So, today I’ve been on location, being an extra in … “Hannah Montana: The Movie.”

You ask — why is a 50+ man in a Hannah Montana movie? Serendipity. The blame falls on my wife, who heard an announcement on a Louisville radio station about an extras casting call in Nashville in April. Her idea was to bring one of our suitably aged nieces down there (our daughter being a tad too mature to be a HM fan). We convinced our 16-year-old niece (and her parents) to give it a try. We sprang for some nice photos taken the day before the casting call, then zipped down to Nashville one sunny Sunday.

A casting call for a pop princess vehicle is more like a cattle call. Signups were at Sommet Center. The line started at the front entrance and by the time we three arrived had already circled the block. The line was just as long by the time we made our way around to the entrance three hours later. Girls aged 8 to 13 were overwhelmingly the bulk of the would-be actors in line, but of course there were plenty of adults, too.

We got the Niece through the line, walked into the arena proper to hand over her paperwork and there one casting director told me they were looking for adult extras, too. Who knew? They took a headshot of me, and sent us on our way.

Days later I got a call from casting saying they wanted to use me, and the Niece, as extras. They rattled off something about me being a “wheel turner,” whatever the hell that meant, and told us to stand by for further details.

Woo hoo! First step on the road to stardom!

The hitch was the distance involved. The set was outside Nashville, about 180 miles away, but shooting would be in early June, after classes were over. We settled on running down to the set for one day’s work. Non-union extras pay is not that good, I was told, so putting ourselves up in a motel for a week would be a money loser.

Mind you, we finalized all this literally at the last moment. So last minute that I called casting on the way down, and they shot me an email with all the details, I-9 forms, and a map to the location, Greenbrier High School. After criss-crossing the area four times, we finally found Greenbrier and a place to stay, at 10 pm.

I was supposed to start at 6 am, the Niece at 9, but those rascally time zones threw me off and I woke up at 6 am. We arrived at the high school at 7, proof of legal residence/citizenship in hands, got our pay vouchers and wristbands, and boarded a big yellow bus to the set, a faux county fair at Smiley Hollow Park.

Like the Anerica song goes, the heat was hot. The temperature was already pushing 90 at 9 am and stayed in the mid-90s all day. The occasional breeze compensated for the cloudless sky, and I was mighty glad we bought sunscreen at Kroger at 11:30 the night before. The routine was like this: work in the hot sun for and hour and half, sit in the shade for another hour or so, work in the sun for another hour plus, relax in the shade, and so on. We had an unlimited supply of bottled water ferried out of to us and kindly production assistants spraying us with pump bottles to keep us cool(er). Nevertheless, it was bloody hot.

And strangely fun. While I am not a fan of Hannah Montana by any stretch, I don’t detest her either. Miley Cyrus is yet another in a long line of Disney pop princesses, who while annoying to anyone older than, say, 17, are a fairly benign influence. (Well, with the possible exceptions of Britney, Lindsay and Xtina …) There extras of all ages there, and we were all, in that special Disney version of the universe, naturally all supposed to adore Hannah Montana. We whooped, we hollered, we chanted “Hannah! Hannah!”, waved signs and banners, all on cue, while focusing a little red piece of tape that symbolized the lead character.

Hannah/Miley was there, in her bus, but I didn’t see her. I saw her dad, Billy Ray Cyrus, because we were background in two of his scenes, and Melora Hardin, but for the most part the principals did their scenes separately from us sun-baked grunts.

Whether our efforts survive editing remains to be seen. I might be seen cheering Hannah while standing four rows of people behind Billy Ray, or might not. If you see a disembodied sign waving behind a crowd of cheering fans, I’m holding it — or maybe someone else is. I figured I was doing it for the experience. If I (or the Niece) make it to the Big Screen, well, how cool is that?

The movie is set for a May 1 release. I might even have to watch it, assuming it ends up in China, just to see if we’re actually in it.

June 7th, 2008 | Tags: extras, hannah montana, movie | Category: General stuff | Subscribe to comments | Leave a comment | Trackback URL