The phone call came from one of the Casting Associates at Fox. They wanted to know if I could provide them with a dozen sailors in order for them to film a scene in an X Files episode entitled “Dod Kalm”. This particular episode was to take place onboard a fictional US Navy Destroyer, the USS Ardent (played by a decommissioned HMCS MacKenzie). In the opening scene of this episode, a group of mutinous US sailors would be seen abandoning their ship into a lifeboat. Later in the opening scene, the lifeboat would be discovered by a fishing boat, and all aboard the lifeboat were now old. The Casting associate wanted a dozen Canadian Navy reservists to play the part of the mutinous US sailors. Apparently, having people climb down a scramble net into a lifeboat is considered hazardous. When filming something hazardous, the studio has a couple of choices, they can hire stunt men (which are VERY expensive) or they can hire subject matter experts (which are not). The casting associate wanted to know if I could round up a dozen sailors who’d be interested in being subject matter experts (extras) on the X Files. I told her I wasn’t sure if anyone would be interested but I’d ask around. After taking a quick poll in the office, I called her back about three minutes later and assured her she’d have her sailors. The following week, I rounded up eleven other sailors and we headed up to the shoot location just East of the Second Narrows Bridge. Ex- HMCS Mackenzie was hardly recognizable as herself. She’d been moved to a dock in Burnaby in preparation of being stripped out and cleaned up by the Artificial Reef Society of BC. She was painted down her Starboard side in US Navy Battleship Grey; while her Port side remained Canadian shipside grey (the colour of fog for those who don’t know what shipside grey looks like). We checked in with a production assistant and made our way to the costume trailer where we were issued with US Navy dungarees. We changed into our US Navy uniforms and made our way over to the Craft tent… Ahhh…the craft tent. A fully catered dry and warm space where cast and crew hangout in between takes. A long table of snacks and food… and nothing to do but sit and wait for someone to tell us what to do. Does it get any better for a sailor? As we sat sipping our coffee, two of the “actors” arrived. They were dressed in US Navy Officer khaki uniforms and I noted with some dismay that both actors had significant problems with their turnout. One actor had a pony tail, which he had tucked down under the collar of his “khakis”. The other other had used gel to try and hold his hair daown and tucked behind his ears. One wore a number of bracelts and rings on every finger. Both wore their name tags, service ribbons and their surface wings on the wrong side of their uniform. Both wore a Canadian Navy issue “weather jacket”. Unbeknownst to us, the man sitting at the table next to us was Chris Carter, the Executive Producer of the X-files and he had overheard my criticism of his actors. He introduced himself, asked us who we were, and asked me what was wrong with the way his actors were dressed. I explained who we were and pointed out the various mistakes with the costumes worn by the actors. He thanked us for our input, wished us a great day and got up and left. I didn’t give it much thought and we went back to enjoying the fresh mini muffins and hot coffee. A few minutes later, someone came and got the two officer actors and led them away. Shortly after that a production assistant came and collected us and led us onboard the “USS Ardent” to the Boat Deck. The Assistant Director briefed us on what we would be doing and what they wanted to accomplish. This particular shot would capture our group of sailors climbing over the guard rails and down a scramble net, rigged over the side of the ship. At the bottom of the net, secured against the ship’s side was MacKenzie’s whaler. As we stood their being briefed by the Assistant Director, our actor officers rejoined us, and I noted with a little satisfaction that they now sported regulation haircuts, a lack of jewelry, a freshly pressed and properly adorned uniform and no Canadian Navy Weather jackets. They did not look happy, and I suspect they knew full well who was responsible for their trip to the set barber. My suspicions as to whether or not they knew who was responsible for them having to get their hair cut were confirmed a short time later when a gentleman came up and introduced himself as the production military advisor and Armorer for the show. He wanted to know what why I had told Mr Carter that the uniforms were wrong. I tried to introduce myself and explain how I knew there were errors with the uniforms, but the man was quite agitated and he kept cutting me off. He made a point of telling me that he’d spent a number of years in the military and he was quite certain that there was nothing wrong with the uniforms. I pointed out that the uniform jacket the actors had been wearing was Canadian Navy issue, not American. I pointed out that Naval Officers did not wear Kabbalah bracelets or costume jewelry such as chains and rings on every finger. He countered that he had 12 years service in a local Army reserve service battalion and he was an expert in military matters. I pointed out that as a current, serving, Canadian Naval Officer, my military experience with naval matters was probably more comprehensive than his. The discussion pretty much ended at that point, and I didn’t see him again after that. I looked for his name in the credits at the end of the the show when it aired, but I couldn’t find it. Finally, after what seemed like an endless delay, we were ready to start filming. This particular sequence would take place in two shots filmed in reverse chronological order. The first shot would consist of the dozen sailors climbing over the guard rail and down the scramble net into a whaler. There would be no organized dialogue but we were encouraged to try and hurry each other along. We were specifically told not to use any profanities, so consequently, it took several takes before anyone could think of something “G-rated” to say to encourage each other to abandon ship quickly. It didn’t take very long for me to become disenchanted with the number of times I had to climb up and down the scramble net which was rigged over the side of the MacKenzie. It became increasingly difficult to remember to keep my comments “g-rated” with each additional take. I mean how many different ways can one film a bunch of guys climbing down a net? It was a five second shot in the show, and you’d swear that the Director was going to make this shot worthy of an Emmy. We repeated the same scene over, and over, and over again, until we were all sore, tired and ready to take our chances staying on the ship with the rest of the crew. Finally, the Director called it a wrap and we were released for lunch. A nice hot lunch and some time to sit back and relax were all that was needed to restore my good cheer. We had an opportunity to chat with the crew, who were just as curious about the group of real life sailors as we were about them. All too soon one of the Production Assistants came to find us and escort us over to make up. We were needed in make up because the next scene we would film would be of us adrift in our whaler, slowly emerging from the fog, no longer as young men, but now aged and whithered. The plan was for each of us to have a prosthetic rubber mask applied to our face and blended with make up to complete the illusion that something had happened to us to make us age very rapidly. It seemed simple enough. We lined up outside of the make up trailer and waited for our turn to be made up. I figured leading from the front was as good a place as any for me (and by being first I could sneak back to the craft trailer for some more coffee and mini muffins). I made my way inside the trailer and settled back into the chair as the make up artist, a very lovely woman , applied a adhesive glue to my face. She worked quickly and efficiently, positioning a rubber mask on my face and trimming away the excess rubber on the edge of the mask. So it would blend with the rast of my face. She used makeup to very professionally hide the edge of the mask until I couldn’t tell where mask ended, and face began. Next, she went to work on my eyes, and here’s where things went horribly wrong. Grabbing what she thought was some excess rubber from the inside of the mask eye socket, she quickly snipped off the extra rubber. The problem was, it wasn’t excess rubber from the mask, it was my eyelid and before I realized what had happened, she pulled out my eyelid and cut a hole in it. If you can imagine folding a piece of paper in half and then cutting along the crease of the fold, that’s what she did to my eyelid. It didn’t hurt at first, and for a second or two, before my eye started to bleed profusely, I could actually see out the hole in my eyelid. Holy mother of god it hurt! Pulling back, I ripped off the mask as the blood began to gush from my eyelid. In a bit of a panic at the sight of all the blood, the makeup artist reached for something to staunch the blood. Unfortunately for me, the first thing she laid her hands on was a handful of cotton balls. She began blotting them to my glue covered face and within a few moments, my face disappeared beneath handfuls of blood soaked cotton balls. When the Set craft services person arrived, she took one look at my face and nearly passed out. After catching a glimpse of myself in the mirror, I could understand why. The whole left side of my face had disappeared under the blood soaked cotton balls which were stuck to my face. What had started as a cut on my eyelid now appeared to look like half of my face had been ripped off. Eventually, someone handed me a handful of Kleenex and I was at least able to apply pressure to my eye and staunch the flow of blood. The poor makeup lady was hysterical and was convinced that she had somehow poked out my eye. I tried to reassure her that I was alright, but every time I pulled away the Kleenex and tried to show her that it really wa a minor cut, she became even more upset. I settled for holding her hand and telling her everything would be okay. Transportation was arranged to take me to the closest hospital, Burnaby General. To their credit, the staff at Burnaby General took the sudden appearance of a faceless blood soaked American sailor completely in stride. I was wisked out of the Emergency Department waiting area, and into a treatment bay. It wasn’t until some time later when it occurred to me that the speed and efficiency they showed in getting me into a treatment room might have been more about not wanting to upset the other patients in the waiting area. Two nurses attended to my wound, cleaning the blood and cotton residue from my face. Within a minute or two, I had my face back. Within 20 minutes, I’d been seen by a plastic surgeon, and I had the hole in my eyelid stitched closed. Within an hour, I was being wheeled out of the ER and over to the cashier’s wicket where I was presented wit ha bill for a $1200.00. “Hang on a second,” I said. “Why am I getting a bill?” “Well sir,” she said in a mildy condescending tone. “Health care in Canada is only free for Canadians. Americans have to pay for their medical treatment.” “I’m not American” I said. “I live here!” “Oh!” said the cashier with just a hint of disbelief as she looked me up and down. “Well according to this bill you’re a non-resident. There must be some mistake, if you’ll just give me your health card, I can get this sorted out in a flash.” “I don’t have a health card” I said. I’m in the military. I realized at that moment, that all of my ID was sitting back in a locker in a dressing room “I can see that sir” she said, “but foreign military has to pay.” “I’m not foreign military” I said, “I’m Canadian military. I’m just wearing a US Navy uniform for TV”. I realized at that moment, that all of my ID was sitting back in a locker in a dressing room down by the Mackenzie and I had no way o proving who I was and no way of getting in touch with anyone from the production company. Luckily, round about that time, the driver showed up and vouched for my story and gave the cashier a production company business card and asked her to forward the bill to them for payment. We headed back to the set. It was clear by the way my eye had swollen, and the requirement to wear an eye patch for the next couple of days that I was not going to be able to carry on with the shoot. Mr Carter took me aside and told me that they felt horrible about the accident and as compensation, he offered to pay me for the time I had lost, and throw in a few hours of double time for my troubles. At the time it seemed quite generous, and I accepted his goodwill gesture, turned back in my blood soaked uniform, gathered my belongings and headed home. Over the next few days I received a number of calls from Mr Carter, Mr Bowman, and even David Duchovny, asking me how I was recovering. When I indicated I did not intend to sue, the calls tapered off and eventually stopped. Today, the scar is almost invisible, the X – Files a distant memory, but my experience…unforgettable.
Posted on: Wed, 25 Sep 2013 17:44:02 +0000
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