Righteous Kill

Ok, this is my last "catch-up" posting, and going forward I hope that I will post as things occur. So Monday I served as an extra for the upcoming 2008 release of Deniro and Pacino's second pairing in Righteous Kill. Three months ago, Charles Rosenay of Boppers DJs fame sent me information about open registration with a NY casting company so I figured what the hell, I called my friend Paula and asked her to take my head shots for me, in trade, I told her she could use them for her portfolio. She does wonderful work. If you are in need of a photographer, check out her site. I went down to the Grant Wilfley casting open call with one of my co-workers Alex Exum to register. He and I spoke a few times about the calls he had received to do things like Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 and others but could not make it, then on 9/11/2007 I got a call asking if I could make a Monday 9/17 shoot, so I said why not. I found out that Sunday after three delays on the self report line that I needed to be in Bridgeport for 6 a.m. Oh the horror. I had dinner the night before with my friends and went home to bed around 10 p.m. or at least tried to as the Sox were losing there game, but we can save them for another post. I was up at 4:30 and out the door by 5 to make sure I was there on time. I figured that this would be a good opportunity to learn how filming actually works for some of my writing. I could not believe how disorganized the whole thing was. My job was to be a guy in the outfield playing toss with a few others while the filming took place of the ball games. So from 8 a.m. or so through lunch and then all afternoon, we were either throwing the ball around, or they had me move over and play soccer for a bit (which was kind of funny because I am really bad). They shifted us from left field to center, and then to right, and eventually to an adjoining field to make it look like different people on different days. Periodically I had opportunity to go up and meet Deniro or Pacino as they were both there along with Wahlberg, Leguizamo, and Dennehy, but opted not to. I really didn't see any point to bothering them, they were crowded by kids asking for autograph, who really had no idea who they were, but did so only because there parents told them to and the Softball teams from Central Park were taking pictures with them, and I felt bad for them, I wouldn't go into you place of work and try to bother you like that. Yes I know it is different, but still I wanted to respect them and not try to intrude into their space. So towards the end of the day, there we were, Deniro 15 feet to my left in front of his sun protecter (a giant black screen he stood ehind to protect from the sun) Pacino 25 feet in front of me on the back of a motor cycle, filming his scene. Pacino was giving his classic grunts, the "oh yeah's" if you will, and us, a few of the extras just hagning around watching the scene when the guy next to me, probabley in his late 20's early 30's, if I had to guess just a hair younger than me turns to me and says "This is probabley going ot be one of the most memorable moments of our lives". I turned and looked at him, seareching for words, but the only thing that came to mind was something along the line of "are you serious?" or "your life really isn't that lame is it?". I hope you know where I am coming from, I mean being here and doing this was a lot of fun, and I have great stories to tell about it, like this girl crude 25 year old girl that acted like she was 15 pretending to be an actor, but not have the common courtesy to respect the directors call for everyone to be quiet. She spent more time running in and out of our group than where she was supposed to have been on a bench with her laptop. Back to that guy though... I was telling Dave and George aobut it that night, and this isn't even the highlight of my summer, let alone my life... heck it wasn't even the highlight of my week... I had a more memorable time with my friends two days before playing paintball and seeing Jane that night than I did on the set. I guess I feel bad, or rather lucky that I have such good people around me that an event like this can be fun, but get me fooled into thinking it was really that great of a moment. Anyway, if they call me again, I am not so sure I would jump at this type of scene again anyhow. All I know is I hurt from head to toe... my shoulder from throwing, my hamstrings from playing softball, my thumb from the vibration I got off the bat in one bad hit.. and it was a long day too... got a little sunburned, got the "hollywood tan" as one of my co-workers put it, and did it all over the course of a day that started at 4:30 a.m. when I woke up, and ended a around 7 p.m. when I finally got home. Anyway, hopefully next time it is somehting where I can sit and read all day, or even add to this blog... Have a good day.