7-day straight on set

I am coming of my7-day stint on sets. The week stared with the Kevin Bacon movie in New Jersey. On Tuesday, I had the Verizon commercial. Then I got booked for 3-all nighters on the new Adam Sander movie "Don't mess with the Zohan".

The first night they had us come at 9pm at this church on Columbus ave, a few blocks from the set which was at Columbus Circle. As soon as we get there they break for a walk-away lunch. The reason it was a walk away lunch was because this was a cheap production. I suppose we were lucky to even get the no-name brand chips and cookie crumbs provided for the 3-night stint.

After the "walk-away" lunch, we brought some chairs outside and sat around on the street by the church because it was way cooler than sitting indoors with no A/C on at all. Then we sat, and waited, and waited. Laughed,watched drunks stumble by and waited some more.

Finally at 5:15 am, they call us to set. This was just great considering "Mr. Sun" was going to awaken soon at 6am and they would have to wrap. So they had us standing around Columbus circle by Central park south to walk around like tourists.

The scene evolved around this Limo that goes out of control, and speeds through Columbus circle towards Central Park and ends up smashing in one of the t-shirt stands. It was fun watching it the first 20 times, though 3 nights in a row of this in different angles takes a toll.

The second night turned out to be so much worse for many people. This was because the first night the temperatures were warm. On the second night the temperatures dropped about 20 degrees below of what it was before.

Some people were wearing shorts and mini-skirts from the night before as it was to be a "summer scene". So you can imagine how crappy it was when not only was it cold, but it poured rain all night long. We thought that the rain would mean that they would shut down early, not the case. They had us out their in the rain standing without umbrellas looking at the stupid limo on two wheels, spinning around the Columbus circle. It was horrible. Still I kept shouting out to my fellow background Friends: "LEGEND WAS WORSE!"

The third night came and you can guess that a third of the original people didn't show up. Also the holding are changed to this really small hall in the congregating of a church. The only good thing at this locations was that there were actually some provisions for food this time, If you want to call stale bagels and cookies food. At least they actually had name brand chips this time which was highly impressive!

So they got us out on set at a fairly decent time, only 4 hours waiting in holding to go back out in the drizzly rain to do the same thing around Columbus Circle that we did for the last 2 nights.

I was fine to see it through to the end, unfortunately I had a huge conflict. I called up xtra xtra casting to find out my call time for the Honda Commercial, and it was the super early call time of 4am! This wasn't bad I thought at least the location was in Manhattan and a 20 minute walking distance apart.

My plan was to ditch the "Zohan" set, hop in to a cab, sign in at the Honda and come back at 5am to the Zohan to sign out. Sounded like a good plan at the time, though it didn't work.

The Honda commercial did start immediately as we signed in. Mind you we had the "Omelet guys" make us some nice breakfast from the truck before we got settled. I had a spinach omelet with hash browns. I must say it was the best "FREE" Spinach Omelet I ever had!

This totally made up for the food rations at the Zohan movie. Back to time, and limited time at that. After the Omelet express, they took our Polaroids and had us out on set by 5:15am. They had us on a very expensive block right by Henri Bendel and Harry Winston,fine jewels of the world. This place is SO exclusive that they have guards on a 24-7 watch and these steel iron gate. These were the kind of gates that they have on these exclusive super-rich homes to enter and if you take a picture or even think about it, you will be shot!

So you can imagine how these "Harry Winston" people hated having us outside there taking refuge in their doorway as it was still really cold that morning. The Henri Bendel People actually let us go in side the doorway. This is a place that I would on no other circumstance be able to afford or even look at a place like that. Truly amazing the power of money that is is.

Back to this commercial, they moved relatively quickly. Those Japaneses are good at what they do. In fact this commercial is to air in Japan. The Honda car itself was this "Eggplant" colored station-wagon like new Honda they are advertising.

Us extras, only 20 of us, were dressed up as Shoppers or business people. Same old background thing we had to walk up and down the street until they got the shot where they have this 19-year-old model in a little dress posing as if she is waiting to get into the car. Not surprising that this would sell to the Japanese market. Mind you the 19-year old model was really good and maintained her composure as the cool winds were slicing through her little tiny dress.

As I said these Japanese don't waste time and we wrapped at 10 am. Not bad plus there was a nice early lunch of baked ziti and chicken with some potato salad. They treat you right on these commercials.

I guess you can figure it out that I had no chance in hell to get back to the other set to sign out. After getting food and decent treatment on this set I was like "To Hell with the Zohan"! So I lost $50.00, big deal.

I got called back for the second day, another early shoot at 4:30 am on a Sunday. I got there on time and had a Spinach Omelet again, some coffee and sat around until they called us to set which was around 6am and we wrapped at 10:30am.

This is when I found out how commercials pay so much better. In fact better than SAG wages. Are you ready for this, they paid $250.00 per day plus a bonus of $50.00 for wardrobe and we brought our own.

So I lost $50.00 at the Zohan, but I made $600.00 in 2 days. Mind you, taxes will cut those winnings right down, Still this totally rocks. I hope I get the check at least in a months time. This is the only thing that sucks about these commercials is that they take forever to pay you. Oh well when it comes, this will be a nice gift.

This week, things have slowed down, though there is word of the "Sex and the City" movies shooting in the city soon. It has been a really busy month considering it's August and I recall last year at this time that I was lucky to get a phone call from the agency.

Let's see what next week brings.

CA