Time out for snacks (Two phrases you are not likely to see in the same sentence: "40-Year-Old-Virign" and "Oscar-winner")

This is a screed that's been brewing. We will return you to your regularly scheduled extra-bile shortly.

First off -- if Steve Carrell does not get a best actor nomination, then all comic actors who are Academy Members should leave. Steve Careel of the movie "40 Year Old Virgin." I'm sure the gross-out element and sexual nature of this comedy will confuse and leave many to dismiss.

But: if you are a fan of things like Animal House, etc., the SMART, yet RIBALD look at things, then this movie was one of the best I've seen in a long, long time. I've been a huge fan of the director/writer's (Apatow) work on TV for a while (Freaks&Geeks, UnDeclared).

Back to Carrell's performance: wonderous.

Didn't feel like he sacrified the comedy for pathos. Didn't feel like his humanity towards the charater got in the way of the comedy. And for every dramatic actor who thinks that's easy -- Please. Try it sometime and we'll be glad to watch you fail.

I really think part of the problem with comic actors being recognized within the body of the Academy, is no matter whether the dramatic thesps admit it or not, when faced with comedy in the present day (not looking back at Keaton, Chaplin, Lewis), they feel it's low-brow. They are still hating the class-clown cut-up who got laffs, while they were sitting in the back of the room brooding, having a rich interior life.

They will say things like comic actors just "mug," meanwhile think of a dramatic actor who doesn't have his stock "I'm in emotional pain" look that he pulls out when in trouble.

Gay Lover was corresponding the other day with an oscar-winner he fucked. Oscar-boy was sniffing about how Bill Murray is not an actor. His opinions are pretty standard: the dramatic actor seethes that the class clown is still getting attention, and he'll be damned if he's every gonna get an award from HIS exclusive club, until the comic is dead, dead, dead. Then we can celebrate comic elegance. Only then.

... and to think this all happened on Garfield II ...

I had heard rumors of a crouton fracas on set. Some had said cheese was the undoing of an extra's coil, but I held out for croutons.

Sure enuff, on the luvely background board called Background Beat -- it's all been documented. While filming Garfield may have been peaches and cream, Garfield II has come with some psychic weight. The actual participants have testified in the Court of Background Opinion. I'm going to post the link to the thread, but I'll also try and spell out what happened below, as the linked thread is sort of stream-of-consciousness, like you're a kid in front of the assistant principal, stifling tears and spilling out your story.

http://www.backgroundbeat.com/index.php?showtopic=1450&hl=

Apparently the croutons were not for salad, they were soup croutons. They were specifically for onion soup. Now, I'm starting to get behind this dude -- salad can be had without croutons, but Onion soup? I don't know what third world dogtown you hail from, but here in the states we eat our Onion soup with croutons.

I've had my soup nazi moments on set. People ripping soup right outta my hands, telling me it was crew-only soup. At first you feel shame for your Oliver Twist moment, and then the anger surges through you when you realize no one said this was sacrosanct soup. It was from the same craft services table you had been eating from all day. I knew that one day this background broth would come to a boil ...

The extra challenged craft services about the croutons being withheld and said that the soup nazi:

"just was on her own controlling the lives of background"

the transpo guy came to tell crouton-crisis extra to leave. extra questioned the authority of a mere transportation guy for set removal. Then, crouton-crisis extra claims: two "mexican" security guards entered the fray. Not sure the importance of their ethnicity, and it's never referred to again. Meanwhile, others on the thread questioned his recall:

"I’m shocked and appalled at such a testimonial. One guard was black, one Italian and the other white-white"

Ohhhhhhhhhh: "white-white." That's some Caucasian crouton crisis right there, brother.

and then another challenged the whole reality of crouton crisis extra calling the soup lady "very mean and treating all background as sh**."

This from an extra referring to himself as Bing Bing:

"She even pleasantly gave me extra cheese without the croutons in the home made onion soup she personally prepared on the spot. "

Yet, no matter how pleasantly she gave Bing Bing his cheesy onion soup, there were indeed NO croutons for him either. His underlining of this passages leaves us no doubt.

Question: Are croutons pricey? Has there been a run on them since the various plagues have been visiting mother earth lately? Do croutons signify status now? Are poor people buying knock-off croutons on the black market? These are viable questions before I can assign guilt to any of the actors in this real-life drama.

All of this horror happened to one of our more elevated background players. This crouton-crisis fellow had run for leadership positions in SAG, which is the union for all actors -- both "fore" and "back" ground. He was a bad Florida recount away from becoming vested with union power, and now crouton-crisis extra is removed from the set, complete with a visit from the Beverly Hills Police.

Read his final words on the subject:

"And Production crews never ever check both side story, they rather lash on background. And even Background Casting Directors have no spine to support or help background, even they lash on background whenever they get chance."

[bold, underling and italics of the word "lash" were added for this report. all bold, underling and italics are purely the perrogativee of this blog and in no way reflect the actual emphasis deemed by crouton-crisis extra]

all dressed up and nowhere to go

Beautiful day. Beautiful palm tree-lined street in Arcadia. Beautiful vintage automobiles. Beautiful Belgian uniform. Fell asleep in the shade of a palm tree. Never made it to set.

Harpy: a shrewish woman based on a mythological beast

5:15AM the alarm goes off and I sleepwalk to the shower. Couldn't sleep at all lassnight cuz I knew I had to get up at 5:15AM. And while my mind is rolling over the fact how sleepy I still am, that it's dark -- the thought occurs to me -- I'm working today. Working Man! I have purpose. My name is on a list, people are already preparing for my arrival.

I arrive on set to hear the Batman House burned down. Wayne Manor, home of Bruce Wayne. Not far from us today in Arcadia. Rumor has it Paul McCartney had just purchased it. I had a friend who's spotted him twice at the same local Mexican Restaurant. Rumors abound in Backie Land, and the worst thing is -- sometimes -- they're true.

As I arrive on set I ask the Harpy A.D. where the changing area.

With total disdain and annoyance: "It's in the blue tent."

I don't think she grasps the concept that an extra is asking a question because they want to do the right thing. In her extras-are-mongoloids prism, a question means you weren't listening, you're stupid.

Every word she sez is broadcast with this tone, the HNB, the Harpy National Broadcasting system I call it. It's a powerful signal, but you can block transmissions if you focus your mind on fuck-you waves back at her.

I'm pulled out of line today and selected for a secret mission by a P.A. I've never seen before.

"He's priority" he sez about me to the various handlers. I got through props, hair and make-up ahead of the line.

"He's priority."

I stop off at the belt brother, the guy who makes sure we are fully belted before we go on set as Belgian Officers. He gets it just right.

The costume lady comes up and readjust it. "It's all about the waist," she sez.

The Designer comes up and adjusts it again to be sure. I've been selected to make a big entrance into this scene while the star Clem Gooney sneaks out. I'll be an aide of a Big Cheese General.

I am now propped-up and dressed and primped and primed. I notice the director Ferdie Feganberger sitting by himself and having a smoke. Extra is chatting pleasantly with him, doesn't seem solicitous from afar -- the harpy A.D. runs over and zealously removes the extra like he's broached all humanities protocol. She sends this extra back into the area, and gives us our "talk" for the day.

We are told at base camp we're being bussed to an All-Girls School.

One extra good naturedly sez "Wahoo, all girls!"

The A.D. pretends not to hear him and asks for repetition. I knew this was a set-up, I could see in her face she was hatching a trap.

He repeats comment and she pounces

"That's the kind of response I absolutely don't want to hear. We need to be very respectful today, it's a working campus and ...."

Oh for chrissakes, one guy was only being silly. She easily could have said:

"Yeah, grrrr, wohoo. Seriously guys, it's a working school and we need to be respectful."

But she was into being punitive. Why, because she gets yelled at, and she feels the need to take that out on us.

We get to set, and as advertised their are young ladies in tartan skirts everywhere. Clem Gooney shows up in a small white van and the P.A.'s all begin whispering in their walkies "He's landed" with the dramatic flair of an Airforce One Touchdown. Gooney hops out and starts wisecracking like Clark Gable in his prime. Gable had horrible halotosis.

They've set up a scene of various military bigwigs arriving for a conference. About 50 extras, dressed as period military, press, dignitaries, etc. It's an old ornate building on the Girl's School, supposed to look Belgian. It's a fun scene, lots of energy. We've been given the freedom to talk today, which is in itself intoxicating in Background Land. We're entering a conference, I'm with the General Big Cheese as his side-General. The General is actually from Luxembourg. He can speak a little of the myriad of languages found in the region. General Big Cheese keeps letting props/costume kow that the rank on his coat is of colonel and that he feels he should be carrying a gun. I speak to him on breaks and he's got a decent knowledge of european history. He's a former cartographer and he owns a home in Santa Monica. He had hoped to get a speaking role in this, but had to settled for featured background. He likes to swim across rivers. Stand next to someone long enuff, and you'll hear many tales.

As the General Big Cheese enters, the press genuflects, flash bulbs pop, he greets everyone in big style. I decide to play it cool, with a smug smile, and push back several aggressive reporters. One of the military extras next to me has a badge that sez "Photographer," but no camera. Vagaries of prop availability. He's decided he's been demoted, because he keeps forgetting his tools. I'm not the only deluded background here making up backstory.

During a small break in filming, the harpy A.D. decides to ask the regal looking General Big Cheese where he is from:

"Santa Monica" he sez.

"Okay, Okay, where's your family from."

"Santa Monica. [and he cuts her off] the question a Custom Agent would ask is 'Where were you born?'

"So?"

"Luxembourg. "

I see two A.D.'s talking amongst themselves and they accidentally let their name slip out to the extra.

"No names on location!" the one sez, as if they feel a name is another tool for the extra to bug you. Meanwhile, they learned my name when I became "priority" today, so they keep using it all day, to show their personal skills or something. I dunno. Maybe I'm being too hard on these guys, because all of a sudden, seconds before a big shot, this extra sez to the A.D.

"Do you read."

"Uh, yeah."

"Well there's a great book about the Duke."

"Huh?"

"You know, the Duke -- John Wayne!"

"BACKGROUND ACTION NOW!"

-- and with that the scene starts. What spurs this non-sequitur in the extra's brain? Why did he feel it was appropriate to this situation to bug the A.D. seconds before she's got to do her job?

Harpy harridan A.D. reels from encounters like these, and you can hear her disdain for us when she can ban objects commonly associated with us. Like THE EXTRAS CHAIR.

She takes great pleasure in denying folks the right to take their beach chairs to set during "her talk."

"Don't take those chairs."

I have problems with the moral, ethical & philosophical tenor of THE EXTRAS CHAIR -- but I understand them. They beat sitting on a hard cold metal folding chair for four hours at a time. They beat finding out all the chairs are gone. If this bitch did a month's worth of extra work, she'd get the utility of a chair. But instead, she see this as part of the extra's obnoxious world, and she's going to curb it.

"None of your stuff either!"

Things like books, and portable CD players, etc. -- the things we take to keep purselves amused while sitting out the wait, those bug her too. She's bugged by the extras and their trappings.

When we get to set, I see no reason why these things were banned, other then her punitive nature. There was room to set up the beach chairs. People could have had their stuff. But, it's all part of her control issues.

Later, director Ferdie Feganberger goes for another smoke break during lunch, sitting on the rigging of a far trailer. An extra approaches him for a cigarette, and I can see the extra doesn't know that this is the director. Another extra comes over to smoke. This time the harpy leaves them alone because she can see that the director really doesn't mind. He's choosing to associate with us. I did extra work on a film of his when I worked in accounting, they came up to our accounting office. On that day he ate with the cast and crew. Everyone ate together. He's not into the hierarchy thing that I can see.

The extra who was talking to Feganberger comes over to me and I want to hear the scoop. What did Feganberger have to say? The extra just said he was nice and they talked about classical music. The extra used to play bassoon in orchestras until he had his stroke. Now he does extra work because he sez

"It's great for meeting friends, sex and dope."

We talk about a recent book that came out about classical music's wild side, and he actually knew the writer. She played bassoon too. He sez the book is not even close to how debauched it was.

Next to us, an extra did sneak his portable DVD player to the set. He's showing a short film he made to gaggle of backies. They all look on attentively, calculating -- can I make this happen? Will this ultimately help?

An extra comes running into the tent.

"We're wanted on set!"

Most extras start to get up, but a few sit in their chairs waiting for official word.

Harpy A.D. is right behind this extra yelling:

"What's wrong with you, I said we're going to set." That's her first words of entrance.

"Everyone go to set, I can't make it any clearer."

"You could make it clearer for me, because I thought I'm not supposed to be there," I say.

"Everyone but you two," she sez, pointing to another extra deemed to also have "priority."

Later she laments to me how stupid these people are. I decide to risk it:

"Well, first of all, you come in the room claiming you've already told us something and that we're not doing it, when, in fact, we were doing it, but because we heard it from an extra."

"I was behind him, he heard me!"

"Yeah, but we didn't hear you. And, you said it was "clear" but it wasn't clear, which is why I had to ask about me."

"Yeah, I said 'except you.'"

"You said that, AFTER I asked you, not before. So you weren't all that clear."

"Well, I just don't want to get yelled at!"

And with that she revealed her problem. She's not interested in how she's communicating with extras, which is the actual process she can manage better and thus be yelled at less -- she's more interested in passing on the admonishments she's just received.

I finally sit down as the crew has gone back to set, and listen to the one extra left behind with me:

"I grew up going to the bars with my parents in high school. Stay till they got good&drunk and then walk them home.

One barfly used to cash his check, drink until he fell asleep on the bar. Guys come in to rob the place, tell him to get on the floor, he's asleep, they shoot him for not listening. Double-barreled shotgun."

It's an extreme punishment, but life will punish you for not listening.

Am I an Apple?

Once you're jumped into the background life with an extra beat-down, a backie boot party, it is indeed

'fo life!

Currently, I'm duded up as a Belgium officer for the movie The Sad Belgium. I'm back in The Suck, The Shit, a Hell Hole. Okay, enuff of the grisly gang&war metaphors, I'm really at a beautiful garden out in Arcadia. Next to me is one of the Ray Liotta twins (http://no-biz.blogspot.com/2004/11/happy-birthday-dana-grant.html). He's dispensing advice as Daddy Hollywood, a role he often takes when not preaching his rabid right wing politics.

"If you want to act, you have to learn how to make faces."

"Really?" sez sad-sack extra who's his new pupil.

"Oh yes, my acting teacher, Sphingy Spongey

"Who?"

"Oh, Sphingy Spongey has acted for SIX DECADES. He told me acting is all about making faces."
On some level I agree with Daddy Hollywood Ray Liotta Right-Wing twin, even with Sphingy Spongey. Despite all the rich inner life, the work, sense memories, we all started pulling faces in the mirror. I wish more pompous acting teachers would be this honest. I saw Julianne Moore on TV the other day describing the face her child made when fighting tears. I knew that Moore had cataloged that sad mask for her repertoire. Back to more nuggets from Daddy Hollywood:

"You can act with your voice. If someone sez 'I like your voice' and offers you a commercial -- say YES!"

He sez YES very enthusiastically. I guess he was afraid his pupil might say "NO!" to such an offer, but he was ready, ready to say "YES!"

The star of The Sad Belgium is Clem Gooney. He is as garrulous as advertised. He tells clumps of background after the director, Ferdie Feganburger, request another try --

"You're only giving 50% on that take! I blame you!"

Then he blames camera.

Then he blames himself.

"Smoke em' if you gotta em," he sez to Extras. We are in a fancy dinner party of yesteryear, when folks smoked. Then he mimes a vibrator on his neck, like a dude without a larynx and sez:

"Thank you Ferdie Feganburger."

An extra next to me has asthma, she does a grimace laugh. She's stopped props twice from propping up folks in her vicinity with ciggies.

Then Clem Gooney calls Ferdie Feganburger "Mr. Coverage" after he shots a relatively minor movement five times. Feganburger does not laff. Gooney sensing he's uptight, calls him "Mr Checking-the-Gates" after he finally is satisfied. Feganburger gives Gooney a "I get it, leave me alone" smile.

Ferdie Feganburger is dressed in a suit coat, red t-shirt with squares on it, and shorn head. I was on one other movie with him and I've never seen someone so present and focused on the task of making a film. You get the sense if there's a crouton missing from Craft Services, he knows it.

Speaking of croutons, an extra told me he saw a meltdown last week so severe, that the COPS were called, not just set security. An extra had it out with Craft Services over a crouton. I laff nervously, picturing myself finally snapping over just such a thing. A crouton, no napkins, making me put back a soda -- the energy in the proton is released with a collision of the smallest items.

The extra who witnessed the crouton crisis, doesn't miss a trick -- he's pointed out to me on set a guy nipping whiskey from a bottle he keeps in is backpack and a young kid behind the bushes getting high. I make a mental note to hide my proclivities from him.

I say hi to my pal the Art Director in front of a particularly wound-up A.D. Letting her know he's my friend. Back off Bitch equivalent. She's made her decision that extras are all refuse washed up on the shore of her pristine existence, and it broadcasts with every movement and word she speaks. In extra's holding, off set, she's calling groups of extras "Apples, Bananas and Coconuts" to differentiate for use in a scene, meanwhile the A.D. inside has named us something else. So, when a well-meaning extra tries to clarify how her nomenclature corresponds to theirs on set, she gets short & crabby with everyone and announced loudly

"You should know if you're an Apple or not!"

One extra sez to me:

"The guy inside said I'm in the this-half-of-the-room group. I'm dodging her apple. She can't throw apples at me."

Suddenly my whole life's awful trajectory becomes explained to me -- I've never been sure if I was an apple. While mulling this point I take stock of my surroundings. We're in this fabulous mansion in Arcadia. It's got cases full of rich people things. Soup ladles worth more than your car. A silver cherry bowl from China. Horns used for a hunt. At some point, did the lady of the house ask herself '' Do I really need this carved ivory box to store my invitations in?" I hope my life amounts to more than a collection of rich person things. That you have to build an ornate cabinet for, so you can show your rich friends -- look at all my things that I can't even use!

Now, as my mind is bouncing around like an extra pinball you won for a high score, I look back to Clem Gooney. Jesus, he's effing good looking. I decide I would love to do him. He really should be president. He deserves to be the leader of the free world. He's just the most distinguished gentlemen looking person I've ever seen. Better than Cary Grant. President is part ceremonial, just have some crusty CIA veteran running the country while Clem Gooney waives to the masses, flashing the grin that sits above the mount rushmore chin. I tell people I saw Clem Gooney on set today later that night, and they immediately say "shouldn't he be president" without any goosing from me.

Gooney is doing this scene with Ted Tunnel. They're both standing close enuff, I can pick up stray bits of conversation. Gooney is doing weird humming and making Tunnel laff. Tunnel laffs heartily at everything the star Gooney sez. Tunnel's eyebrows ar as bushy as his fathers -- Lars Tunnel. His brother Jim Tunnel is also a famous actor, and together they made the film "The Magnetic Bosco Brothers." Somewhere they have an unheralded sibling deep in therapy.

I'm still as deluded as ever -- when the action starts, I get so into my conversation with my fellow extra, I don't even listen to the great acting icons actually speaking just inches from me. Nope, I'm miming a conversation, looking deep in the eyes of the other person and ACTING! I may be furniture, but I'm furniture working on my craft.

If you go to prison -- you really have no excuse not to write a book -- and the same with extras. If you're in the gulag of being background, you can use the time to really try acting when no one's really watching you. You've got a long day on set, much of it sitting in holding areas, tents -- and if the only product of that is reading Soap Opera Digest cover-to-cover you've missed the gift of investment in yourself this job allows. I was wishing they would give us barbells like in the yard, so we could pump up like prisoners. The Second-Second would love the muscled-up extras demanding smoke bumps!

Back in the room, we're all sweating buckets. Our period costumes are made of wool, for the Belgium winters. Add in the movie lights, and you have makeup peeps running around dabbing at us, sopping the sweat off our foreheads.

I look at one of the grips setting lights -- sheezus he looks just like Pauley Shore. I'd like to see Pauley Shore survive in the ultra-male world of the grips. That'd be a reality show worth watching.

We are set free early, and I change in room with full view to passer-bys. The main men's changing room is a zoo, so I drop trou here with the "I don't give a shit" attitude that comes with being wrapped. Or so I thought. In our street clothes, sound has requested our services. They need "walla-walla" -- crowd party noise back at the scene of the party. It's actually the most fun I've ever had doing walla-walla, they encourage us to speak in French if we can. I do my fake French so well (recite verbs, but do it with a great accent) that the person I'm talking to is actually surprised when I switch to english. I never let them on the secret that I was just saying "I do, I am doing, I have done, 70, Depardieu, very good, shit brother, mother." As we leave the mansion, heading back to sign-out for the day -- Clem Gooney appears. He is also wrapped, and has shed the first layers of his costume. He looks at us, the extra lepers and sez:

"Hey guys, thanks a lot, you were great, thanks for the day!"

Now that's a movie star I'd crawl through cactus for.