Hacker News Reader

Comment by mtalantikite | Hacker News Reader

I once was leaving my work studio space in north Brooklyn and there was a pretty large shoot happening a block away. I had my headphones on and was going to a bodega on the corner before heading home, not really paying attention to the shoot itself because you sort of get desensitized to it living in NYC.

As I'm walking all of a sudden I notice that J Lo was a few feet from me with cameras on her, clearly in the middle of a scene they were actively filming. I play it cool and walk into the bodega, where the film monitors were setup and people were watching the live feed. Some guy -- I read him as the DP -- goes "hey nice work, you're background?" to which I respond "oh, no man, I'm just buying something". They shut the whole scene down, because clearly I had no contract and ruined the shot, and as I walk out of the bodega J Lo is just looking at me smiling.

Some PA totally got fired that day.

View on HN

Moments like that make me wonder what would have happened if you’d just answered “yes”.

One of the Star Trek films included a moment where they asked a bunch of extras some question. She wasn't supposed to answer, but nobody told her that, so she replied totally normally. I mean, they were back in time in the "present day" (for when it was filmed) so her answer made sense for the scene.

They loved it and kept the shot, but then realized- whoever this was, she now had a spoken part in the film! They had to find her, get her to join the actors guild, and then pay her some minimum amount for having a line in the film.

I'm sure someone will reply now with the correct version of this story, the woman's name, which Star Trek film it was, and a link to proof of this all.

Star Trek IV - The Voyage Home. That I can tell you off the top of my head because I remember the scene you are talking about.

But the rest of the story requires reading: https://legendsrevealed.com/entertainment/2016/02/25/did-a-w...

>So they had her sign up for the Screen Actors Guild (everyone who has a line in a film has to be a member)

Anyone know why this is? Why a person uttering a line must be part of a guild? Is this a U.S. thing, or international?

Also, why aren't the talks of unions here on HN using the world guild? Union? Meh. Guild? Yeah! Developers would flock to be part of a Developers Guild.

Edit: Answer to first questions:

https://www.quora.com/Are-all-actors-and-actresses-part-of-t...

>SAG-AFTRA is a USA union. There are many many hundreds of thousands of actors in other countries around the world. Other countries have unions too. Some, like SAG-AFTRA are strong and look out for actors’ interests very well. They may also act as gatekeepers and insist that their members have a certain standard and professionalism. There are plenty of countries where unions have little strength and actors are bullied and have next to no bargaining power. American actors have a lot to be thankful for.

> Anyone know why this is? Why a person uttering a line must be part of a guild? Is this a U.S. thing, or international?

Because the guild has an agreement with the studio that only guild members can have speaking roles.

Joining the guild is pretty straight-forward. It's a lot less work than the typical whiteboard interview.

Note that in general it's obnoxiously hard to get in, and that screws people over all the time. It'd be nice if the general case was being able to join when it makes sense...

Maybe it's just my family because my dad worked in Alameda for a while, but at least for us that's the most quoted line in the movie!

Everything would have just kept going along? If he wasn't just a random guy and was actually supposed to be there, there wouldn't have been anything to worry about.

Accidentally walked through the set of The Devil Wears Prada who were set up to film on around 5th Avenue and West 55th, fortunately they weren't filming. They had a really nice craft services table. Hopefully no one got fired.

could they have offered you a contract at that point to save the shot?

Nah. OP _almost_ finessed his mistake, almost.

What the subtext says to me is that the assistant director, or whoever OP talked to, was well aware that OP was just some rando passing through, (probably through experience working in cities), and not a unionized member of SAG. The “nice work” comment was an opportunity for OP to say, ‘uh huh’ and float the director enough plausible deniability to salvage the shot. As soon as he said, “no”, it’s cut and reshoot. Probably not a big deal, but worth a shot (pun intended) from the director.

Yeah, this is how I read it as well. The fact that I was trying to buy something from the bodega owner is I think what tipped them off that I wasn't supposed to be there. The place was clearly closed for regular business.

They definitely didn't want to have to call 'cut' in that moment -- you've already set up the shot and have J Lo (and I think Ray Liotta) doing their thing. Starting over isn't ideal (but probably not a huge deal).

Reply on news.ycombinator.com