I Am Iron Fan

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We are wedged in between Michael Angelo and a man who laughs a lot at his own jokes. He is young but bald and wearing a brown tweed jacket with elbow patches and jeans — he resembles a professor. His wife and kids are in line too and, apparently, the boy who looks to be about six can play “Iron Man” on guitar already. When his father tries to get him to tell the nice strangers, the boy breaks off with his sister to lie on the patch of sunny grass nearby and read Harry Potter. He is too young to care about fame. In his mind there is no doubt he will live forever. He leaves the adults to wait in a smoggy, grease-stained parking lot.

It’s a fair day in April. My friend, Amy, and I have decided to relax for the weekend — a welcome respite from trying to impress bosses, excel at hobbies, and score brownie points with our loved ones. A weekend without designs sounds appealing except for one thing. Thursday evening, Amy forwards me an email with the subject “Casting Call for Iron Man 3,” which is apparently taking place at Crabtree Valley Mall in Raleigh. The search for extras has begun. Amy, an actress, wants to know if I’m interested. Normally I would chuckle and delete such opportunities, dismissing them like a lottery ticket or a Who Wants to Be a Millionaire contestant. And yet…

Two things propel my interest: the first is my adoration for all things Robert Downey, Jr. and, thus, Iron Man. The second is a feeling of excitement. Possibility. Maybe even hope? The allure of fame, of being chosen, of being seen, glimmers faintly in the recesses of my mind. “I probably won’t get chosen, but why not? It’s an experience,” I tell Amy.

Headshots are required and resumes are optional. Since Amy and I are both in need of headshots, we decide to wake up at 7 a.m. on Saturday to snap a couple of informal ones in my backyard. The casting call mentioned “artsy and/or eccentric types,” “upscale preppy types,” “those with unusual hair, piercing, or facial hair,” and “computer geeks,” so we decide our best chance of standing out as two Caucasian women with normal hair and no tattoos would be to wear rainbow-colored maxi dresses. We amble up to the Walgreen’s photo counter to print copies of our headshots, and the lady inquires where we’re headed. “Oh, there were a couple of guys who just came through here who were going to that,” she exclaims. She writes down the name of the mall and location so that she can pass it along to her kids and grandkids. It is 8:45 a.m. — the mall doesn’t open until 10 a.m., but it’s a half hour drive away and as Amy puts it, “There will be a line.”

A few delays later, we arrive at the mall around 9:45 a.m. There were no directions as to where in the mall the audition was being held so we park near an entrance and head inside. We walk briskly, passingVictoria’s Secret, the Lego Store, and Abercrombie and Fitch, along the way — Crabtree is a mall of 1,326,000 square feet. Finally we see the station where the talent scouts are and a small line roped off. “Not so bad,” I comment. We then notice that the line has a break in it but that it continues to be roped off all the way to the door. “That’s still pretty good,” Amy mentions as we go outside under the parking garage. Then we see it — an unmistakable weaving steady strand of people stretching farther than we can see. “Oh my God,” I utter. We begin walking.

The line wraps around three quarters of the entire mall and, as one cop informs us, there are roughly 3,000 people in line, the earliest of which arrived at 4:30 a.m. I feel numb. There are teenagers eating bags of Chik-fil-A, whole families with babies screaming from their strollers, grey-haired men who weigh over 300 lbs, girls in their early twenties who look like sleek, blonde models, even a few people who do not seem to speak any English. “Well, I say we see how far we make it in thirty minutes. Maybe to that column?” I suggest to Amy. She nods and checks her watch. The casting call should last from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., but in this crowd it doesn’t seem like we’ll make it inside the mall in time. Still we get to work meeting the people we’re standing near anyway.

Michael Angelo, an African-American man who is forty-one but looks to be in his late twenties, introduces himself. He wears a hat, shirt, and lanyard that all say “Same Thing” and is toting a couple of DVDs under his arm. It turns out, as the loquacious Michael Angelo informs us, he makes movies. “They’re ghetto movies. The guys I know don’t want to watch Madea. Tyler Perry has the lockdown on black films in Atlanta, but I make mine for a different audience, you know? They’re funny movies, for the regular man. It’s called Same Thing and then there’s the sequel, Same Thing 2,” he says. Amy squints at the line in front of us and shifts her weight from one foot to another.

As we fill out the casting forms they gave us (“Do you own or have access to a luxury car? Would you be willing to cut your hair or shave your head?”) we’re surprised to see we’ve made it past the designated column in less than thirty minutes. “We’ll give it thirty more minutes, I guess,” Amy says. We both wish we’d brought food. The amazing part is that the line forming behind us only gets longer. No one leaves, no mass exits of fed-up people like you see in corn mazes or Disney World ride lines. Everyone seems to be resigned to the fact that this is the price they must pay for their shot at fame. Amy and I search through the endless hoard to see who might get cast. One lady in tall black heels has visible tattoos, as do a few gentlemen. No twins are spotted, even though they’re looking for “a set of identical twins (male or female) between the ages of 12-14.” In a parking spot across from us is a bubblegum pink car. “They might get in!” Amy decides.

At about 11:15 a man wearing a red polo walks by with a confused look. “Excuse me, what is all this for?” he asks us. “Iron Man 3 casting call for extras,” I respond. The man smiles and says, “I like Iron Man!” A sucker is born every minute — apparently that man and I are only a couple out of thousands that showed up that day. We snag a few more converts while standing in line while I try to think if I’ve ever been in a longer line at an amusement park, college graduation, or to see George Bush speak when he was President and realize, no, I have not. If this casting call was for any other movie (with the exception of Sherlock Holmes or the like) I wouldn’t be here. “This is definitely the largest casting call I’ve been to,” Amy comments.

We’re within view of the mall doors now, the final countdown. Amy loads a YouTube video of Michael Angelo’s trailer for Same Thing, and we try to watch, even though we can’t hear the volume well and our noses are clogged with the stench of cigarette smoke and exhaust fumes nearby. Glancing around, I’m surprised to see so many people wearing Captain America and Spiderman shirts; one woman clutches her resume in a Pirates of the Caribbean folder. “Wrong movie,” I mutter to myself. The lack of any Iron Man merchandise puzzles me — are they purposefully not pandering or, even more likely, do they just not care what movie it is, so long as they are cast as an extra?

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