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Crowd 2nd Assistant Director: How to (not) stand out in a crowd

6/24/202626 min

We all have our favourite faces in cinema - but what does it take to be a background actor? Crowd 2nd Assistant Director Demitra Coulson tells us how she manages over 300 extras at once, and shares stories of working on One Day, Bridgerton and Tom & Jerry: The Movie.

This is Out of Frame, where we celebrate and explore the work of below the line roles in film and TV. Out of Frame is produced by Platform Media for CrewHQ at Warner Bros. Studios Leavesden.

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First 90 seconds
  1. Yinka Bokinni· Host0:00

    Hello, I'm Yinka Bikini and this is Out of Frame. We all love a good film or TV series and nothing beats settling into a cinema seat or a comfy spot on the sofa to watch your favourite actors do what they do best. But that is only half the story. It can take a mammoth-sized crew to bring a movie or TV show to life and this is the place to find out exactly who those crew members are. Each week I'll be shining a light on the below the line roles. These are the people who bring a creative vision to life from the set department to prop makers, makeup artists, sound mixers and everything in between. This is Out of Frame. The cast of a film or TV series become familiar characters to us. It's the loyal gang of high school friends or the lovable group of coworkers, or it's a team of superheroes. But these aren't the only actors on set. There's also the extras. You may know them as background actors or crowd actors. They're essentially for making a scene feel authentic. Someone who is responsible for keeping these extras in order is Demetra Coulson. Demi is a crowd second assistant director, and she's worked with the likes of Netflix, Amazon, Channel 4, and of course, Warner Bros. Demi, welcome to Out of Frame. Hello. How are you? Good, thank you. Good, good, good, good, good. Before we get started, I thought that I could ask you a couple of questions to give

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