Yup, still part of the background on Hell on Wheels.
We finally bought the first season CD. And managed to watch the whole package in 5 days - a marathon, let me tell you.
Yes, season 1 is worth watching. It's a gritty western - John Wayne style. Anson Mount plays the heart-broken Southerner well. He's a little understated, but I think he suits the role.
Colm Meany has the perfect twisted personality traits to play double-dealing, slimy Durrant to a T.
The preacher comes off as a warped individual, perfectly capable of separating his personalities to preach and murder with impunity. I loved his callous disregard of his daughter after she shows up. And she plays the pious goody two-shoes well.
The Swede, played by a Canadian (and I can't remember who right now) is superbly played. He has the OCD pattern down well. He's confused by the western attitude, but tries to embrace it. His is a very complex character.
I'm not a fan of Dominique. I thought her acting weak during the Indian attack. Just not enough emotion displayed for that gruesome a scene. And I didn't think she played exhausted very well. But her glances while Meany proposes an indecent relationship hit the mark.
All in all, I loved the first season. And now, what I do know about the second season makes a lot more sense.
So last week I got a call back. I'm not really sure which episode was shot, but I saw an intense main and secondary cast scene.
Wonders upon wonder, the ground wasn't soaked. I mean, I wasn't trying to keep my balance through mud puddles the size of Sylvan Lake.
I only wore 1 petticoat - talk about being a hussy! Of course, I still had about 30 pounds of clothing on. And talk about hot! Oh how the sun beamed down on an almost breezeless set. Got to about 27 degrees Centigrade on set. We, the poor background actors, sought shelter in whatever shade we could find between takes. Course, once 'Rolling, Background. Action' got called, out into that sun we walked, dodging horses and their byproducts, wagons, and each other to walk through the rut-filled streets.
See, we get told where to walk so the camera will catch sight of us in the background looking like the town is populated. And back and forth we got until we're told to stop.
We heard our call this one time, got into position and had to wait - in the sun - for almost 10 minutes as a small, single prop plane circled overhead. Guess the pilot saw action beneath him/her and wanted to know what was happening. So nothing happened while we waited for it to go away.
In last year's season, I noticed the exec director used different directos for different episodes. Makes sense, I guess. This year, they're doing it again. But this director! Whoa!
Now usually we backgrounders have our own minders - 1-3 or more, depending on how many of us have been called. This time I believe there might have been 3 background minders, our regulars Taz and Alex and some newer person I think called Matt. But none near me and my walking companion or the guys near us. Occasionally we'd have Matt come over and actually give new directions. But he never asked if we needed water or a bathroom break. And managed to walk away when we spoke up about them.
Cast and crew, of course was well taken care of. Their water is kept cool. They get offered snacks right on set. We watched them take a bathroom break, never all at once. But they did get to pee.
Several hours into the shoot, we got told where our water could be found. But during the 5 minute break we got told to keep out of that building cause the cast was in there 'resting' between takes. Great! Water just out of reach and the only shade with chairs out of bounds!
Minders echo the director's calls so everybody knows what's happening. But we rarely had anyone near us so we had to watch other background actors to see whether and when we needed to move.
And I watched the director have several hissy fits. The plane caused one, but he couldn't blame that on anyone. Another came after, remember we couldn't hear any directions, somebody on set was (horrors) talking! I did hear him have a few others, but I wasn't close enough to know why.
That director rarely called 'Action!',. He did call 'Cut!', but failed to say whether we should 'Reset'. He mostly stalked around, dithering.
And he didn't bother about us. To him, I guess we were truly 'Meat Puppets' as another director I know calls his background actors.
As I stated, we didn't get monitored. Not for water - remember it's scorching in that sun and we're wearing heavy 1850s' clothing and sweating like pigs - nor bathroom breaks.
The cast was under tents for this scene - think shaded. The crew could wander around and find enough shade when they weren't doing their crew jobs. And both were supplied with COLD water as needed.
I watched this one crew, a large woman, eat several sandwiches and chug several water bottles, waving them around us. But she's crew, and high enough up the ladder she can ignore any questions/pleading from us lowly background while she's teasing us with that water. Didn't even forward on our pleas for water.
We did finally get water and sandwiches over an hour later than the cast/crew - and nothing appetizing like the cast or crew get - but we had to stuff them out of sight for another 'Retake', and never chew while the camera is rolling.
And to make matters worse, when we finally heard 'Wrap!' after 6+ hours, we were rushed over to the vans to ferry us up. We get up there and...no drinking water and the bathrooms are already put away for the day.
Well, I had to cross my legs till I got to Airdrie, a good hour's drive.
I hope this episode is a good one. Cause I sure didn't think much of the director's actions towards his low-paying background actors.
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