I actually think the label 'mad' is misleading, I have appropriated the term in reaction to the stigma attached to it and the shame I am supposed to feel because I have been given the label. I have no shame. I think the shame belongs to people who cause others to become mentally distressed in the first place. If there was no stigma, I would not call myself 'mad', I would call myself a human being being human. And this human business is an absurd and ridiculous career. The career of being human didn't get off to a good start with me, the place I did my training for the human role - my family home - left me ill-equipped to deal with life, but trained me well to be hurt, confused, and lonely. To cope with the bad conditions, I recreated worlds in my mind, which helped my artistic creativity, but apparently I wasn't allowed to be creative with reality. I didn't know reality is a bureaucratic exercise.
Anyways, the following is taken from my first book 'The World is Full of Laughter' and details my experience being an extra in 'The Empire Strikes Back' and how it affected my later non-consensual thinking - or if you want to call it psychosis - in that I thought there was a battle between good and evil aliens and I was part of it, I can pinpoint the genesis of that in the following experience.
I had worked in films previously, but the first film I remember working on is one of the Star Wars movies ‘The Empire Strikes Back’ with my sister Sheila.
First we had to audition. We were told there and then we were hired and were measured up for our costumes. With our Dad as our chaperone, we worked on the film for about a week. Being an extra involves a lot of sitting around waiting to be called onto the set. Extras always look forward to meal times. Breakfast was always a tea and coffee urn, with sausage, bacon or egg in a roll. Although I’m vegetarian now, whenever I smell bacon or sausages being cooked, it always reminds me happily of those days.
There were 10 other kids with us, most from stage school. One of the production assistants realised it wasn’t fair for us children just to sit around, so he let us play on the part of the set not being used. The set was a labyrinth of white space age tunnels and futuristic cloisters. I always wanted a wendy house but this was much better. The 12 of us played chase, and had shoot-em-ups with prop guns. Our scene was going to be filmed after lunch, so after we ate, we were put into our costumes. Every single one of us had to wear a pair of green trousers and a green jumper that itched like hell. We were also given a circuit board each, which were to be our schoolbooks.
Finally called on to the set, we had to walk down a gangway with a teacher. A silver C3PO also shared our scene. Again we had to wait around between shooting. Sheila and I used this time to explore the set. We saw Chewie, which made Sheila cry. The guy inside had to take off the furry head to reassure her. All sorts of ghouls and monsters walked about. The longer I was there, the less I believed it was make-believe. I carried the feeling with me that it was a documentary. I liked this world, more interesting than ordinary life. Empire Strikes Back is basically about the battle between the forces of good and evil, and I felt part of it.
I saw our journey from our home to the studio as a space ship ride taking me to another world. “Where you going?” Fred the window cleaner asked us. “I’m going into outer space.” I told him proudly. Planet Earth was purely a stepping-stone.
I didn’t like planet Earth – it had my Dad and school on it.
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