Left turn...

Well, as a bit of a left turn in my career, today sees my debut appearance as a walk on background artist. I'm driving to glamourous Luton this afternoon for a night shoot for the BBC, to appear as a drunk in a Victorian drama. This all started when a friend and I were discussing getting involved in the world of voice-overs, having both done one or two radio adverts and enjoyed the experience. I started searching online, as you do, and found a site which listed loads of adverts from production companies and extras casting agencies. Why not, I thought. SO, for £15, I signed up for three months, selected four pictures of me from previous holidays where i didn't look to fat, and then applied for four ads. Within 2 hours I'd got two replies, one of which invited me for a casting call in London, and the other for a casting in my hometown.

I went to the one in London which turned out to be a bit of a cattle call. You line up in a corridor, sign a form saying you'll hand over 15% of your earnings, get called in to answer a bunch of questions (have you ridden a horse? do you have a driving licence?) and get measured. Then you have a picture taken, and you can go. This particular call was for an Elizabethan movie being shot in Shepperton in June, and I decided I wouldn't be in luck, having sat with a whole bunch of younger, more handsome and slimmer blokes in the casting call.

However, yesterday, I got a call from the casting agency asking if I was free the next day to go to Luton and play a drunk, to which I of course answered yes!

The week before I had been to the completely different call for a documentary being shot near my hometown, and having signed the obligatory form, I was ushered into a room to meet the producer and director of the programme. It was fun! we chatted about the subject matter (of course I'd read up on the subject the night before), I told them I'd done no acting before, and then they got me to sit and act like I was being preached at, I was interested in what was being said, and they filmed it. Then they asked if I'd ever held a gun. They asked to pretend I was holding a gun, and someone had just shouted "they're coming in!" and I was to act scared but ready to defend my position. All that went through my head was the opening to 'Dad's Army', when the home guard are walking through the fields with thier weapons brandished... They said thankyou, they thought they could use me, and the'd let me know.

So, an hour after getting the call about the Luton shoot, I got an e-mail telling me I was in on the documentary shoot too!

I hopw can do as I'm told...