background performers

SHOOT: Jon Tenney & Rebecca Romijn Film KING & MAXWELL Explosion Aftermath in Gastown

by Susan Gittins
May 2, 2013July 7, 2014
USA Network Series

Secret service agents turned private investigators Sean King (Jon Tenney) and Michelle Maxwell (Rebecca Romijn) are the leads in the upcoming TNT series King & Maxwell, based on popular characters from best-selling author David Baldacci. In the episode filmed this week, the pair investigate an explosion at a Washington, D.C. eatery. One which impacts King nearby.

King & Maxwell crew spent five days at Incendio in Gastown this week either preparing or filming before-and-after-explosion scenes. They did everything but the SPFX explosion itself, which had been filmed two years before for the CW pilot Heavenly, which was not picked up to series. All King & Maxwell had to do is match the original set dressing on the patio.

And then distress the windows for the aftermath of this SPFX explosion and cover the pavement in debris.

In scenes filmed Monday, Sean King (Jon Tenney) drove up to the Italian restaurant just as it explodes.

And in yesterday’s scenes, an upset Michelle Maxwell (Rebecca Romijn) rushes to her partner. “Sean,” she cries as she walks towards him standing in the debris.

SHOOT: Rachel Nichols & 250 Protester/Police Extras Film CONTINUUM 2×10 in Gastown’s Blood Alley

by Susan Gittins
April 17, 2013July 28, 2013
Continuum

Continuum staged a big protest scene in Gastown’s Blood Alley today with Vancouver-cop-from-the-future Kiera Cameron (Rachel Nichols) shoved around in a crowd as hundreds of protester extras battled police extras in full riot gear. In one scene, Kiera ran out of the melee in her black high-tech cat suit, boots and a sky-blue jacket. But this was a rare sighting. Most of the time you couldn’t see her in the throng of up to 250 background performers.

Luckily, there’s another chance to see her at the Continuum panel at Fan Expo Vancouver this Saturday, April 20th, at Canada Place. Cast Rachel Nichols, Victor Webster, Erik Knudsen, Lexa Doig, Luvia Petersen, Stephen Lobo, Jennifer Spence and Omari Newton are scheduled to be there at noon in Ballroom A. And fans are promised a sneak peek of season two, which premieres this Sunday, April 21st, at 9 p.m. on Showcase in Canada.

SHOOT: Anna Gunn & Josh Hamilton Film Bravo Pilot RITA at West Vancouver Community Centre

by Susan Gittins
April 14, 2013July 28, 2013
TV Pilots

Update: July 26, 2013. Bravo passes on the pilot Rita. Will not be picked up to series.

Crew for Bravo’s first original drama pilot Rita turned the east parking lot of the West Vancouver Community Centre into a rich parents’ pickup point for fictional Connecticut private school Cabott Academy today. Adapted from a Danish series, Rita (Anna Gunn of Breaking Bad) is a forthright but witty teacher at Cabott Academy, one with a different view of life than the affluent, overprotective parents of her students. In a scene this afternoon, she walks out of the school’s Learning Annex where she has words with a parent and then talks with the school prinicpal Terrence (Josh Hamilton), who has a big crush on the sexy staffer, before she walks away.

It sounds like an easy scene to shoot until you consider the dozens of student and parent background performers leaving school at the same time and walking through a gridlock of luxury vehicles moving in a small confined area (extras were asked to bring their own high-end cars but wardrobe did a little upgrading to make the drivers look more like American east coast 1 per-centers). Director Miguel Arteta used a technocrane to cover the melee of students leaving and a second camera to focus on the two cast members.

SHOOT: Tahmoh Penikett & Victor Webster Film CONTINUUM S2 at Vancouver Art Gallery on Easter Monday

by Susan Gittins
April 10, 2013July 28, 2013
Continuum

Corrupt Vancouver politician Jim Martin (Tahmoh Penikett) returns to Continuum in the second season. We met him in the seventh episode, The Politics of Time, when Liber8 killed the investigative reporter Alicia Fuentes (Pascale Hutton) looking into the financing of Martin’s campaign to be head of the local dock workers union. Detective Carlos Fonnegra (Victor Webster) investigates Alicia’s murder without telling his Vancouver-police-partner-from-the-future Kiera Cameron (Rachel Nichols) that the murder victim is the woman he slept with the night before, making him the prime suspect and testing Kiera’s loyalty. It proved to be a tangled web of old friendships gone wrong so it’s no wonder that Carlos isn’t friendly with Jim Martin when they meet on the north steps of the Vancouver Art Gallery this season.

Continuum filmed for three days outside and inside the Vancouver Art Gallery last week, mainly in an old courtroom at the south end. Could this be the trial of young Liber8 apprentice Julian Randol (Richard Harmann)?

Good friends Tahmoh Penikett and Victor Webster between takes.

Spectators watch the action.

SHOOT: Karl Urban & Minka Kelly Film TV Pilot ALMOST HUMAN in Vancouver’s Business District

by Susan Gittins
March 24, 2013July 31, 2013
Almost Human, TV Pilots

J.J. Abrams and Fringe showrunner Joel Wyman’s TV pilot Almost Human (formerly Human) is filming in downtown Vancouver’s Business District on West Hastings Street, transformed into a futuristic Los Angeles, for the second day in a row this weekend. Stars Karl Urban (Star Trek’s Bones) and Minka Kelly (Friday Night Lights) are on set as Los Angeles police officers at the crime scene of yesterday’s armoured vehicle heist.

SHOOT: Moira Queen (Susanna Thompson) & Chin Han (Frank Chen) in Fire Alarm Scene for ARROW 1×16 at Bayshore Hotel – Updated

by Susan Gittins
January 24, 2013August 4, 2013
Arrow

What happened in the Westin Bayshore Hotel when the lights went out and the fire alarm flashed orange? Moira Queen (Susanna Thompson) is the only Starling City 1 per-center I recognized exiting the building. She was accompanied by a mysterious Asian man [Update: Frank Chen (Chin Han from The Dark Knight) who is an old friend of the Queen family and involved Malcolm Merlyn’s nefarious The Undertaking], So where are Malcolm and Tommy Merlyn (John Barrowman and Colin Donnell) and where is her hooded son Oliver Queen (Stephen Amell)? Are they all inside somewhere?

Arrow filmed in the Westin Bayshore Hotel in Coal Harbour for two afternoon/evenings this week and this was the only exterior scene. 150 chilled -to-the-bone background performers, dressed in evening gowns or tuxes, vacated the hotel during a simulated fire alarm in take after take on Tuesday night. Two cameras filmed the big exterior — one high on a hoist at the north end of the property and the second, a tracking camera directly in front of the lobby doors. Last night Arrow was scheduled to film in the International Suite on the west side of the hotel, with a simulated flash of light and the sound of a prop pistol. Who gets shot? We’ll have to wait to find out.

SHOOT: The Merlyn Boys (John Barrowman & Colin Donnell) Film ARROW 1×16 at Bayshore Hotel

by Susan Gittins
January 23, 2013April 3, 2024
Arrow

Ummm, people of Starling City. Am I the only one who noticed all those Triad guys dressed up as waiters at your big gala scene last night in the Westin Bayshore Hotel? Merlyn father-and-son (John Barrowman and Colin Donnell) seemed oblivious to it. Speaking of those Merlyn Boys, is this the best father-and-son casting since those Bishop Boys on Fringe?

Barrowman and Donnell arrived at set together and had such fun rehearsing in their tuxes that they did an impromptu song-and-dance number together up and down the escalator in the Convention Centre. I don’t have photos so you’ll have to trust me that it looked like something out of a Fred Astaire movie. Besides their obvious resemblance, the two men share a theatre background.

In the scene below, Malcolm Merlyn, accompanied by bodyguards, is the recipient of some kind of award. His son Tommy hangs back as his father takes the stage to accept. After a brief speech, Malcolm steps off the stage into the crowd as the room goes dark, a fire alarm starts flashing orange and the be-jeweled, be-gowned rich folk of Starling City exit the building. What happened?

SHOOT: FRINGE’s Anna Torv and an Observer Ministry of Science Van Downtown for 5×10

by Susan Gittins
November 5, 2012August 12, 2013
Fringe

Today is a big day for Fringe of exterior filming in multiple locations in a downtown Vancouver area. It started on Granville Street with dozens… Read More »SHOOT: FRINGE’s Anna Torv and an Observer Ministry of Science Van Downtown for 5×10

SHOOT: FRINGE’s POlivia on the Vancouver Art Gallery Roof in a Rainstorm for 5×08 – Updated

by Susan Gittins
October 19, 2012August 12, 2013
Fringe

Fringe crew set up for filming on the Vancouver Art Gallery’s north plaza last night in a torrential downpour and then filmed scenes in slightly less of a deluge. The last hours of filming for the final season’s eighth episode turned out to be one wet slog. Background women were allowed to keep their umbrellas for the scenes to protect their hair and 1940s garb but background Observers had nothing but their fedora hats to keep them dry during a take. [Update: POlivia filmed highly emotional scenes on the roof under a scrim of Anna Torv’s Olivia convincing Joshua Jackson’s Peter Bishop to take the Observer tech out of his head.]

Earlier in the day, Joshua Jackson’s Peter and Michael Kopsa’s Captain Windmark were spotted heading to set inside CBC Vancouver [where they filmed a stunt fight in empty office space on the east side] but rain-drenched fans only observed Kopsas’s Windmark at the night shoot when I was there.