In what has amounted to by far the most random thing we have done on this trip so far, Tina and I spent almost our entire Friday on a ferry boat tooling around Sydney Harbor as extras for a Bollywood film. Hilarity, confusion and boredom ensued all day long.
On Wednesday, our friend Tegan had received a call from her agent about a job for Friday being an extra. She was torn about doing it since Friday she was supposed to hang out with us. Kris told her to go ahead, so she decided to ask her agent if we might be able to do it too. When this suggestion came up, we jumped at the opportunity, not just to start our budding film careers but more so after learning it paid and this would be a God-send way to pay off the stupid repair on the washing machine door.
So off we headed to downtown Sydney on Friday morning, not knowing really what to expect. Safe to say whatever it was, was not in our expectations. When we first got onboard we made our way to the top outside level and took our places around little setup tables, with fork, napkin and wine glass props set up. We were expecting to start getting involved once the ship left and patiently waited as the whole Indian crew bustled around, mostly chatting as the leading man got his silly makeup job. Well anyhow we spent the next 3 or so hours sitting around on the deck as they filmed very specific and what seemed to me, very dull scenes of banter over coffee that didn’t involve us three at all. About 15 minutes before lunch, after I had played 5 rounds of cards with myself and Kris was 20 minutes into a sun-bathed nap, we got called for our scene which was a wide panned shot of the whole top deck as the leading pair entered to sit down at their table. 10 minutes later we broke for lunch, which consisted of overly processed and very spicy curry downstairs. We thought we might be done but were told by film crew to stay on board because they’d probably use us again. Well, they never did and we spent the next 4 hours as prisoners aboard the ferry, playing plenty of cards and enjoying the hilariously coordinated dance moves the two actors were pulling off. We finally got off the ship at 5:00, having worked for 10 minutes and $288 richer (140 of that going to the washing machine repair) It wasn’t as glamorous as we thought it might be but we will still keep our eyes out for Bollywood releases in the coming year or two and make sure you all hear about it when we find ours. J
Hilarious moments include:
1. Early in the morning Kris had pulled out the deck of cards to play with Tegan. 3 minutes later a gust of wind caught the cards and blew about 20 of them all over the film set. Amidst her embarrassment and our laughter, the kinder peons on the film crew gathered them all up and gave them back to us.
2. Later that morning, Kris started doing one of her Syllacrostics out of her puzzle book. It caught the attention of the dance choreographer, Raju, as well as a passing fancy from the director and other members of the crew. It was clear a handful of them would have much rather been doing one then whatever it was they were doing.
3. The lead actor was wearing those neck cuff earmuffs all day long to keep warm and it became this running joke. When they were getting ready to film a scene, he wouldn’t even take them off himself, so some poor mate had to run in from off set, take them off of him and run back to where he was standing. Wow.
4. One of the extras that showed up that day was clearly pretty high on himself, name dropping with whoever would talk to him. A few minutes before our BIG scene, I caught him pulling out a little mirror and blush set, or whatever and start powdering his face. Turns out he was totally off scene for the whole scene! Priceless.
It’s safe to say, neither Kris nor I expected this as part of our Australian itinerary, but were glad to have done it, to have made the money to pay the repair and a little extra and entrenched ourselves in the Bollywood film circuit. ;)
Above pictures: Lead actor with his ridiculous earmuffs talking to director,
No comments:
Post a Comment