You may not notice them as you watch your favorite TV show. They’re drinking coffee in a restaurant, walking down the street, or dancing at a crowded party. But by doing what they’re doing, they’re making scenes look more realistic.
They’re background actors, the extras, the performers who stand behind the stars and rarely get noticed except by eager-eyed friends and proud-as-punch mothers. Interested in background acting? Wondering whether it’s for you or how to get started? I spoke with several actors who gave me the background on working background.
Debbie Miller Nelson worked in the wine industry before leaving her job and taking the leap into acting last year. Nelson often works background five days a week on television shows and films like “Gotham” and “Younger.” She said she loves it because “every day is a different role, a different decade, a different wardrobe with different people.”
She recommends that actors who want to do a lot of background work be professional, show up on time, and follow directions. Though she does caution that while some weeks “there is too much work,” other weeks find her with only one day on a set.
John Rigon recently began working background after his wife answered a Facebook ad for a Martin Scorsese film. He loved it from the start—the variety and watching the crew and performers do their work. He feels it gives him valuable experience and enables him to learn about the business, saying, “it almost feels like going to film school.”
Bob Leszczak started doing extra work when he lived in California but since moving to the east coast, has been able to find near daily work in New York. A writer of books about television, he feels that being on sets provides him with a well-rounded view of the business and gives him an “ongoing element of surprise.”
Like most background actors, these three aren’t doing it for the money. They’re doing it for the enjoyment and the love of acting because the money—especially for those actors who have to pay tolls or buy gas to go to shoots—isn’t a lot. Nonunion extra work typically pays around $143 for a 10-hour day, while SAG-AFTRA actors in large cities make about $170 per day. Background actors often receive meals as well, although they eat after the union workers.
READ: What to Do if You Want to Go From Background Actor to Featured Role
There is the possibility for background actors to one day get their union cards and earn at the higher scale: actors receive SAG-AFTRA waivers when they’re given lines, are featured, or because the set doesn’t have the minimum number of union extras. Three waivers make an actor SAG-AFTRA eligible.
Background actors need to be flexible and have an open schedule if they want to work a lot. Call times can be very early and will often run very late. Leszczak told me that “planning out one’s week can be an on-going chess match. We occasionally return home from one shoot at three a.m. and find that we’re needed at five a.m. that same morning for the next.”
All three actors truly enjoy honing their craft, even if some days it just involves walking down the street behind a star. They also appreciate the opportunity to get to know other like-minded performers and network to make connections for other projects. Nelson will be in a short film this summer because of someone she met on a set. Leszczak says that after doing many background jobs, he encounters the same people over and over again: “We become like one big background family.”
So if you don’t mind early mornings, late nights, and not being the star, and you’re dying to be on a set, look into background acting. Do it, as Leszczak says, “for the experience, the camaraderie, being part of the entertainment industry, and being close to the stars.” You’ll never again look at a crowd scene the same way.
Catherine LaMoreaux is the artistic director of Dragonfly Multicultural Arts Center, a nonprofit community theater she co-founded with her daughter in 2014. Dragonfly is committed to diversity and non-traditional casting. Catherine has written five plays, including “Tenali Raman,” an adaptation of Indian folktales, and “Cyrano!,” a reimagining of “Cyrano de Bergerac” with a female Cyrano. Her degree is in theatre from the University of Michigan. She teaches high school acting and tutors in English.
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