New Years Band, Sunset Boulevard 

Sunset Boulevard is a 1950 film directed by Billy Wilder. The film focuses on Norma, a silent film star trying to make a comeback in Hollywood. Her dreams start to come to fruition when an unsuspecting screenwriter stumbles onto her property. It mainly focuses on Norma and Joe throughout the film, but many minor characters and some cameos of real silent film stars are in it. An extra that stuck out to me was the New Year’s Eve band that Norma hires for her party. They only have a couple of scenes and felt like one of their uses was for “ornamental excess” to help fill up the ballroom to make it seem not as empty (Straw, pg. 79). The band appears for around three minutes and “…are nevertheless important to the plot [but can] be easily identifiable to the viewer…” (Keathley, pg. 106). The few scenes they have served as the music/score the audience and the characters are hearing. Wilder uses a film strategy that critic Stanley Cavell talks about not emphasizing actors and their objects/props but letting them play out in the world within the film (113). In the film, the audience finds out that Norma did not invite anyone and that the party is only for the two of them. Having Norma hire the band, the audience can figure out Norma’s different traits and act towards them. The audience sees how Norma uses her extravagance and wealth to impress Joe by hiring the band. She is also reserved and private because she does not tell the band to leave when Joe leaves her party. Out of the three performers of the band, only Perc Launders is credited on IMBD and in the actual movie credits is uncredited. Perc Launders has been in many movies as a background/bit player actor, much like the actor Jack Mulhall when he “was no longer a featured performer” (Read, 118). Overall, the New Year’s Eve band in Sunset Boulevard showcases how background actors can add more to the scene, acting or music-wise. Even if they are on screen for a second, they are like “…many other forgotten performers, only a fleeting reminder of cinema’s past era” (Read, pg. 119).

Sources:

Clark, C. (2018, December 3). Entertainment, Relationships & Life after 50. Retrieved March 10, 2022, from https://purpleclover.littlethings.com/entertainment/8239-15-movies-unforgettable-scenes-new-years-eve/item/sunset-blvd/ 

IMDb.com. (n.d.). Sunset Blvd. IMDb. Retrieved March 10, 2022, from https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0043014/fullcredits/?ref_=tt_cl_sm 

Mathijs, E., Straw, W., Kenaga, H., Williams, M., Keathley, C., & Read, R. J. (n.d.). Screen Volume 52 issue 1 : Free download, borrow, and streaming. Internet Archive. Retrieved March 10, 2022, from https://archive.org/details/Screen_Volume_52_Issue_1/page/n119/mode/2up?view=theater

Who is Profiling the Character?: Abby Farnsworth
Source of Image: Clark, C. (2018, December 3). Entertainment, Relationships & Life after 50. Retrieved March 10, 2022, from https://purpleclover.littlethings.com/entertainment/8239-15-movies-unforgettable-scenes-new-years-eve/item/sunset-blvd/ IMDb.com. (n.d.). Sunset Blvd. IMDb. Retrieved March 10, 2022, from https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0043014/fullcredits/?ref_=tt_cl_sm Mathijs, E., Straw, W., Kenaga, H., Williams, M., Keathley, C., & Read, R. J. (n.d.). Screen Volume 52 issue 1 : Free download, borrow, and streaming. Internet Archive. Retrieved March 10, 2022, from https://archive.org/details/Screen_Volume_52_Issue_1/page/n119/mode/2up?view=theater
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