Bumping elbows with the stars!

So for those of you who are close followers I'm sure you've been on the edge of your seat waiting for me to blog about my movie debut. And maybe because it has been several days since I was an extra you are wondering if I hit the big time and am too busy filming and being a star to write.... well that might not be the case, but let me tell you what did happen.

We received phone calls on Wednesday night saying we needed to be on set at 7am. We filmed at the biggest, nicest, most expensive (those three often go together don't they) hotel in Garmisch. Needless to say when we arrived at 10 minutes to 7 it was my first time to see the hotel up close and personal. We were taken in to where we could change into our wardrobes. I was asked to bring several dresses for the costume director to choose from. They chose a black dress I had borrowed from a girl I know here and I wore it with a beautiful scarf that Barb gave me for my birthday. After I changed someone told me to come find them in makeup, but I couldn't find where they told me to go so instead I went to eat breakfast with the rest of the extras. We had our own trailer, which was a bit small for all of us and had about five picnic tables in it. They had a spread of bread, meats, cheese, tomatoes, cucumbers, and jam along with coffee and tea. This is a very typical German breakfast. There was also a trailer for everyone who was not an extra to get food like scrambled eggs and espresso. While we were eating in our trailer someone came in from makeup and took me with her to the makeup trailer I could not find earlier. There were two chairs one of which was already occupied by another girl. The person who came and got me started doing my hair. Occasionally I would try and steal glances at who was also in there having their hair done, but couldn't really tell. I figured it was someone actually in the movie because she was asking for her hair to be done a certain way and I would have never tried that as just an extra. Then someone came in from outside and asked the other girl if she needed anything to eat. She asked for eggs without peppers. The man then said in German to someone outside to go get eggs without "paprika" the girl started saying "no I said no peppers, no peppers, not paprika" I may not understand a lot of German, but I do know that paprika means peppers in German. So I kindly told this girl what I knew and she calmed down. It was as she was getting worked up about peppers and paprika that I heard her voice very clearly. It is a voice I know very well because I hear it literally every single day when I watch One Tree Hill my favorite TV show for the past 7 years. I stole another glance and clearly saw in the mirror running across the trailer that I was sitting 5 feet from Sophia Bush who plays Brooke Davis on One Tree Hill. My heart rate quickened and I started to sweat a little as I realized that I had been in this trailer with her for 10-15 minutes already without even knowing it. The egg man asked what she'd done the night before and she said she and Brooke had gone to Thaifood. I was wondering who Brooke was and late my question was answered. BROOKE SHEILDS! Oh my goodness! That the guys had gotten really drunk and then come banging on her hotel door and stole a bottle of wine and then wanted to rehearse. She said they ended up having a really good rehearsal. After the egg man left I asked if she went to Rambutan, which is right around the corner from where we live. She said yes and I asked if she liked it, she said it was really good. Then I started talking to the girl doing my makeup. She asked if I live in Garmisch and I explained my reason for being here. Sophia then asked if now is a busy time for R&R soldiers to come on their leave. I explained that they come at all time throughout the year because they all get their leave at different times. Who would have thought I would have ever had a conversation with Sophia Bush in my life. Crazy! When my hair and makeup were done I exited the trailer. I couldn't bring myself to tell Sophia that One Tree Hill is my favorite show. My mom asked if I was star struck. I think in the first instant I was a little bit mainly because of how I realized who was sitting next to me, but I have realized lately that I just don't know how to compliment people who I don't know. I am always worried it is going to be weird and don't know how to say it. The entire day on set and at lunch I never got up the courage to tell Sophia how much I love the show that she is in. Gosh darn me.

It ended up taking longer than they expected for us to get on set because the cast was rehearsing before they needed us. But not everyone was on set because Bill Nighy was walking all over the place. Bill played the old pop singer guy on the movie Love Actually and Davy Jones the evil octopus captain guy in Pirates of the Caribbean. A film guy was working on things for the website and possibly for the bonus features section on the DVD and asked a few of us to be in what he was working on. He wanted us to talk about how Bill is a creep on set and always trying to talk to the extras. Then Bill himself walked up. He actually did talk to all the extras so maybe the story line wasn't that far off. We asked to take a group photo and he insisted we all take individual shots with him. Then we stood around talking and filming more pretending he was creeping us out. Eventually he had to move on and we continued to wait to be called inside.

Maybe around 10:30 we were taken inside. At first we all stood in the back of the ballroom as they practiced their scene.

Let me fill you in on what this movie is about. They are calling it a Cinderalla Snowboard Story. It is called "Chalet Girl." The boy played by Ed Westwick, star of the tv show Gossip Girl, has been in a relationship with Sophia Bush's character for 5 years and they are now engaged. His parent's own a ski chalet. The boy falls in love with a girl who works at the ski chalet played by Felicity Jones. Since her character does not come from a wealthy background like Ed and Sophia's characters Ed's mother played by Brooke Shields does not approve. Basically everyone finds out about the affair except Sophia UNTIL their engagement party when Ed ends the relationship and admits to his affair. The rest I can only assume works out for Ed and Felicity's characters. We were filming the engagement party scene on Thursday.

A few at a time the AD (assistant director) went through the extras pulling people out to place then around the room in between takes of rehearsing the first piece of the scene. It was Ed (who is so short he had to stand on a 2 inch wooden platform haha) across from the guy playing his brother. An older couple came up to his to congratulate him on his engagement and then Nicolas playing the brother offered to get the couple another drink and led them off. After running through it a couple times the AD came to get a few people to to walk across the set as background movement, guess who he chose? ME! I was getting so worried I'd just stand in the back all day, but patience is a virtue. The first time the AD pushed me across the stage on my que I was so nervous, but each time I relaxed and just loved every moment of it. The AD said it was his fault after the first time I walked across, but that as I did and Ed turned his head to look back at Sophia it looked like he was turning back to look at me as I walked. He said I couldn't upstage the stars. Gosh I wish that could have been in the film how cool would it have been for it to appear as if Ed turned to look at me hahaha. The rehearsed a lot and then we filmed a lot of takes, but eventually we moved on the the next segment. It was however on one take that as I walked across the set I LITERALLY bumped elbows with Ed Westwick as he turned to look at Sophia. So when I say I was bumping elbows with the stars I mean it. :)

More to come later.... this was one of my most favorite things I've ever done.