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BBC-backed comedy starring Freeman overlooks minimum wage for extras

Published Wednesday 17 September 2008 at 12:05 by Matthew Hemley

A BBC-backed comedy, starring Martin Freeman and Ashley Jensen, has been accused of attempting to flout minimum wage laws after production staff advertised for extras to work for free on the project.

The advert, placed on a casting website, called for actors to appear in scenes for the film, entitled Nativity, but added that “no payment can be made”.

For a five-hour shoot, in which actors were requested to appear as Christmas shoppers and stall holders, it promised only a meal and the chance to be “part of a BBC Film” with an “all-star cast”.

This is not the first time the BBC has been accused of trying to bypass minimum wage laws. As revealed by The Stage last year, it placed an appeal on online classified site www.gumtree.com for unpaid performers. But when approached about the latest advert - spotted by The Stage and Equity walk-on councillor Clive Hurst - the Beeb denied knowledge of it, despite being highlighted in it.

BBC Films executive producer Joe Oppenheimer told The Stage that the offending material had been placed by a member of staff from the production company Mirrorball Productions, “who had been asked to find extras and who was coming up with a way to swell numbers which he should not have done”.

Oppenheimer said he had since acted to ensure proper payments have been made to any actors who responded to the call, but admitted that extras could have gone unpaid if the advert had not been spotted.

“I don’t know what would have happened if we had not been alerted to the ad. I would like to think that when it came to it, the producer would have asked who these people were and asked if they were being paid - but we will never know that,” he said.

He added: “Genuinely, I am grateful that it was pointed out - it is the kind of thing that could easily happen - we try and make sure we are across these things as much as possible, but with a feature film and with so many people involved, it is sometimes tricky. What is odd is that the day the advert needed extras for was not the first day extras had been used and, up until that point, they had all been paid.”

However, Hurst disputed this, claiming he had received correspondence from actors who claim to have appeared in scenes prior to the advert being placed, for which they did not receive payment. He said the number of companies trying to flout minimum wage laws was rising and that he had asked the Low Pay Commission for more stringent measures to tackle the issue.

A spokesman for Nativity said: “We are grateful to have had the error highlighted and can confirm that all the extras will now be paid for their work.”

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