If you’ve been reading my blather here for any length of time, you’ve probably perused my Home Alone stories ad nauseam, along with other columns highlighting my memorable experiences as an indispensable part of feature films known as an “extra” or “atmosphere” or “background”. As those names imply, it’s a position filled by a reasonably sentient human-type being who is to be less noticeable in a scene than a discarded gum wrapper or a crack in the sidewalk.
Since Catherine O’Hara’s recent passing was a sad shock to me, I wanted to highlight the memorable time I spent with her at John Hughes’ studio creating the airplane scene in Home Alone, where, across the aisle from her, I did serious method acting as a person slightly more visible than a sidewalk crack.
I found Catherine to be an easygoing, constantly smiling lady on that 83° March day, anyway. The recently closed New Trier High School, where Hughes had filmed The Breakfast Club, was now repurposed as his movie studio.
Catherine, who played Kevin’s mom in the movie, and John Heard, Kevin’s dad, were shooting the airplane cabin scene in the smaller un-air-conditioned school gym. Between shots, floor fans were dragged over to cool everybody off. During a break, some of us went outside to get some air. John Heard started tossing around a football with a couple of us on the sports field. At the edge of the field was a small brick utility building with three concrete stairs leading up to the door. John and I sat on the stairs to rest. A couple minutes later, Catherine came hobbling toward us, right hand on her lower back, imitating a bent over old lady. Grinning and grimacing slightly, she said she had some kind of a crick in her back and made a joke about it. She and John got into a conversation about working with Robin Williams. I just sat and listened since it was obvious I had nothing to add and if I did, it would most likely be something inane that would end the discussion and make me look stupid.
My point is that Catherine took things in stride and good humor. The day was only half over and we had to go back in the hot airplane set where we filmed into the late night. It wasn’t bad for me because I was directed to be asleep in my seat without my suit coat. But Catherine (and John) had to be in winter clothes for hours. With the heat and her sore back, she never left her good mood behind.
I stopped by the buffet table about 11:30 p.m. to pick up a snack for the ride home. John was there, munching on something. He said they still had one more scene to film.
My memory of Catherine O’Hara is a nice one. By the looks of tributes to her from Macaulay Culkin, Whoopi Goldberg, and others who knew and worked with her, she was a special person.
Working as a nobody in films has given me the opportunity to interact with film stars. I’m no longer star struck as when I was younger, although meeting Anthony Quinn and Maureen O’Hara nearly caused me to melt down into my shoes. These were two actors I’d grown up with. I knew they were real people (at least according to my mother), but it seemed to me as if they existed in another world or a different dimension. Anthony was Zorba, Attila, Barabbas; Maureen was the mom in Miracle on 34th Street who didn’t believe in Santa, one of the first movies I remember as a kid and here I was shaking hands with both and working in a film with them.
My mother got me interested in movies because her mother passed on the chance to head to Hollywood in the silent movie days with her best friend Agnes Ayres, who went on to star with Rudolph Valentino in The Sheik. That’s a story for another day.
Getting back to present life, please remember to believe what you see with your own eyes, not what the current administration tries to convince you that you didn’t see. This isn’t 1984. Wait…where’s my calendar?