Double Take

A friend shot me an e-mail from a casting company looking for a double for an actor. A double is someone of same height, build and appearance of the principal actor. Setting up a camera shot can take a long time to get lighting and blocking right. A stand in takes the place of a principal during the set up so the actor can remain in his or her comfortable dressing room until the director is ready to shoot.


When I worked Memphis beat, both stand in actors looked or were shaped nothing like the principals they were filling in for. The stand in for Jason lee is about 5 inches shorter and 40 pounds heavier than Jason, and with less hair than my ass. He must be some one's brother in law.  The e mail that I was sent had a photo of the actor Miguel Ferrer. Photo double needed, 6'1" medium build. I saw the e mail and thought "Yea, so? Why did you send it to me?"

A couple hours later my friend asked if they called me yet? "Who? About what?" Oh that. If you think so. I sent a photo in and with in 10 minutes received a call back. They asked for a most recent photo to forward to the director. I didn't get the photo double work but did get a call back for background work. Just as well. Even though stand in work is a step up from background with a little better pay and better food, I was happy with just background.


I ran into a number of background extras that I knew, all said it's been really slow for the past couple of months.  I ended up coming in late because of being contacted last minute. That was fine, I spoke with a buddy there who said they had sat in holding for the past 3 hours and hadn't been to the set. About 3 or 4 backgrounds came up to me and commented that I was a good stand in for Miguel. "But I didn't get the part." "Really? Ya kiddin? You kinda look like him"  Yea, well it's a cold heartless business.


We sat from 9pm until about 2:30 am until we were brought out to the casino. This scene was being shot at Harrah's. The second second assistant director (very sweet young lady) sat me and a couple of other backgrounds at a roulette wheel. The real casino dealer gave us each about $100 in practice chips and we started to play. He was cool and explained the game to us since none of us had ever played roulette. About 20 minutes passed as I waited to hear "BACKGROUND ACTION."


To my surprise the 2nd 2nd A.D. yelled "It's a wrap, thank you everybody." They had shot 3 takes with the actors and a steady cam and we never even knew they were filming. All of us were paid $100 cash and sent home. I had taken the ferry over to Harrah's and it wasn't running again until 6:00 am back to the West Bank where I live. What can I do in New Orleans at 3:00 in the morning with a $100 in my pocket? Ok, one beer.


I am proud of myself. On the walk down Canal Street I had three prostitutes asked if I was looking for fun. "No thanks honey" and I kept walking. I see this as a sign of personal growth. One beer later I looked at my watch and it was only 3:30 am.  I had trouble finishing my beer and just wanted to be home. I splurged on a $20 cab ride just to go to bed. 


Oh yea, the film is called THE COURIER

meet the new boss

The other day I got a call from an old buddy who found me on Facebook. We had worked together at the sign company years ago. Richie seemed surprise that I had moved down here to New Orleans. Things were about the same for everybody back in the sign shop. Richie asked what I was doing for a living since I moved down to NOLA. I hemmed and hawed that the only work I could find was as a background actor.

I'm not sure if he believed me at first, but yea it's where I get most of my income. He laughed and said it sounded like fun. I then remembered my old boss Joe. He cut me a lot of breaks and I owe him. However, there were the occasional sarcastic or condescending comments from him. I told Richie to let Joe know that one of my new bosses is George Clooney.



In Jersey it's called Ballbusting.

Memphis Beatnik

Look for me about 5 minutes into part 2. The detective calls me "hairnet."

The Where's BiNGE Drinking Game

Tomorrow night on Memphis Beat my friend and I will be on, in the background. Outdoor bar-b-q scene. Maybe, or we might be on the cutting room floor, or just a blur. We haven't seen it yet.

Anyway, if you spot me you have to do a shot, if he and I are standing next to each other take two shots. Some fat dude gets stabbed, so it's probably in the beginning of the show.

Memphis Beat - Tuesdays at 10/9c TNT

face time

I worked in a kitchen all day. Hot greasy place, stained and nasty apron, cops hassling me. Ironically when I moved to NOLA most of the job applications I filled out was for dishwasher at the fancy restaurants in town. Ok, and strip joints. The irony is today that I worked as one as a background extra. I'm just working as an actor until I can find full time work as a waiter.


I was lucky to have a 1:00 PM report time, some had 5:00 AM. Wardrobe gave me a new apron and proceeded to splatter it with various kitchen stains. A Pollock masterpiece of berries, melons and chicken grease. Then a make up artist gave me some gel to smear on my skin for a look of sweat. "Be careful not to get any on your wardrobe." But the other lady just smeared...never mind.

They filmed Memphis Beat at a posh hotel in NOLA, my third time working the show. After lunch the crew, actors and background proceeded to the kitchen for filming, I was singled out. "What's your name?" the director asked. I instantly thought "Damn, they recognize me from the other two episodes I did and are going to send me home." They don't like to keep using the same extras if they can help it. There is a shortage of dependable background at times in New Orleans. Right now the film the Green Lantern is tying up a lot of background actors. So I guess I'm the best they can get. "Your name?" "Uhm...Styles?" "STYLES! We got something for you to do...."

When we took positions in the kitchen and Jason Lee and Sam Hennings walked in. I'm not sure but I might have gotten the "Oh no, not this asshole again." look from Jason. I'm familiar with the look. I shot back a "I'd rather be working background on Green Lantern right now" look. The best face time I've gotten so far as a background actor and I had to be wearing a damn hairnet.

I've been a background extra on the show so many times,
I could become a drinking game.

I had a featured extra part as a minimum wage earner getting questioned by cops. Not a real stretch for me as an actor. But I did have a lot of experience to draw from. At first Sam Henning was improvising some questions. "Did you see anything, what time did you come in?" The director stepped in, "Just ask yes or no questions so he can just nod." If I even mumbled an answer it would've been a couple hundred more in my paycheck. Just nod, we have a budget. "Did you see anything?" I looked at the ceiling and nodded no.I walked away with my meat.

Check out Sam Hennings IMDB page. This man has an amazing history of working in television. It was a privilege to be on screen with him.
SAM HENNINGS

Cool Car

This clip has a chase scene in it that was shot about 3 blocks from where I live in Algiers. The car rocks. I'm working again as an extra on Memphis Beat tomorrow. I explained to the casting agent that I had worked two other episodes. Since they were several episodes back she said it would be fine. My first episode will air next week. Look for me at a Bar B Que festival. I'm the sunburned guy.

I'm glad I got more background work, I was afraid that I had become a washed up has been extra.

Bad Decisions

Bad decisions, nothing will make me laugh out loud when I'm by myself more than when I think about all of the bad decisions I have made. Bad decisions when it came to money. Bad decisions of who I associated myself with. Bad decisions of careers. Bad decisions.

I decided to change my life and reinvent myself to be one who makes the right choices when I moved. I moved from Jersey to ground zero of the world's worst ecological disaster a month before it happens. Good decision. Really, I love this city, love these people. I made the right decision. My friend in Seattle said. "Wow, you had to move front row center to the end of the world." "Yea, New Orleans has been chosen to be the host city of the Apocolypse, that's cooler than the Olympics."


In the past three months I have been homeless sleeping in a car, I've rubbed elbows with TV stars. I got to be a twelve foot high Jester leading a parade down Bourbon Street. I've gotten to be a street performer in the French Quarter. I've smoked up with Asian gang members. I had U.S. Marshals point weapons at me, handcuff me and run me down to Orleans Parish Prison. I've walked the same streets as pirates, artists and musicians have for hundreds of years. I've made great friends. Like Waffle and Dr Maad.


Moving to New Orleans, the best decision I ever made.

.

Thanks George...

I am pleased to report that some one at the top must have gotten wind from somewhere and our meal was much better today. We ate with the cast & crew.

We received calls from the casting company on Friday for work on Monday and Wednesday of this week. Saturday I was contacted by a different casting company looking for extras to work on the film "Green Lantern" for about five days this week. That would've been more lucrative, but I stuck with my commitment on Memphis Beat. I overheard several other background extras make the same comment.



Monday we pissed and moaned about the quality of food served to us at lunch. Yes, we are only extras which places us in the category of cattle. The extra wranglers were cool and the day went well. This morning in the holding room you couldn't find craft services with a Geiger counter. My buddy and I went down the catering truck with a sign on it "Cast crew only, Extras go to holding" What's next, segregated drinking fountains for extras and crew? We grabbed our coffee from the catering truck, who's going to argue with two bad ass cowboys. Ok, one bad ass cowboy and an Amish dude.

On the walk back to holding, a homeless junky saw our hats and took us for easy out of town marks. "I haven't eaten in two days, can you spare seventy five cent so I can get a burger?" In unison, my buddy and I pointed back to the catering truck. "Go up to that truck, they'll feed you for free." "Yea, just tell them you're a production assistant." An hour later crafty showed up in the holding room with coffee and snacks. When lunch came around, we were herded into the same dining area as the crew. The food that was left was great.



Like any job, you have coworkers who whine and bitch all day. "It's too hot, we've been waiting for hours, when's lunch?" Shut up, it's the easiest most fun job you'll probably ever do. Be on your mark, do what you're told and shut up so the rest of us can hear the director. Where else can you go to work and be dressed up like a cowboy, a cop or a criminal and be fed?

Method Extra Acting

Lee J Lester, Country & Western's most under rated bad boy resides in Memphis when he is not on one of his many final tours. Three decades of classic hits and countless stays at rehabs around the world ensure Lester's legacy will live on.

During the Memphis Beat shoot everyone was so impressed by my buddy's wardrobe that he became a foreground extra. The scene was a memorial service for a country and western legend who passed away in Memphis. The service was attended by everyone who was anyone in the music industry. My buddy who looks like a Willie / Merle / Waylon Cash type got pushed to the front of the scene every time. Front row of the service, being snapped by paparazzi, and a back stage after party. The director also teamed him up with another background extra who was dressed to the nines. She had this gothic Cher look going. Kind of Stevie Nicks meets Elvira.


By the time we got home from the shoot, this background character had more back story than the rest of the show. My character is "Scratch" Goldblum.

How many background characters have their own FACEBOOK page?

LEE J LESTER

Memphis Delta Beat Blues or something......

At 6:30 this morning I was dressed as a cowboy in a van with others dressed like Dwight Yokem heading to a Memphis Beat shoot. The TV show needed background extras for a scene involving a Country and Western memorial. I went on the shoot with my buddy "The Bobby DeNiro of background extras." This guy first appeared on TV when he was a kid on a local Krusty the Clown type of show. He's had the bug ever since, having worked in dozens of films and shows. Also behind the scenes, he was once dubbed "The Ray Harryhausen of New Orleans." Probably the most serious extra I have met so far.

You walk onto a set with him and gain creds with production people. I guess this makes me the Joe Pesci of extras. The angry guy from Jersey who knows it all. Bobby used his background skills of Mardi Gras costumer to dress to impress the wardrobe department. He loaned me my hat with the one he uses for yard work. I got a "cameo" out of it.

Man, Bobby was pissed about lunch.
There is a superstition among extras that if you talk to a star, bad things will befall you. It's like opening up a mummy's tomb, you don't want to be around if it happens. Sometimes it just happens to you. Jason Lee is cool. On some sets the background extras are forbidden to even look at the stars. I've heard first hand accounts of how extras are warned on a Tom Cruise set. "If you look at Tom you will be dismissed for the day and not called back." Don't tell me that. I'll pelt him with Mardi Gras beads and yell "SHOW ME YOUR TITS!"

Perhaps I shouldn't write that.

In the scene from an auditorium I somehow landed two rows behind Jason. I probably was in the shot. Some extras want "face time." To be seen in a shot. Not us, face time means they won't use you again for the rest of the series. You want to be as far from the camera as possible. If you are always a blur, you'll always be working. Jason comes in, smiles and jokes a lot. Seems pleasant and is quick with suggestions that carry weight.

So anyways, he takes position in front of me and looks around. "I like the hats, nice hats." He looks right at me "Nice hat, is it yours?" I reply: "No, an Amish rental." I got that blank look that my humor sometimes gets.


BTW That hat has appeared in the following:
Memphis Beat (twice)
Hurricane Season 2008
Final Destination 4 3-D - 2008
The Brooke Ellison Story -2004

It's the only hat with it's own IMDB page. Keep an eye open for me in episode 4 and 5.

Unique look

Again I have been hired to work as a background extra on Monday. I'll give you the details and cartoons then. I asked my buddy who was also hired why I keep getting the work. Not that I mind. He responded that it must be that I have a "unique look" that they like. I had to send a head shot of me dressed in country and western. When asked if I had any western apparel I responded "I'm from friggin Jersey. Cowboy hats get your ass kicked up there." My buddy responds "Then they ain't had a Texan up there yet..."

I got a loaner outfit. I sent in this picture and got the work. Colleen in Seattle says that I look like an "Amish Clint Eastwood."


"Do you think I'm handsome?"
"You have a UNIQUE look...."
"Thanks mom."

Two months of cartoons in two minutes

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Slide show of all of the cartoons that I have drawn since arriving in New Orleans. BP oil spill, looking for work on Bourbon Street, working as a background extra on films, being arrested by US Marshals in a case of mistaken identity.

Walking In Memphis (sort of)

When I moved down to New Orleans, I had no idea what I would be doing to earn income. I was prepared to dig ditches or wash dishes. Somehow I ended up doing background extra work in films, more fun than digging ditches. Yesterday I worked on the TV show Memphis Beat as an extra. The scene was a Bar-B-Que festival set in Memphis, but filmed in NOLA. A twelve hour day in the sun, waiting and waiting. I didn't say it was an easy job, it's still a job. Being a Bar-B-Que festival the director wanted lots of smoke, he got it. Real BBQ wood smoke combined with the Hollywood smoke of crushed walnuts and church incense. By the time we finished, my friend Russel and I smelled like we had spent all day at mass.I haven't complained about the weather since I got here. Too many cold, damp nights driving cab in Jersey for me to be bitching about warmth and sunshine. It was warm when we worked. The first scene we performed in involved a streaker running through the street festival. That then transformed into a stabbing scene of Fat Red and eventually a gun shoot out. Twelve hours into our day we were sunburned, smokey and tired. Re shooting take after take of bystanders hiding behind BBQ grills dodging gunfire then having to run for cover. Over and over again. It was a great F*ckin day, I hope we get called back.

Professional Background

There is more to the craft of background extra than one might think. Even though I am relatively new to the craft, I see many who don't take it seriously. Yesterday I worked with a friend. This guy has been doing it for quite a while and has a lot of experience. He is the Bobby DeNiro of background actors. He takes it very seriously, and treats it as a talent. He has no tolerance for those who don't.
While on the set of Memphis Beat, episode four, my friend got into a bit of a yelling match with a man who did not treat being an extra as a job. From the very beginning this amateur was scoffing down the prop food, out of shot in the shade talking on his cell phone. He never was at the same mark twice when he was in the shot. Wandering around talking to people and looking for free Bar-B-Que. Most of the day he spent with his ass sitting on a cooler in the shade gnawing on ribs while telling his friends on the phone that he was an actor.

Bobby DeNiro of extras said they probably hired him to save money. The guy took up the room of five extras when he was in a shot. I said "Yea, but he ate as much as ten during lunch. What they saved in labor, they lost in catering costs." Even when they yelled "CUT" he kept eating. Amateur.

My name is Eric

The other day in my blog I mentioned that due to my ignorance of recent television and films, that I could be standing next to a celebrity and never know it. It happened, sort of. While on the set we saw the principals arrive and take positions. I hadn't heard of this show, and do to my lack of interest would probably never watch it. I don't have time to watch TV, I'm too busy writing my own scripts for an animated series to do so. I really don't give a crap about who's on the cover of People magazine, who's banging who or what big shot is in rehab. I am not impressed by fame.

The one guy looked kind of familiar, I didn't really care who he was, I just wanted to earn a day's pay. About half way through the day I found out who the actor was, Jason Lee. Wow, ok, I heard of him. When I first moved down to New Orleans two months ago and stayed with Waffle and Diane, they turned me onto a very funny show called 'My name is Earl.' I liked the show from the first time I saw it, it kind of had the feel that I wanted for my future animated show 'BiNGE.'

Ironically before I left New Jersey I sat down with a yellow legal pad and made a list of everyone that I owed money to. Personal, professional and credit card debt. I vowed that I would work my ass off to make good on all owed money. My name is Earl was about a shifty but lovable white trasher from NJ who finds out about Karma while watching a late night talk show. He makes a list on a yellow legal pad of all of the negative things he has done, and sets out to make up for them.
One background extra broke protocol by going up and chatting with the stars. Ordinarily this would lead to automatic dismissal from the set, but for some reason she got away with it.