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| Photo taken from Boston.com. |
The press release was practically all over Facebook. Mark Wahlberg planned on shooting a movie in Boston called “Patriots’ Day” that would be about the marathon bombings and there was going to be an open casting call for extras. I was immediately intrigued. The movie Black Mass had shot in Boston about two years ago and I missed the open casting call for that project. I didn't want to miss this opportunity. Or, wait, maybe I did?
See, I was hesitant about the whole thing because I frankly didn't think that such a movie about the marathon bombings should be made. I couldn't see how the making of this movie would be anything but awkward, recreating the bombings, shootouts and such, especially only three years after the fact. It would just be so weird and unavoidably exploitative. I mean, maybe if Wahlberg and the studio donated all the profits to the victims of the bombings, that might be good...but, still, just the fact that they would have to recreate very traumatic events that left such a scar on Bostonians, not to mention the citizens of Watertown. Wouldn't it be kind of disrespectful? I would think so.
I wasn't the only person who thought so, either. There was already a lot of controversy surrounding the movie. The producers had asked Watertown if they could shoot in its neighborhoods and recreate the shootout. The people of Watertown declined. They had no interest in reliving their nightmare and why would they? How disrespectful it was for the producers to even ask.
So, yes, I definitely found myself in the camp that didn't think the Patriots’ Day movie should be made. Nevertheless, I still felt compelled to check out the whole casting call process, though I didn't have high hopes about getting a part or even really care that much. I was more attracted to the experience of a bona fide Hollywood "cattle call", which would be something I'd never participated in before. What would it be like? How many people would show up?
I had to check this thing out. I was curious.
So on Sunday March 13, I got up at the butt-crack of dawn and drove into Boston—well, Allston, to be specific. My destination was a place called BOSTON CASTING INC., which was located on Braintree Street, right in the Harvard Avenue area if you're at all familiar with those parts. I found a parking spot maybe about ten minutes away and the ensuing walk made me sweatier than I ever would've thought. The weather was kind of weird that day, which is known to happen in the pesky month of March that has trouble deciding whether it's going to be winter or spring. Without a jacket, I was chilly. With jacket, I was hot. Since I didn’t know how long I would have to wait in line outside the Boston Casting place (I envisioned a mob scene), I thought I better stick with the jacket so I wasn't freezing. This ended up being an unwise choice because I was dripping sweat by about only five minutes into the walk.
Of course, part of the perspiration was probably also from anxiety. I didn’t know what this casting call was going to entail. Would I have to perform a monologue? Would they give me some kind of cold reading and I’d have to perform on-the-spot? My mind was racing with all the possibilities.
Aside from the sweating, the walk was rather enjoyable. In fact, I had never seen so many yoga pants in my life. It was a Sunday morning and all the yuppie girls were out jogging, walking, running errands, getting coffees, and they were all doing these things in the hottest yoga pants I'd ever laid my eyes on. Holy shit! The entire scene closely resembled my idea of heaven. Yoga pants, man! Yoga pants!!!
The closer I got to Boston Casting, the busier it got and then I noticed that there was a significant Boston Police presence. Police cruisers had their blues on and were blocking off certain streets. Officers were directing traffic and pedestrians. Damn, dude, now I was starting to get intimidated. Was this just going to be a gigantic shit-show? What was I getting myself into?
The traffic cop directed me to cross the street and I realized I was now walking in front of a place called O'Brien's pub. My mind flashed back to about 15 years ago when my old punk band named "Death in Arms" had a gig there. We were the opening punkers amidst a rather large line-up of Allston gutter-punk bands. The headliner, I believe, was a band called “Tommy and the Terrors” while other bands included a punk chick-band called “The Profits” and a Misfits-like band called “Mourningside”. I enjoyed playing that gig, though I'm pretty sure nobody liked us, with maybe some exceptions (a few of our parents had come to cheer us on). The Allston gutter-punk scene was kind of snobby as most "scenes" can be and in their eyes we were basically a bunch of square suburbanites who weren’t victims of society. I actually don't even know how we managed to book that gig. I'm pretty sure the bassist in our band—a cool chick named Erin—had an 'in' with somebody in the gutter-punk crowd. Yes, even in the punk scene, it was all about who you knew. If you think about it, that's so not punk.
Aaah, those were the days, though. Allston had a pretty prevalent punk scene back around the year 2000 area when I was rocking out with my band. But things had changed since then. Now the bars were geared towards BU college students and, instead of punkers walking the streets, there were girls in yoga pants. Not that I'm complaining, of course, because I love me some yoga pants. But it would be nice seeing some punker butt flags (also known by their real name “butt flap”) sprinkled in with all the yoga pants.
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| This is a butt flag. The real name for it is a butt flap. |
Aaah, butt flags. I miss butt flags even though I’m not sure they fulfilled any useful function other than to look aesthetically displeasing to the eye. Huh, what? Oh, right, butt flags…I mean, um, all this punker talk really has nothing to do with anything. Let's get back on topic here!
I turned the corner past O'Brien's and then made my way down to Braintree Street, which was the street that Boston Casting was supposedly on. I didn't see said casting place yet, so I made my way further...and further...further down the narrow road that ran parallel to the Mass Pike. It wasn't too long before I saw another cruiser's blue lights flashing and then I saw the predicted long line of people that snaked its way down the sidewalk. "Oh boy," I thought. "This doesn't look good."
I joined the end of the line and couldn't even tell how long it was, because it eventually curved into the Boston Casting building at some point. I thought I was in for a long wait. Good thing I had brought a sandwich with me, as well as plenty of water and chocolate chip cookies.
While I was in line, there were a bunch of casting directors handing out clipboards and forms that we all had to fill out. They needed information like age, height, weight, shirt size, inseam etc. If we had either a police uniform, fireman uniform or doctor uniform, they wanted to know about it. If we had any official Boston Marathon jackets, they wanted to know about that, too. They also asked for acting experience and special skills. I didn't have many special skills I could write down, but I made a note that I was willing to do nude scenes.
While I filled out my form, I could hear little snippets of conversation coming from the other people waiting in line. There was a girl behind me talking about how she once played a doctor extra on “ER”. Then there was a guy in front of me bragging about how he was working for ESPN the day of the marathon bombings and he was right near the finish line where the bombs went off. The casting director ingratiated him and said, "Write that on your form! Write it down for sure! The director wants people who were right there. He wants realism!" I again couldn't help but think about how awkward this whole movie was. The more traumatized you were, the more qualified you were to be an extra in the movie? It all just sounded bizarre and, well, awkward.
Also, while I stood in line there was a car that pulled up near everybody and started blasting some terrible rap music out of its subwoofery sound system. Everybody couldn’t help but look over to the car and on the window somebody had painted a website for an “emerging rap artist”. I’m not sure if the "emerging rap artist" himself was driving the vehicle, but I guess this was some sort of attempt to promote the rap material. I suppose he may have thought that "Marky" Mark Wahlberg himself would be in attendance, hear the music and go, “Holy shit! I’ve heard some rap music in my time, but this is the next best thing! I must find out who this emerging rap artist is!”
Surprisingly, and fortunately, I didn’t have to wait in line very long. The whole casting call was—at least at that point—very organized and they were letting people into the building in groups of ten.
As I made my way into the casting headquarters I sort of befriended a nice little old lady, and by "befriended" I basically mean I spoke a couple words to her. She was wearing an official Boston Marathon jacket (hoping to stand out among the cattle) and she asked me how her hair looked. I politely said it looked "just great" and it did for the most part. I then jokingly asked her how my hair looked and she laughed. This was a joke because my hair was basically shaved down to about an eighth of an inch and there was no way that it could look out-of-place. I actually was kind of impressed with myself that I had come up with such a quick-witted joke and I looked around to see if any casting directors heard me. I thought that if they heard the joke they would realize how charismatic I was and then they would shout, “Stop everything! Who is THAT!?! (Pointing at me). THIS kid needs to be in pictures! NOW!!!”
This didn’t happen, though. Instead, the old lady, about nine or ten other actors and myself got corralled into a no-frills conference-type room with some grease boards on the walls. A young-looking casting director jumped in the room, briefly told us about the movie and made sure to emphasize that the "film" (i.e. more sophisticated word for money-making "movie") would be done "tastefully". Then the casting director went over some of the rules when it came to being an extra, the biggest of which were that we would need to commit to a 12-14 hour work day, we weren't supposed to take pictures on the movie set and we couldn't bother the actors or director. The most important commandment above all others was, "Thou shalt not talk to Mark Wahlberg unless he talks to you first.”
Then we basically all dumped our forms and "headshots" (my headshot was more like a selfie I admit) into one of two plastic bins. For SAG people, their material went into one bin, and for non-union, their material went into another bin. I was non-union.
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| This was my ahem (awkward) "headshot". I know it's a mirror selfie. You don't have to point that out like a smart-ass. |
For those of you who don’t know, SAG stands for “Screen Actors Guild”. It's basically a union for actors and you must have a significant role in a movie or TV show before you're qualified to join. I heard the word 'SAG' floating around a lot while I was at the casting call. It meant you were special and in an acting echelon above most of the other people. SAG also meant that you could potentially score a non-SAG girl's number while you were at the casting call. Maybe you could even get a blow-ja-awahoo (radio edit).
A lot of people were trying to chat up the casting director before they left. Not to be cynical, but I could feel the desperation in the air. So many people, so desperate for a part, however small. In fact, my time at the open casting call was an incredibly humbling experience. I never felt so far away from achieving a goal of being an actor in a movie, not that being a movie actor is one of my top goals in life, though it's still something I've always dreamed about since I was young. Hopeful as I may have been, all I could see was my headshot being thrown into a massive plastic bin along with hundreds of others. It was one, giant slush pile, and this was just to get a role as an extra in a movie. An extra! And, oh yeah, I wasn’t even in Hollywood! If it was this tough to get a role as an extra in Boston, just imagine what it would be like in Los Angeles, where practically everybody and his brother is trying to become a movie star.
When I left Boston Casting, I saw that the line of hopefuls seemed to have grown a bit during the time that I was inside. I admit that I felt all cool walking down the line, holding my folder in my hand that I had used to carry my headshots aka selfies. I walked with confidence, making it clear that I had just "auditioned" and they were still waiting in line like nervous nellies unaware of what awaited them inside.
As I made my way back up Braintree Street, I made sure to walk directly behind a few news reporters whom were covering the whole casting call. At least if I didn't get a part in the movie I'd still make it on the evening news, ya know? Then I soon noticed that a Boston police cruiser seemed to be rolling along beside me. It felt kind of strange and then I realized I was carrying a black courier bag on my shoulder that looked big enough to carry a you-know-what. Surely the police were on high alert since anything having to do with the Boston Marathon could potentially attract some evil-doers.
The cruiser kept rolling along with me and I was almost sure that the police were going to pull me aside to search my bag. I must say, I felt relieved knowing that I left my dildo collection at home that morning. Normally, I carry my dildo collection around with me wherever I go—it makes me feel safe and secure—but there was a voice that morning that told me to leave it behind. Thank God I did!
The police, however, didn't end up saying anything to me. I turned a corner and their cruiser didn't follow me after that point. I was relieved. I went to a liquor store on Harvard Ave. called Blanchards and got a nice, frosty tall-boy of Natty Ice. It was my reward for having nailed my audition. I crushed it, dude. Killed it!
It wasn't until a few days later that I learned a whopping 5,000 people showed up to the open casting call by the end of that Sunday. I also learned that, as the day went on, the line extended all the way down Braintree Street, then down Cambridge Street a bit and then even went over the Mass Pike bridge. For those of you who don't know the area, this was really fucking far! Most people didn't even end up getting into the Boston Casting building after a certain point. They just gave their forms to casting directors outside and got the hell out of there. Holy shit! I guess I got there at the right time because, like I said, I really didn't have to wait in line very long at all.
As far as getting a part goes, I suppose my chances are extremely slim. I'm one person out of 5,000 and I didn't have any special marathon attire or police/fireman uniforms that made me stand out at all. If I ever do become an actor in movies someday, I will look back on all this and say, holy shit, I'm a lucky dude! If you have even a supporting role in a major motion picture you're basically as lucky as a dude that wins the lottery. It's not something to take for granted, that's for sure. And if you actually become an A-list movie star? Holy double-shit, dude, you're talking a miracle there. That's more than being one in a million. It's like one in a billion almost. I hope Marky Mark knows how lucky he is!
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MATT BURNS is the author of several novels, including Weird Monster, Supermarket Zombies!, The Woman and the Dragon and Johnny Cruise. He’s also written numerous memoirs, including GARAGE MOVIE: My Adventures Making Weird Films, My Raging Case of Beastie Fever, Jungle F’ng Fever: My 30-Year Love Affair with Guns N’ Roses and I Turned into a Misfit! Check out these books (and many more) on his Amazon author page HERE.
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