It is a truth universally acknowledged – all right, perhaps not universally, but many people I know happen to agree – that Colin Firth is the quintessential Mr. Darcy, the gold standard against which all other Darcys shall inevitably be judged. However much Mr. Firth may privately wish to leave Mr. Darcy, his sideburns, his horse, and his pond behind him once and for all and move beyond his most beloved role, the brilliance of his performance as Fitzwilliam Darcy is so well-fixed in the minds and hearts of all his fans that he is considered the rightful choice of anyone who has ever let her mind wander into a Regency fantasy or two. And I, dear readers, am no exception.

I have a few celebrity crushes, just like everybody else, but I’d be hard-pressed to name a single one as long-standing or fiercely loyal as my nostalgic attachment to Colin Firth. For some reason, looking at the man still makes me feel like a fourteen-year-old girl – maybe because that’s approximately how old I was the first time I saw the BBC Pride and Prejudice, starring Colin Firth and the marvelous Jennifer Ehle. At the time I had already made my way through Mom’s complete box set of Austen novels and commandeered her red “I’d Rather Be Reading Jane Austen” sweatshirt. She and I sat together on the couch in our living room, popcorn within arm’s reach, and watched all five hours of the miniseries straight through. The beautiful production made me want to live in Jane Austen’s world in a way that, up to that point, even her novels had not quite done.

I’ve watched that miniseries more times than I can count. To this day I always catch my breath when Colin Firth utters the line It taught me to hope as I’d scarcely ever allowed myself to hope before. I have seen him in plenty of other roles, and admired him in those roles. But I don’t think you ever forget your childhood literary crushes, and his Darcy was my first literary crush personified. So now that you understand how very few actors would have inspired my brief and impulsive foray into the world of filmmaking, what follows is the true story of my one and only day as a movie extra.

It happened because of Twitter, of course. One of my friends casually mentioned that Colin Firth was attached to a small-budget film shooting in town, seemingly unaware of the cataclysmic reaction this knowledge would set off in my brain. The cast and crew were to be in the area for weeks, and the local press gleefully reported on where the stars went for dinner, how many minor-league baseball games they had attended, where they would be filming around town.

Ohmygod Colin Firth and I are living in the same city, I thought. We are waking up and going to sleep under the same little piece of sky. At first this was little more than a ray of sunshine on cloudy days, something I thought about when I needed a pick-me-up. “Aren’t you excited,” I said – perhaps too often – to my husband, “about the fact that we are in the same town as Colin Firth, albeit temporarily?”

“It’s very exciting,” he replied, every time. But I wasn’t sure he really meant it.

I wondered if I would see Colin Firth out and about. It seemed highly unlikely that our paths would just happen to cross. On the other hand, it also seemed ridiculous and unfair that Colin Firth could really spend weeks on end in my town and I would miss him completely. A just God, I felt, would not let that happen.

A few weeks into the shoot, thanks to Twitter, I learned that a local casting agent was looking for walk-ons. I looked at her website and it seemed legit, so I emailed her, sent a photo as requested, and called the next day to follow up.

“Nicole…Nicole…you’re the Asian one? I love your look!” (The…Asian look?) “I think I can use you; you’re different. They’re looking for more minorities.”

(Here I was momentarily torn between tokenism is a scourge that must always be resisted and oh man I really really want to meet Colin Firth. I decided to keep my eyes on the prize.)

She gave me instructions on what clothes to wear (office/business casual wear), where to be dropped off (near the film’s base camp, a “big blue building” downtown), and my call time: 10:30am. “That means you should be here, with paperwork filled out, by 10:00,” she told me. “Filming could take eight hours, twelve hours, fourteen hours. If you come, you have to be able to stay all day. And no cameras allowed.”

 

The next morning I dressed in a blue cardigan, a black pencil skirt, and my least uncomfortable pair of nice shoes, and tried to remember how to put on makeup. Dan and I loaded the baby into the car and drove downtown to the address I’d been given, which, as it turned out, was a big yard behind a barbed-wire fence. Beyond it I could see a mostly-empty dirt parking area filled with trailers, and a rundown powder-blue warehouse with big “Beware of Dog” signs all over it.

“I guess I’ll get out here,” I said, trying to sound more confident than I felt. My husband looked a bit skeptical, but I assured him it would be fine as I kissed my daughter good-bye. I walked nervously through the lot towards the warehouse, wondering if this “Colin Firth movie” was in fact some vast, clever ruse to lure women of taste to their doom. I pictured Dan on the local news, tearfully talking with a reporter about my unexplained disappearance. She didn’t even want to be a movie star, he would say, as someone kindly handed him a tissue. All she cared about was meeting Mr. Darcy.

Up close, it certainly did not look like a place that ought to be associated with the making of a motion picture, but fortunately it also did not seem to be a place where people hid a lot of bodies. At the far end of the lot there were several vehicles, which, I later learned, were being used in the movie; there was a big catering cart, where cooks were already at work prepping for lunch; there were long folding tables and chairs set up as a makeshift cafeteria; and strewn all around were random, dangerous-looking piles of junk and scrap metal and other things you’d expect to see near an abandoned warehouse that had been quickly and inexplicably turned into a film’s base camp.

I hadn’t expected my one and only day in show business to be nonstop glamour and excitement, but still, this was not quite what I had imagined. One by one, the other extras trickled in, and the casting agent I’d spoken to on the phone — a friendly woman with short blond hair — greeted us and gave us timesheets to fill out. The others regaled one another with tales of past movies, shows, and commercials they’d done. I thought it might have seemed disrespectful to all these aspiring actors and actresses to mention that my own “acting experience” was limited to high school musicals, so I didn’t say anything. I noticed that all but three of us were in fact white, so they hadn’t done such a super great job finding those “minorities” for today’s shoot. I felt more convinced than ever that, while the others seemed plenty qualified, I was only here because they wanted more brown faces.

For over an hour we stood around, waiting for something, anything, to happen. (That was, incidentally, how most of the day went for us, with a few exceptions — people continually rushed around doing important things and I stood there feeling extraneous and in the way.) The temperature in the warehouse seemed to be dropping, and there was a smell I didn’t care to identify. Finally a young, redheaded, frazzled-looking production assistant appeared, introduced herself, and loaded us all into one of the shuttle vans to be taken to “wardrobe.” We were all quiet on the ride, and she commented on how strange that was, for actors. I thought everyone was probably just still cold.

“Wardrobe” was set up in a small parking lot near a local fancy restaurant where a scene was being filmed. Little kids at recess at a school across the street waved at us, and we waved back. “I want to be famous!” they screamed. “Put us in your movie!” People from wardrobe looked our clothes over and, in some cases, provided different clothes or props. And then we just stood around in the parking lot, waiting to be told where we would go next.

We stood there for nearly two hours.

It would have been a nice day to be outside, were it not for the 30-mile winds and the high pollen count. People were soon putting on extra layers and sneezing, and other people began talking about how hungry they were, and my skirt and thin cardigan were not really keeping me warm, and I thought, not for the first time, how kind of sucky show business was, and how much I would rather be with my baby, and did I really believe Colin Firth was anywhere around here? The real actors in our little group of extras complained about the general disorganization, of course, while at the same time acknowledging, “It’s always like this. That’s show business!”

Eventually a shuttle van took us back to base camp, but we were only there long enough to eat lunch. As we ate, rumors flew about who would be in our upcoming scenes. One woman insisted it would be all three leading men. I didn’t believe it for a second. I was feeling increasingly pessimistic about my chances of seeing Colin Firth at all — they were filming all over town today; what were the odds he’d be in any of the scenes at our designated location?

After lunch they wrangled us back into the van to head to our filming location, finally: the lobby of City Hall. It was supposed to be posing as a law office, although in my opinion it looked nothing like a law office and everything like City Hall. The assistant director placed the extras around the lobby, one behind the reception desk, several near the elevators, one on a bench with a newspaper, one handing a file to the receptionist. Once the scene began, I was to walk up two enormous flights of stairs. The propmaster handed me a cup of coffee and a briefcase. “These are your props,” he said, fixing me with a look as if I’d already done something wrong. “When the scene is over, I need both of them back. You don’t return them to anyone but me, do you understand?” He seemed rather unnecessarily intense about this. I assured him that I wasn’t going to steal his briefcase, but he didn’t look convinced.

We walked though the scene once or twice, then filmed it maybe a dozen times. When the director called out “background,” we all began moving, continuing through “action” until we heard “cut!” It was a little tedious to walk up and down the stairs so many times, but I was just happy to be doing something in a heated building. City Hall employees stood around gawking and grinning at us. When the scene was printed, they herded us all into a very cold room to wait for later scenes. “Who’s in the scene they’re filming now?” I asked one of the assistants.

“I’m not sure,” she said. “Colin is here, though. He just came in a few minutes ago.”

Colin Firth. Here on set! But while it seemed we extras had just barely gotten started, it was almost five o’clock and I knew we’d be sent home soon. Time was running out.

I was in a group of extras brought to a little waiting area on the third floor, just beyond the elevators. We couldn’t see much of what was going on; they were filming a scene in an office down the hall. “I heard Colin Firth was here,” I whispered to one of the others, a man who’d been waiting here longer than I had.

“Yeah, too bad you missed him,” he said. “He was just here.”

“You really saw him?”

“Couldn’t miss him, he’s like eight feet tall.”

I was about to press for a better description when the assistant director reappeared. “The extras can go home,” he said.

My heart sank. I had spent the entire day feeling like a human prop, being rushed from place to place, at the mercy of the frantic disorganization that seemed par for the course on a film set. I had stood more often than not, I had used unspeakable bathrooms, I had face and hands chapped from the wind and miniscule grains of pollen in my eyes, and I had missed my baby daughter all day. Sure, I had some fun times, some interesting moments; I met and talked with some cool people (there’s no people like show people, and all that). But I had just missed seeing Colin Firth.

I felt forlorn as I collected my things and said good-bye to the other extras. Another production assistant materialized to collect our timesheets and walk us out. “Um – actually…” I hesitated, then just decided to ask, figuring I had nothing to lose. “Would it be okay if I stayed for a few more minutes? Just to watch and, uh, learn?”

She considered me for a moment. “Sure,” she said. “Tell them I said it’s okay.”

I hurried back to the set and slid into a chair in the corner, doing my best not to draw any attention to myself. I knew I didn’t have too long before someone figured out that I really didn’t need to be there and tossed me out. But I had only been sitting there for a moment or two when suddenly a very tall, very familiar man appeared in the hallway beyond. I sat up straight, heart drumming, as he came into the room. He was standing there. Right there. Right in front of me. Wearing a white shirt, jeans, and a light-colored blazer, listening and nodding as someone from the crew talked with him, taking the manila folder someone else waved in his face. He was close enough for me to reach out and touch him. (Not that I would have done that. That would have been a highly inappropriate breach of Colin Firth’s personal space, and I definitely didn’t think seriously about it at all.)

He glanced around the room. As unlikely as it seemed, we made eye contact. He gave me a polite little nod of acknowledgment…and a smile.

Colin Firth is smiling at me! 

Someone told him that a van was waiting downstairs to take him back to his hotel. “Right, thanks,” he said, and turned and walked towards the elevators.

I grabbed my things and stood up quickly. “See ya,” I said to the bemused crew members. And I did the only thing I could do, really, the only thing that made any sense. I followed Colin Firth out the door.

Out by the elevators, he had stopped to talk with another member of the crew. “I think I’m just going to take the stairs,” I heard Colin Firth say. Oh! I thought. He cares about the planet! (Like, I’m sure he does, but in retrospect I believe he was also taking the stairs because that building had some of the slowest elevators on earth.)

Then he turned and saw me standing a few feet away. He was right there. More right there than ever before. We were alone (well, almost alone) in a deserted hallway. This was my chance.

I tried not to feel lightheaded. I was fully aware that this, this right here, this was one of those incredibly rare, miraculous, once-in-a-lifetime opportunities that fate occasionally sees fit to fling your way. Colin Firth wasn’t busy, he wasn’t out on the town with his wife and kids, he wasn’t shooting a scene, he wasn’t talking to someone about something important. If he were doing any of those things, I couldn’t and wouldn’t have bothered him, but as it was, it was literally just him and me — him and me! — well, him, and me, plus a crew member who wasn’t even paying attention to us anymore.

“Excuse me, Mr. Firth?” (Very polite. Very respectful. My grandmother always told me that respect goes a long way.)

“Yes?” he said. (In my memory he said this encouragingly, not at all warily.)

“I’m sorry to bother you, but I’m a huge fan, and I just wanted to tell you how much I have loved your work,” I said, all in a rush. (I think my voice was shaking. I probably also sounded as if I’d been sucking helium on set, though I cannot be sure. Frankly it was very difficult to hear my own voice over the steady roaring in my ears.)

“Thank you. That’s very kind of you.” He smiled again — kind of a tired smile, but it was still wonderful. He held out his hand to me, or maybe I held out mine first, and we shook. I checked in with my knees: Are we hanging in there? (They were, just barely.)

I had no camera, as they had been banned from the set; still, I couldn’t let this encounter pass without securing some proof that it had actually happened. “Would it be too much trouble to ask you to sign an autograph?”

“Of course. It would be my pleasure,” he said, also very polite, as he watched me forage.

It was kind of hard to rummage in my bag for a pen and paper without ever breaking eye contact with Colin Firth. “I have a pen,” I said, as if to reassure us both that I was in fact the sort of thoughtful, responsible fan who carried writing implements at all times. In my head, a fevered monologue kept up: Argh! I am keeping Colin Firth waiting! Should I just have him sign this copy of Northanger Abbey, or will that totally tip my hand?

Both Colin Firth and the crewman either took pity on me or realized they had only one chance of getting rid of me this century, and began hunting in their pockets for something to write on. It was all becoming fairly ridiculous when Colin Firth finally took charge and tore off a piece of paper that had been taped to the front of his manila envelope. He flipped it over to the back, and I handed him my pen (now my favorite pen) and Northanger Abbey to use as a hard surface to write on.

“And what’s your name?” Colin Firth asked me. For the restraining order.

He stood there in profile, looking at me expectantly, eyebrows slightly raised in an expression that reminded me, of course, of Mark Darcy in Bridget Jones’s Diary, and thankfully the correct answer to his question finally occurred to me. “Nicole!” I supplied quickly. “I’m Nicole.”

“To…Nicole…” He paused for a second, and I could almost see the wheels turning in his handsome curly head: What to write to the complete stranger, emphasis on the “strange,” who has accosted me on my way out the door?

While he wrote, he asked me if I was one of the extras. “Just for today,” I said, wondering if I was giving all walk-ons everywhere a bad name.

“So you’re not an actor?”

“No, no.” I allowed myself to laugh at Colin Firth’s adorable question. “This is strictly a one-time thing.”

“In that case,” Colin Firth said to me, “I hope you enjoyed the experience. Did you find it interesting?”

“Hmm? Oh, yes. Yes I did. Very interesting.”

He finished scribbling, signed his name with a practiced scrawl, and handed paper, book, and pen back to me.

“Thank you,” I said, smiling what was, for me, considering the moment, almost a normal-person smile. I like to think that I looked deceptively serene, lit from within, just from being in his presence. “I hope you enjoy the rest of your time here.”

“Thank you, that’s very kind,” he said again, and shook my hand with one last smile. “Good luck to you!”

He turned and pushed open the door to the stairwell, while I put his autograph inside my book and put book and pen back in my bag. Looking back on it now, I realize any decent person would have then let Colin Firth leave in peace. But I was supposed to be leaving, too, so we were really going in the same direction. And now that we’d finally spoken, there was no reason for me to hang around this poorly ventilated city government building. When Colin Firth realized I was trailing him to the stairs, he stopped and held the door open for me.

Colin Firth is holding the door for me!

I said thank you, because no one likes a creepy and ill-mannered fan. As we walked down two flights of stairs, I tried to follow several steps behind him, maintaining a careful distance even though I really wanted to shout, Colin Firth and I are alone in a stairwell!

At the bottom of the stairs he paused, and held the door for me again, waiting until I moved past him into the lobby. I decided to assume he was doing it to be kind, and not because he wanted to be able to see my hands at all times/watch me for any sudden movements. I said thank you for the last time, and wished him a good evening as he walked through the revolving doors and out to the van waiting at the curb. Several loitering crew members said good-night to him, all cool and nonchalant and “bye Colin, see you tomorrow.”

I would not be seeing him tomorrow, or ever again. Lightning never strikes in the same place twice. I watched Colin Firth walk away, clutching the bag that now contained his autograph, holding the moment tight. And then finally, reluctantly, gratefully, I let it go.

I pivoted and gave the night security guard a huge grin, like, hey, total stranger, did you see what just happened, eh? Eh?? He smiled back at me, flashed me a thumbs-up. You go, girl. I turned back to the doors, looked at the spot where I had just been standing with Colin Firth, made sure none of the crew were looking, and hopped up and down a few times. (Maybe just twice. My feet were really hurting by now in my heels.)

Outside, the sun was shining bright and the wind had finally died down. It had turned into the perfect early spring afternoon. I called my husband and filled him in. I called my mother. I called my college roommate, with whom I had watched the entire Pride and Prejudice miniseries on more than one occasion, and left her a long, rambling voicemail that steadily escalated in both pitch and volume. It wasn’t until much later that evening, as I was getting ready for bed, that I remembered to thank the God I now, more than ever, believed in for indulging me in this one tiny thing.

Thank you, I thought with a tired, dreamy smile. If you had anything at all to do with today, that is. Probably you were busy elsewhere. But if it was you, it was really, really nice of you.

Really, really nice. Just like Colin Firth.

 

As smashing as my one and only day as a film extra turned out to be, on a scale of 1 to Meeting Colin Firth, I probably wouldn’t sign up to do it again. First of all, it’s highly unlikely that my undeniably Asian but otherwise run-of-the-mill features will ever again be enough to get me a walk-on token film extra job despite a total lack of acting experience. Second, from the very little I saw whilst lurking at the margins, being in any way involved in the business of filmmaking is incredibly grueling and difficult work, hinging on hundreds of variables large and small that are often beyond anyone’s control, and I don’t even like to make my own lunch.

In spite of how it ended, with me alone in a stairwell with Colin Firth, my day on the film set certainly wasn’t as glamorous as I expected – just incredibly busy. I couldn’t help but be impressed by everyone I met (even the people who were rude and/or disorganized), how hard they all had to work to make this movie, how much time and effort went into filming just a handful of scenes that might not even make it into the finished film. I came away with an enormous amount of respect for the collective commitment and dedication it takes to put a movie together – even a small one. That’s something I still think about when I see a new film, no matter how good or bad it is. Show business is not the life for me, but I’ll always be glad I got to watch and be a part of it for just one day…not least because I still have Colin Firth’s autograph tucked into my mother’s old dog-eared copy of Northanger Abbey.