This year I’ve dabbled in a bit of work as a television extra. You might recognise me as “guy walking in background with street light antennae” in the above scene from episode 17 of Seven’s “Winners and Losers”… No? Well, you must have missed that one.
I’ve now been a professional extra on shoots for every major Australian television network, with the exception of SBS. As well, I’ve finally got around to watching Ricky Gervais’s “Extras”, which is some fantastic satire on the whole process of being an extra. Plus it’s just a funny show.
So I thought I’d pool all of my “wisdom” together into a blog entry to enlighten you on some common myths and harsh realities of working as a television extra.
1. It’s good money.
No it isn’t.
Sure, a lot of the time you’ll just be sitting around getting $25 an hour, waiting to be told where to walk. But you might be lucky enough to get one or two 4-hour jobs A MONTH (assuming you live somewhere with a thriving film and television scene). You’re not getting paid to sit around the other 712 hours of the month.
And keep in mind, you have to give 10% to your agent.
The real TV money is in acting, writing, producing, directing and crewing. But you’re never going to buy a house by working as an extra.
2. Free catering!
Well… sometimes…
This is one of the finest illustrations of what it’s like for an extra at the catering table… (skip to 8.21):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBFZP2wU1Tg
From my own personal experience, I’ve found that often the producers will try very hard to AVOID feeding the extras. Feeding extras = extra costs.
One time I was on a shoot with a cal time of 6AM. I approached the catering table, just hoping for a coffee. A guy who was standing at an espresso machine said, “What are ya after mate?” I replied, “Oh… just a flat white, thanks.”
I made two mistakes there:
1. He wasn’t the guy who makes the coffees. And
2. Coffee was for actors and crew only.
So I settled with just a water.
On another occasion, I’d just finished 4 hours of wandering in the background with a group of about eight other extras. The AD (Assistant Director) called out, “Right that’s lunch everyone. Oh, and extras, that’s a wrap for you. You can go straight home.”
But if you’re lucky enough to land a full day extra gig somewhere, make the most of it and enjoy that free food!
3. You get to MEET famous people!
Maybe…
You’re probably more likely to MEET a famous actor if you’re hanging around the set and you’re NOT an extra. Because when you’re an extra, this tends to happen (skip to 4.50):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_K9kdV36S0U
Sure, you certainly get to SEE lots of famous people when you’re an extra. But you generally don’t get the opportunities to have extensive conversations with them.
Even if you’re in the same scene together, you can’t bother them. They’ve got to think about their lines and which marks they have to hit around the set. And you have to listen out for your cue to walk.
Unless you’re directed to “converse and have a laugh with Al Pacino”, you’re not likely to exchange more than a “hello”, or at best a handshake and a quick photo. But I guess on Facebook, that’s all you need as evidence you met a celebrity… Speaking of which, did I mention I met Peter Combe?
4. It’s easy.
Most of the time it is. But it can also be extremely stressful.
Picture this. You’re one of 10 extras in a scene with big name TV stars in front of a crew of about 30 people. There’s guys with smoke machines and bright lights. There’s boom microphones bobbing all around just above your head. Guys running around with steady-cams looking like some half-man half-recording-machine. And you have to somehow walk through all of this in a precise way, at a precise time, without disturbing the real actors, without tripping on cables, and without looking at the cameras.
AND, you don’t want to be the extra who screws up the take. Because you know that you’re a nobody. And the only good thing an extra has going for them is their reliability. If word gets out you don’t perform 100% every time, BANG that’s it. You’re blacklisted and you’ll never work as an extra in this town again.
Keep in mind also that quite often as an extra, you’re not always given all the information.
You rarely get to see the script. You don’t know the names of most of the cast or crew. Sometimes you’re not even sure who the director is. And there have been occasions where I’ve been on a set and I don’t even know the name of the show I’m on!
I’ve showed up for a job only to discover I was at the wrong place, and the unit base was about half a kilometre away.
On that same shoot, I also discovered only when i arrived at the set, that the role would require some serious heavy lifting. No one told me that. No one asked if I was fit enough to carry a man on an antique stretcher. Even more surprisingly, there was no safety briefing! No one told me how to lift, or to do any stretches.
Then just before we go for a take, the director tells me to turn around and lift the stretcher backwards! I was struck by a vision of me slipping on the slick marble floor and seeing this guy’s head crack open with cameras capturing the moment in stunning high definition.
No one else seemed to realise the danger. Was I going to be the one who speaks up? (My girlfriend works for WorkSafe Victoria, you know)
That’s too much pressure for $25 an hour.
I actually refused to carry him backwards. I simply said “I’m sorry, but I can’t lift it like that.” We got through it in the end without killing anyone. But my hands, shoulders and legs were very sore for the rest of the week.
Absolutely appalling for one of Australia’s major broadcasters.
I did actually call the line producer the next day and told her my concerns. She said she’d look into it. I never heard back. I suspect I’ve probably been blacklisted.
But who cares about all of that when…
5. You get to be on TV!
If you’re lucky.
I’ve actually been very fortunate so far with being selected on the day, purely by chance, to be an extra who has his face pointed towards the camera (See “Winners and Losers” screen shot top of page).
Of course I’ve had my fair share of being hidden in the background with my back to the camera as well:
Here’s how Ricky Gervais portrayed it in Extras (watch the first minute):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=skmwwHS4iR8
I can beat Ricky on this one though. Back when I was still living in Adelaide, I was an extra in an episode of Nine’s “McLeod’s Daughters”. The whole scene was cut.
6. Well, it’s a good place to start.
No. No it’s not.
You will never ever be promoted to “star” from purely doing work as an extra. The best you can hope for is more extra work. And the occasional screen shot (see above).
But no Hollywood director is going to watch the show, notice you miming in the background and say, “Wow, look at that out of focus guy pretending to drink a coffee! He’s perfect for the lead in my next picture!”
Still, it is a bit of a laugh. And I’ll happily pretend to drink coffee out of focus in the background for $25 an hour again, if and when the time calls for it.
Kind regards,
David M. Green
Extra special.
