Sunday, November 09, 2003
i'm ready for my hara-kiri, mister demille.
i feel like such a stupid baby jane. on friday night, in the times square station, i yelled, "i'm gonna be in a movie." with irony intact and all--it's not like i had delusions that i'd be best friends with glenn close and eric bogosian would get me salad from craft services, but . . .
oh. twelve hours. four-thirty to four-thirty. no pay. which i knew, but i didn't know about the twelve hours, or that the extras would be an indiscriminately mixed group of paid SAG background and, er, the rest of us. it's really demoralizing to do this sort of . . . i don't know, discouraging, slightly subhuman work and not get paid for it when the people around you are doing the exact same thing and are making cash. to top it off, no one ever said thank you, it was crack-your-teeth cold, i had to wear a fucking beret and velvet bike shorts (who thinks that's what someone wears to a loft party, crazy french wardrobe lady?), and the guy i was paired with for the last scene told me not only was he not SAG, he wasn't really an actor.
a friend was working on the film and told him that if he worked for three days as a SAG extra, he could join the union. this is true, although it's about to be changed. i got a little excited. if vouchers were given to non-union folk, this twelve hour hell might be worth it. when we were finally wrapped at four-thirty a.m., he beat me out of wardrobe and i saw him at the table with the PA in charge of background, signing the same forms and time cards that the SAG actors had. score, i thought. while he finished i walked up to the table and waited minutes for the overworked PA to make eye contact with me, and then asked him about the vouchers. he told me i could only have one if i knew someone higher up than him who could authorize it. and, i'm sure he'd been there for more than twenty hours. but he wasn't polite. he wasn't kind. and i'd just worked for twelve hours for free, and he couldn't have cared less. and some musician who's just "hoping to get into acting" is now on his way to being SAG while i continue to labor without the aid of unions formed to protect me. i asked if i was required back tomorrow, and he said dismissively that i could come if i wanted; they didn't really need me.
i'll say.
oh. twelve hours. four-thirty to four-thirty. no pay. which i knew, but i didn't know about the twelve hours, or that the extras would be an indiscriminately mixed group of paid SAG background and, er, the rest of us. it's really demoralizing to do this sort of . . . i don't know, discouraging, slightly subhuman work and not get paid for it when the people around you are doing the exact same thing and are making cash. to top it off, no one ever said thank you, it was crack-your-teeth cold, i had to wear a fucking beret and velvet bike shorts (who thinks that's what someone wears to a loft party, crazy french wardrobe lady?), and the guy i was paired with for the last scene told me not only was he not SAG, he wasn't really an actor.
a friend was working on the film and told him that if he worked for three days as a SAG extra, he could join the union. this is true, although it's about to be changed. i got a little excited. if vouchers were given to non-union folk, this twelve hour hell might be worth it. when we were finally wrapped at four-thirty a.m., he beat me out of wardrobe and i saw him at the table with the PA in charge of background, signing the same forms and time cards that the SAG actors had. score, i thought. while he finished i walked up to the table and waited minutes for the overworked PA to make eye contact with me, and then asked him about the vouchers. he told me i could only have one if i knew someone higher up than him who could authorize it. and, i'm sure he'd been there for more than twenty hours. but he wasn't polite. he wasn't kind. and i'd just worked for twelve hours for free, and he couldn't have cared less. and some musician who's just "hoping to get into acting" is now on his way to being SAG while i continue to labor without the aid of unions formed to protect me. i asked if i was required back tomorrow, and he said dismissively that i could come if i wanted; they didn't really need me.
i'll say.
