Becoming Sandra Bullock

I am being paid to be Sandra Bullock. No, I am not a member of the Sandra Bullock look-alike circuit, if there even were such a thing. I am working on a film set as her photo double. This means that I sit in a little trailer all day, writing an essay about being Sandra Bullock and waiting for her to finish shooting her scenes. At some point, she takes off her clothing and the wardrobe people give it to me. I put on her clothing, go to the set and stand in for her in all of the distant shots where her presence isn't required.

The process for becoming Sandra Bullock was relatively simple: I arrived on set and was ushered to the hair and makeup trailer, where a nice man pored over images of Sandra and made me up to look like her. I was given her haircut, her makeup, and eventually her clothing.

Photo doubles are used to keep famous actors happy by not forcing them to act in every one of their scenes. Upon hearing about this phenomenon, the first reaction a good citizen should have will probably be Marxist in nature. Something like: Damn it! Actors are like a cross between a thoroughbred and a rare orchid — a lot of money and time is put into them, and they are not expected to produce anything with any amount of sense or regularity at all. The set is full of Teamsters, production assistants and caterers who all must put in a day's work for a day's wages, so why shouldn't Sandra?

This is a valid point. After my first time on a big-budget movie set I had vague notions of telling the film workers of the world to unite, and that they have nothing to lose but their gold chains. But after time, one finds the subtler point to be gleaned from becoming Sandra Bullock.

It is not interesting that I have to become Sandra Bullock some of the time; it is interesting that Sandra Bullock does not need to be Sandra Bullock all of the time. She spends all day being Sandra Bullock, and then when she doesn't absolutely have to, she goes into her trailer and sheds her Sandra Bullock skin, and I get paid a nominal amount to wear her skin on camera.

Of course, I look almost entirely unlike Sandra Bullock, but from afar theatergoers won't notice. They will assume I am Sandra Bullock because she was just seen in a close-up moments before, and as the car speeds away or as the camera pulls back the viewer assumes a certain amount of continuity. This works out because that tiny image of Sandra Bullock maintains the minimum of semiotic similarity to her. Her build, her hair, her clothes. All signs point to Sandra Bullock. This could mean that Sandra Bullock is not even Sandra Bullock, but rather a collection of attributes that can be passed around and used in her absence. The "real" woman — the one who goes to the bathroom and worries about her fine lines and was probably called Sandy by her mom — can sit in a trailer and exist separate from Sandra Bullock. Because when she is in her trailer thinking about mortgages or the war in Iraq, I am on set being Sandra Bullock.

This is the nature of having a public persona, especially in a medium like film where the record of the filming lasts longer than the event of filming (it's film, see). There is a discontinuity between Sandra Bullock and the woman in the trailer. The woman in the trailer surely remembers her work in Speed, and I'm sure she is cognizant of her identity during this filming, but I'd bet that she has changed a lot between Speed and now. Everyone changes; it's only human.

But Sandra Bullock isn't human, and it hasn't changed a bit. Sandra Bullock is a glorious, continuous line — a ray, for geometry buffs — that begins at her first appearance on camera and seamlessly connects all the movies and public appearances she has made in one single trajectory. This is how the public wants all of its stars. This is how the public wants Sandra Bullock.

That woman in the trailer surely has to deal with the ramifications of her on-camera persona — that she will eventually change with age, as humans are wont to do, and that the public will become enraged that Sandra Bullock is fading away. But for now she can use this postmodern paradox to her advantage. She can revel in the portable nature of Sandra Bullock. That's where I come in.

She can request someone like me to temporarily become Sandra Bullock, releasing her from Sandra Bullock when the burden becomes too great. Someone will come to the woman in the trailer's rescue, allowing her to shed the skin that probably fits less well every day. Someone will be Sandra Bullock so she doesn't have to. She will give it to another woman like me, and relax for a moment in namelessness and facelessness. Sandra, lay your Bullock down.

— Aemilia Scott (aemilia at flakmag dot com)