So you want to be a Movie Extra?

You are so hungry for the opportunity to get in front of the lens you are willing to work long exhausting hours and sit in masse with tens if not thousands of other good doers to be a part of a movie. The pay for staying out the chance to be in a movie. This is the run of the mill fast paced lifestyle of the movie extra.

How to be a movie extra?

Movie extras are willing to go the extra mile to have their resume read something positive about being involved in a featured film. Many times movie extras can be in groups of five or ten, they may play passers by on the street or even people inside of a diner. You may even find hundreds if not thousands who will sit in a stadium and act out a sport scene. Some people will do anything just for the first experience. It may not be glamorous, but it may inspire you for more.

What some movie extras will do is become readily available to casting agents and can show up on a dime to shoot a scene or sequence and perform as directed. The more reliable you become the more places you will be invited to show up. The only problem is that some of the work is done at weird hours of the day and due to setting up the scene you can stand around and wait a long period of time just to hear action and then two minutes later you are done.

If you are a movie extra and you get the opportunity to show up on the set some extras get a speaking part. An average extra may make from $1000 - $10, 000 depends if they actually say something audible on the film. Click here to find paying extra jobs. Granted, large crowds aren’t paid, they are sometimes fed. As a movie extra you will learn to keep your schedule wide open and be ready at a minutes notice. You may be able to parlay a SAG membership. A SAG or “Screen Actors Guild” membership is a unionized group of actors who are well paid for their time and service. Thus if you show up and have an SAG card, you may have a leg up on the other actors around you. It may also open the door for other speaking parts that you may not have had the opportunity before.

Now that you see the benefits of being a movie extra, you may be wondering where do I find these opportunities? You can look in the local papers, trade magazines and of course the Internet. There are several reputable websites for casting calls and extra work. Remember being an extra there is a consistent need to have a flexible lifestyle. You will often find yourself in the company of familiar faces as casting agents may use the same extras on more than one occasion.