Extra! The unheralded "stars" of movies
For all the hoopla of Oscar Night, there's one group of Hollywood professionals the Academy always overlooks. They're the anonymous performers from "Central Casting," deserving of some EXTRA attention, as Lee Cowan is about to show us:
They are some of the most familiar faces you'll probably never recognize - hoping to be stereotyped ("mob guy," "lawyer") into greatness.
Names don't matter here. It's all about size, shape and type. Faces are photographed, body parts are measured - all of hopefuls who carry the classic Hollywood dream: hoping to become a Hollywood extra.
Extras are Hollywood's houseplants - cinematic wallflowers, the face in the crowd - or the crowd itself.
They are the unknown souls drowning with Leonardo DiCaprio in "Titanic"; the nameless airport passengers being chided by George Clooney in "Up in the Air"; the Israelites faithfully following Charlton Heston through the parted waters of the Red Sea; or they're baseball fans so "Natural"-ly cheering on Robert Redford.
"In some ways they're the unsung heroes of the movie world," said film historian Leonard Maltin. "But being unsung is kind of part of the job description, isn't it?"
Maltin said there isn't a lot said or written about extras, precisely because they're not supposed to be interesting.
"You're not there to improvise, you're not there to show off. You're there to be part of the background, and be an authentic-looking part of the background," he said.
So where do directors shop for that background? In a place that sounds more like a punch line than a business: Central Casting.
"No one believes there really IS a Central Casting!" said Jennifer Bender, a VP of one of the biggest cliches in Hollywood - part temp agency, part circus recruiter.
"We get called, 'We want three blondes, two brunettes, two African Americans and an Asian, between the ages of 20s and 30s,'" Bender said. "I mean, that's by definition what we do."
It's been around a long time, since 1925 - created as a better, more organized alternative to the perils of Hollywood's casting couch.
Legendary director Cecil B. DeMille was a frequent client. He even appeared in a short film about Central Casting and its talent-in-waiting, who come "from the ends of the Earth" for "the magic call that may mean the lucky break."
Today, Central Casting's mission remains the same as it ever was, and 87 years later remains a booming business.
It hires between 2,000 and 3,000 extras EVERY SINGLE DAY, including casting Oscar-nominated films like "Moneyball."
"That movie had thousands, thousands - I mean, we had to fill up stadiums," said Chris Bustard, who was in charge of finding them all at the request of producer-star Brad Pitt.
Fitting because, after all, Central Casting is where Pitt got HIS start.
Pitt told Cowan that when he first signed up at Central Casting "I had no idea was I was doing. But I got here, you know, I landed, had a meal at McDonald's and got the paper. And by the end of the week I was an extra!"
So was John Wayne, Ronald Regan, even "Desperate Housewife" star Eva Longoria - pretty humble beginnings that are enough to keep some 300 new applicants coming to Central Casting every week.
Summer Wesson is one of the casting directors who has at her fingertips an unlimited database. If her screen came alive, it might sound something like this:
"Biker, downscale bar patron, homeless ..."
"Cop, doctor, lawyer, news reporter, baseball player..."
"Hair down: Homeless, mental patient, lots of mental patient; Hair back: Nun, medical technician, nurse ..."
Jennifer Bender said that some people that have been an extra in so many different films that they're almost like stars in and of themselves. "Absolutely, there are several of them, and I think there's a few that you would probably recognize."
One of them may be Jesse Heiman, dubbed the "World's Greatest Extra" in a YouTube clip that was made by, believe it or not, a fan!
It's been viewed more than 2 million times - highlighting Jesse's appearances in everything from "Glee" to major motion pictures like "The Social Network" and "Spider-man."
"Are you OK being the 'World's Greatest Extra'?" asked Cowan.
"Well yes, of course," said Heiman. "It's a title. I have a title! It's like I'm the Madonna of the extra world!"
There are others you might have seen and not know you've seen, like John Starr, who's been an extra since he was cast to sit behind John Travolta in "Welcome Back, Kotter."
"You're the lowest person on the totem pole," Starr said. "You're an extra - literally, just an extra."
"It does strike me, though, that to be successful at it, you sort of have to embrace the obscurity of it all," said Cowan.
"I always say you have to embrace the humility," Starr replied, "because it really is a humbling position, unless you're able to just enjoy it for what it is."
And what it is, is hardly glamorous.
"A lot of people don't realize how much talent it takes to, you know, be dead!" said Howard, auditioning to play the part of a body (as in, a LIFELESS body) on "NCIS."
Dignified? Maybe not. But difficult? You bet! His eyes can't flutter. He has to be able to take shallow breaths - and for "NCIS" executive producer Mark Horowitz, the competition for the role is, well, stiff.
"The camera is moving on them and off of them all the time, and so they have to sort of stay in that character pose during the course of the shot, and it takes a bit of technique," said Horowitz.
By far the most common technique for an extra is simply walking. In the biz it's called "a cross" - as in crossing behind the stars.
Sounds easy, but rookies get it wrong every time.
"Hands at your side, looking straight ahead, walking like a robot - that would be the first mistake, and a lot of people do it. They don't think twice about it," said Suzanne Saltz, 2nd assistant director on "NCIS L.A."
Most of her job is choreographing the extras - on this day, more than two dozen of them, like Yvonne Lavalle.
"What makes me a little crazy is when we do crosses behind mini-blinds, where the camera is this high off the ground, and all they see is your waist," said Yvonne, "and we do it 500 times."
But getting noticed is NOT part of the job description - which is why Shirell Ferguson Coleman always makes sure that she has something to do, and something to say.
The trick, she says, is to mouth words (like "Peas and carrots" over and over again) but do it silently.
The hours are long, the wages are minimal - no comfy trailers for the extras! All for those few moments of obscurity that just one day just might pay off.
Being "straight out of Central Casting," as they say, may be a cliche, but it's also a Hollywood badge of honor.
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