Vicky J. Rose: Posted 9-7-2010

Vicky J. Rose At the end of August and beginning of September, I had the fun of being an extra for a few days on the set of Robert Duvall's latest movie "Seven Days in Utopia." Below is an account of that adventure:

David Mullen, the cinematographer for the movie, stayed in the apartment above B's house while filming. When he wins his Oscar, I'm going to tell all my friends I slept under him for five hot and steamy nights in Utopia. Just kidding! They wouldn't believe me anyway. We rarely saw David; he was always in a hurry, streaking in and out. On the set, he worked so intensely, I never even tried to speak to him.

 

If you want to see photos of Robert Duvall, Kathy Baker and the other cast members; you'll have to look elsewhere. We weren't allowed to photograph the actors or ask for autographs. However, they did let us take pictures of each other in the "holding" area for extras. There is a social protocol on a film set that I could never really get my hand wrapped around. To make matters worse, because I don't have cable TV or much money to spend on movies, and I live with a son who has control of the remote, the only actors I knew were Robert Duvall and Kathy Baker. I spend my life writing the things I want to write and working when I can find a job, and the rest of the time I don't pay too much attention to the rest of the world. Maybe that's why I'm not very successful. "Mr. Duvall" to the extras--he's only "Bobby" or "Bobby D." to the director and the other cast members--is the best actor in America, and Kathy Baker is so good in the Jesse Stone series with Tom Selleck, that I knew who they were. So I just said "hello" to everybody and hoped I didn't commit a faux pas. One time I said "hi" to one young man, and as he walked away, someone commented, "Didn't you know that was the producer?" I knew he looked ready to chew nails, but he said "hi" back, nevertheless.

This was a closed set, but B and I got to view part of it from the country road that rose above it. Can you imagine how hot it was for the actors and crew with the Texas sun bouncing off those white rocks in addition to all the camera lights?

 

The first thing people ask me is: "Did you get to meet Robert Duvall?" Not really, there were times when he was approachable, but I never had guts enough to do that and wouldn't have known what to say anyway. I haven't seen his latest movie; I can't tango, and I know zilch about horses. However, he was pleasant to the people who did speak to him, but I don't think he has a clue to the depth of admiration the people of Utopia feel for his work, because most of them were like me, too shy to say anything and too afraid of bothering him.

Cast and crew may have suffered elsewhere, but we got to sit in Utopia Park, next to the beautiful Sabinal River, while waiting as extras.

 

On Saturday, I arrived at the Utopia Park nervous and scared with my three changes of clothes-LeAnn wasn't there yet. Luckily, I made friends with one old cowboy who was driving a truck for the production company. When I found out Dave descended from Edward Burleson that made him okay with me. If Edward Burleson had had a good publicist, he could have been more famous than Sam Houston or Stephen F. Austin. Later LeAnn arrived and took me under her wing, and Cheryl, who was in charge of our wardrobe, looked at our clothes and told us what to wear. Cheryl did her job well, being nice to us at the same time. Of course, I knew she was the real deal when I saw safety pins hanging off her sleeves and a credit card from Hancock Fabrics attached to her belt.

It was pleasant, watching and listening to the children play. They were almost always polite and well-behaved, even when they had to be quiet during times of filming.

 

After getting Cheryl's approval, a van took us to the Methodist Church in Utopia. I stood with the other extras in front of the church trying to pretend Robert Duvall's character, Johnny, was in a truck that drove by a few times. The hardest part was trying to stand up straight and hold my stomach in. Then they had us walk along Main Street as if we were hurrying to a golf tournament. Later someone said they were only filming our feet. I hope the bunion on my right foot doesn't show.

This nice woman, who checked our hair to make sure it was right, is also the wife of Texas singer Joe Ely.

 

After that, it was back to the Utopia Park and the rodeo grounds. Almost everything has to be filmed in pantomime. It's really hard to cheer an invisible bull without making a sound over and over again. And if this sounds as if it went quickly and there is nothing to it, I can assure you it took hours. It wasn't because the crew was goofing off-I've rarely seen people work so hard. They don't fool around-it's too expensive of a project. It was all hurry up and wait on our part, and to be absolutely quiet while they were filming anywhere in our vicinity. In the meantime, I laughed and joked with the other extras, and by eleven o'clock that night, we all felt like we knew probably just a little too much about each other, but that was okay too, they were a nice group of people. Whoever was in charge made up for all our troubles by feeding us marvelous cuisine from an upscale French restaurant located in Utopia, of all places. I haven't eaten that good since I left San Angelo and Dunbar's Motel and Restaurant.

When he overheard me say my camera batteries had died, Marcus offered me some replacements. Marcus explained to me what his job was, but it went over my head-something to do with the cameras. I have briefly watched other movies being made over the years, and none of the crew was ever as friendly and nice as the crew I met in Utopia. Also, I have friends who worked as extras and really disliked it, but that was not the case here.

 

On Monday, I went to Uvalde with B to try and find clothes for the scene they were to film that night-a dance. They didn't want us to wear red, white, or black, and most of the clothes I brought were black. My fifteen-year-old Tony Lamas were with me, so I didn't have to worry about boots. We searched all the western wear stores in Uvalde, but couldn't find anything big enough for me to even stick my arm in. Those clothes are made for skinny young girls, not chubby mamas. Giving up, we went for groceries, and I found exactly what I was looking for in good old Wal-Mart.

Anne Woodley, in yellow, writes a column for the Uvalde Leader-News. The pretty lady with her came all the way from Cotulla, I believe, to be in on the filming.

 

We were going to be needed from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m., so I tried to take a nap. All of us extras were too excited and worked up to rest too much, however. Once at the park, I asked one old fart if he would please be my dance partner, and he agreed. (Not Dave, he had to dance with one of the actresses.) Of course, when it was time to go into the outdoor dance pavilion, my partner disappeared, so I had to be in the background instead of on the dance floor. I don't know why I was surprised. It doesn't matter if men are 15 or 85; they are going to let you down when you need them the most. I think God plans it that way so women will learn the only man they can truly depend on is Jesus Christ, and he seems kind of distant sometimes. When my would-be partner finally did show up, I was nice to him. But at the end of the evening when they allowed more dancers on the floor and he asked someone else, I no longer felt the need to be so polite. It caused me no guilt whatsoever to give him the cold shoulder the next night when he kept buzzing around me. Don't ask me why men are that way; I don't know. Be nice to them and get pooped on, kick them in the balls and they come back for more. However, as my buddy Dave pointed out later, it worked out for the best because the dancers had a rough time of it. They had to do a one-step, much harder than a two-step, and they had to do it on tip-toes because their feet were making too much noise sliding on the concrete. As for the rest of us, they wanted constant movement in the background (yes, I know a real dance is not that way, but this is Hollywood).

Lee Haile works as a tour guide, a singer, and a story-teller. He, along with his wife, Karen, are natural entertainers. Lee does a lot of work for dude ranches in the area. He also talks to everybody. He's the one who told us the hairdresser was Joe Ely's wife.

 

Whenever I am scared, I want to touch somebody's hand; I want to hug someone; I want to pet a dog or something. We were supposed to walk around the perimeter of the dance floor greeting people in pantomime and looking happy. I just started hugging people like they were my best friend. I found out later I even hugged some of the actors, which I'm sure I wasn't supposed to do, but nobody yelled at me to stop. I did think at the time the young men appeared a little surprised, but they made a quick recovery. We did this over and over again. It was getting to the point some of the men were looking a little too happy to see me coming and some of the wives were looking peeved. Thank the Lord we stopped before some woman picked up a Coke bottle and knocked me in the head.

Lee had an appreciative audience while we waited to get started. Lee also told me there was an animal rights activist on the set to make sure no animals were harmed during filming, which is a good thing, But she carried her desire to justify her job too far when she told the director he was being cruel to a grasshopper for leaving it in the sun too long. As someone who has watched grasshoppers strip the leaves off peach trees and then sit in the sun all day gnawing at the bark, I didn't know whether to laugh or be disgusted.

 

During one period when we had to be quiet because they were filming behind us near the river, I found an empty picnic table near the wall they had set up to separate us from the other scene, and I lay down on the far side and shut my eyes. It is a trick I learned when I went to barber school. I would work Friday nights, go to school on Saturday mornings, clock in, and go out to my car to sleep in the back seat, asking the others to wake me when they got busy. (It was a laid-back school, most of the time, the boys played dominoes.) Even if I couldn't sleep, it would refresh me, and I was able to tackle those fades that almost made me cross-eyed. Back then, I only got to hear the traffic from Burnet Road in Austin, not Robert Duvall's wonderful voice. With my eyes closed, I could catch snatches of his dialogue. If you think he sounds great on film, I promise you he sounds even better on a moonlit night in South Texas next to the Sabinal River.

I didn't get to know the girls on the right, but the one in pink works for Utopia EMS. The blonde in the middle and I got so tickled at the dance, we broke into giggles just looking at one another. The girl at the far end with the short dark hair and I have a few things in common, sort of. I told her my father cried when his third daughter was born, but he wanted us to be feminine. She said her father had four girls and tried to turn them all into tomboys.

 

This time they fed us BBQ from Cooper's in New Braunfels. I was raised on Elgin's "hot guts" but the brisket we had that night was the best I've ever tasted. In our group of extras, rumors flew around constantly. One of them was that Robert Duvall had requested Cooper's BBQ because he liked it. No matter whose idea it was, and why they decided to give it to us peons, it was great. The next morning I got up at 11:30. B fed me and sent me back to bed. I got up at 5, and she fed me again. She was truly good to me. She said if she had just been 20 years younger, she would have been right out there with us. She had done a church scene before I got there but didn't think she could pull an all-nighter. I wish she could have gotten her Cowboys & Indians and Texas Monthly magazines autographed, but it just didn't work out that way.

Anthony Sharp and his wife, LeAnn, own Rio Frio Lodging & the Hill Country Nature Center. They not only lodge guests in the area, they give bat tours, birding and big tree tours, have a bluebird trail, and can organize campfire storytelling. Anthony also has good eyes and can recognize Robert Duvall when he sees him.

 

Our next scenes were all going to be at the rodeo arena, but we spent a lot of time across the parking lot sitting around the picnic tables by the river, waiting. LeAnn and her husband, Anthony, and my friends from Tarpley, Lee and Karen Haile, had been there the night of the dance, but I hadn't wanted to be too much of a fifth wheel, so I didn't visit with them too much. Karen has a band, "The Three Peace Band," that plays in Bandera, and she had rehearsals and couldn't come back. I missed seeing Karen again, but since it wasn't an all couples thing anymore, I didn't feel so bad about hanging around, especially when there were other stragglers like me floating about. We walked back and forth between the picnic area by the river and the rodeo arena. We did whatever they told us, then they'd herd us like cattle back to the park. We spent so much time visiting with one another and having a good time, I began to feel guilty about being paid for it.

Unfortunately, it was almost too dark under the trees when I took this picture. LeAnn is so much like her mother in that she's very organized, a lot of fun, and can handle any situation. The man next to her is Henry, and he put up with a lot of bull corn from the rest of us. Or maybe just from me.

 

Once while Lee and LeAnn were gallivanting around-I know Lee was talking 90 miles an hour to somebody somewhere-Anthony said, "Here comes Robert Duvall." I said, "No, it can't be him, Anthony, everybody is saying he's gone home." Anthony insisted so I got up to look. I saw two men walking toward us, and I said, "That can't be him." Anthony replied, "Yes, it is, I'd know that walk anywhere." I realized Anthony was right, but suddenly they were upon us, and I stood there like a fool with my mouth open, and I finally blurted out, "Uh, hi-dee" as they walked by. Mr. Duvall, who hadn't even looked at me, made a motion with his hand like, "yeah, I see you, now sit down and leave me alone." So I sat down, mortified, my one chance to impress a big movie star and I looked and sounded like an idiot. They say he's kin to Gen. Robert E. Lee. I believe it; I was ready to salute. Oh well, short of winning the Nobel Peace Prize, I don't think there is much I could have done to impress him anyway. Another blonde moment, come and gone.

I've forgotten what Brian's official title was. He relayed messages from the director, telling us where to go and what expressions we were to exhibit, along with shushing us when we were supposed to be silent and a million other small things. You can imagine what he had to put up with dealing with a bunch of amateurs who knew absolutely nothing about movie-making. He must have been good at his job, however, because by the end of filming, if he had told us to roll in horse manure and act like we were enjoying it, all we would have said was: "Can we speak or do we have to do it in pantomime?"

When we got bored, all we had to do was look at this crew member's Mohawk and it perked us up. Don't let his hairdo give you the wrong impression-he worked hard along with the rest of the cast and crew. The money they spent and the tourism the movie will attract to Utopia was and will be a boon to their economy. The film industry comprises the U.S.'s third largest export, an important part of our economy, and I'm glad to have had a tiny hand in it. Very tiny.

 

It wasn't long afterwards that they dismissed us. Filming for extras was over, and we were all a little sad. I liked the people of Utopia (and the film people!); I hope they liked me. The cast and crew who were so nice to us have all gone on to other things. Most of us extras will be just a blur in the background of the film, which is what we are supposed to be. Will the film be good? I think so; if talent and hard work have anything to do with it, I know it will be. But don't take my word for it; see for yourself beginning in the summer of 2011. I'm in the blue plaid shirt, hugging everybody. Click here to view the trailer of Seven Days in Utopia. It sounds wonderful and looks great! August 1, 2011: I got to see a special preview in Utopia--alas, my blue plaid shirt ended up on the cutting room floor, but this movie turned out to be even better than I thought it would! To read a review, click here.

Vicky J. Rose

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