Sydney, Australia

I’m a star for a millisecond. My face will be on TV in a month, smiling, clapping and shown every half hour for a flash as the camera pans. I am the faces of the Virgin mobile ad campaign. I say faces because computer graphics will be used to make dozens of me for use in massive crowd scenes. I signed up for my millisecond (literally) of fame because I saw the words “FAME-FREE FOOD-VIRGIN” printed on an advert in the hostel. When I read the whole thing through I found it promised free food and drink to star in a Virgin Mobile advert. I set of with one of the motley crew, those of us who are the more eccentric long-term residents at the hostel, and we went to seek our fame.

At the auditorium where the ad was shot all the cast had a chance to meet each other. It turned out that while half of the extras where grubby backpackers, the other half were paid actors who had agents. It was a strange mix that sat there as the camera started rolling and we were instructed on what to do. I still don’t really know what the plot of the advert was but it seemed to be a game show involving txt messaging where we were the audience. Because it costs money for extras they could not afford entire crowd scenes and we had to change seats every five minutes to fill up the hall so computer graphics could be added to make it look full. We clapped, cheered sighed and more for almost eight hours non stop before someone felt sorry for us and we were released.

I realize that I don’t want to do that job again without a large amount of money changing hands. Sitting around all day is not my idea of a good job (I know, I wouldn’t have said that last year) and since working with Simon I feel I need to be challenged. It was interesting however, to see what goes on behind the scenes of a TV advert and I appreciate how hard they are to make.