atrocious perm (that you later find out is a weave...from Avon..."This was $14, if you can believe it, doesn't it look healthy?  And full?"...)  yells at you to walk faster.
        ...

20)  "You GUYYYYYYYYYYYS!!!!!!!  EXTRAAAAAAAS!!!  BACK TO HOLDIIIIIIING!!!!!"  ...Where you sit for three hours.  With two more crossword puzzles.
       "Oooh, hey, can I help you with that?"
       Oh!  Sure.
       "Where you at?"
       Um, 89-Down:  Narrow groove, as in a muscle...
       "OOH!  Oooh yeah, that's uh....um...Shoot, I know it..."
       ...
       "Ooh!  No!  You know what, there, 5-Across, what's that?!"
       Oh.  OK:  Chihuahua's breed group.  Three letters.
       "Yeah!  Isn't that just 'dog'?!" ...
       ...Ummmm....
       Oh.  God.  Dammit.
 

21)  Lunch break.  All crew and AFTRA-members stay and do craft services in the tent, where there is swordfish and cucumber water and like this salad bar and all these amazing decadent things.  Which you don't need anyway, because you're assuming that you still have "too much thigh".  It's fine.  You're over it, swear to god...
       You report outside, where non-unioners have noodles and cookies.
       ...You run for more caffeine.  And some Starbursts.  And mixed greens with no dressing--because non-unioners apparently don't get dressing.  Today at least.

22) Over the next five hours, you're sent to stand in line behind the funeral home to be ready to go on set 4 different times.  Each time, you are there for 45 minutes, with no word as to if you'll be used, if you can go elsewhere to like meander or pee, nothing. 
       You chug three more cups of coffee, and a Diet Coke, listen to this guy who weighs like a buck-thirty get into a heated debate about circuit training with a personal trainer (and want to crawl into a hole and die), and become involuntarily pulled into a fake boxing-match with a guy who says that you're evil (...).

23)  You pet Parker Posey's dog.  And then an older couple walks by, carrying an urn.
        ...
       You're dismissed back to holding.

24) After conducting a lesson in both Shakespeare and the wonder that is 'the moose-knuckle' (which sent the buck-thirty guy running around the holding tent asking everyone "So, uh, would you say I have a moose-knuckle?  Really, do I?"  the extras are all called together...
      ...And DISMISSED!  FOR THE DAY!!!!
      ...It's 7:30pm.
      "You GUYYYYYYYYYS!!!!!! CALL the CASTING HOTLIIIIIIIINE at 9! 30!!!!!"

23) You return to Brooklyn at 9:45pm.  You discover you are due back to the bus at 6:45am.  (I get to sleep an extra hour!!!!!!!)

24)  Repeat steps 3-9, 11-15.

25)  You are called on set at 11am, take another half an hour getting filmed walking back and forth across a hallway--a skill at which you've become particularly masterful at.

26)  They are preparing to shoot a pivotal scene:  Laura Linney is giving the eulogy at Cynthia Nixon's unborn child's funeral.
        YOU are going to be directly in the shot, right over over Cynthia Nixon's shoulder--so you get to ACT!  THIS IS GREAT! 
        They want to pair you with a boy in the shot.
        They choose the buck-thirty guy.
        "So...what's a moose-knuckle again?"
        ...Ohhhhh myyyyyy GOD!

27)  Buck-thirty guy apparently is too elastic-faced for the scene (but YOU'RE not!  Way to take a note...) and is thankfully replaced.

28) You've acted, you feel super good, you're TOLD you did super good (Hoorayyyy!)...you're dismissed to holding.

29)  Repeat steps 20-22...replace noodles with rice and veggies, Starbursts with Jelly Bellies, and awkward circuit training-conversation with "I have money, lots, and this is why it's so important...".  ...

30)  At 6:30pm, you are called back onto set to be background in front of a sushi bar...with Parker Posey and her son on the show.  You try to not look at her too hard or acknowledge the fact that you want almost her exact career (FACT:  I.  Love.  Parker Posey.)  or just generally be weird.  (Don't be weird.)
  ...You're not.  SUCCESS!

31)  You're dismissed back to holding just as the Waffles and Dinges-truck pulls up for the crew...and the septic tanks of the Port-a-Potties are being purged immediately next to the tent.  ...Yes.

32)  Following an hour of putzing (looking up a sundry of different origins of terms on Wikipedia, thinking up new ways to avoid buck-thirty guy, discussing which borough is better and why...and drinking more caffeine--mistake......)
       "You GUYYYYYYYYYS!!!!!! EXTRAAAAAAAAS!!!!!  You're WRAPPED!"

HOORAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYDear.  Sweet.  Jesus.

It's not that the work is bad.  It's not.   At all.

But godDAMN it's exhausting.  And in multiple regards.

Fantastic for people-watching, fantastic for just the experience...but I feel like it's not a thing I want to frequent doing. 

BUT!  At least I can say I've done it.  And at least you'll SEE ME, which is neat...but hopefully only from the face up.

Because this bitch apparently needs to fine-tune her sense of Minnesotan-winter funeral attire.