Call of the West : Fillmore: Acting hopefuls gather to audition for roles as extras in a Western starring Patrick Swayze. Efforts to lure film business are paying off.

A steady stream of acting hopefuls smiled for snapshots and agonized over applications in Fillmore on Thursday for the chance to appear in an old-time Western starring beefy heartthrob Patrick Swayze.

A casting agent for the Disney movie, with a working title of “Tall Tale,” came to the tiny town seeking extras to fill the screen as loggers, farmers, railroad hands and townspeople.

“I’m hoping for a miracle,” said Santa Paula resident Marie Myers, 47, an unemployed bartender, as she filled out casting forms. “I can’t believe I’m doing this.”

Myers was drawn to the audition by the lure of fame and to be near Swayze. “I’d die for Patrick,” she said. “He’s excellent.”

In the first two hours of a seven-hour casting call, nearly 500 aspiring extras passed through the gazebo in downtown Fillmore and turned in their applications detailing their age, weight, height and “special skills.”

“We’re looking for people who know how to ride horses and play instruments,” said casting agent Shirley Fulton Crumley.

The agent said she is seeking a mariachi band to play background music for a dancing scene in the turn-of-the-century fable. Film extras, she said, earn $60 to $70 each day on location.

“We need people who look ethnic,” Crumley said. “This is taking place in 1905, so we need people who look like they just got here--Irish, Mexican, Swedish, you name it.”

On Wednesday Crumley collected 2,000 applications in Santa Clarita. In all, Crumley said she will hire about 1,500 extras for shoots in Fillmore, Santa Clarita, Colorado and Arizona.

Only a portion of those will be culled from Fillmore, but Crumley said applicants should not get discouraged.

“All these people apply, but it’s deceiving,” she said. “In order to get regular people who are willing to take time off from their jobs and rearrange their lives, you have to make six or seven calls just to get one who can do it.”

In the past year, Fillmore has stepped up efforts to lure potentially lucrative film business to town, lowering fees and forming a seven-member film commission.

Since the commission was established in May, 1992, film companies have shot portions of 23 movies, commercials and music videos in the town, almost double the number made in the previous four years combined.

“Fillmore is a pretty little town with lots of charm and old buildings,” city film commissioner John McKinnon said. “In these economic times, bringing some filming in is a way to bring needed money to town.”

Recent shoots include the film “City Slickers II,” starring Billy Crystal, an Aerosmith music video and television commercials for Levi’s and Harley-Davidson.

“There’s so much going on here, you just feel like you want to be a part of it,” said Mary Hughes, 61, who recently moved to Santa Paula from New Jersey. “I want to get into the business right away.”

Fillmore High School drama student Marie Rogers, 14, who applied for a slot and then volunteered to help collect forms, scrutinized the competition.

“Wow, this one’s really great,” she said, admiring a photo of a woman dressed in American Indian garb. “I see people who actually dress this way in real life.”

Duke and Jered Bradbury, a father and son team, decked themselves out as cowboys for the tryout.

“I like Westerns and I always wanted to be in the movies,” said freckle-faced, 11-year-old Jered, his sandy hair covered by a large straw cowboy hat.

“We’re hoping we’ll be chosen to appear together,” said his father, who was dressed in cowboy black from his weather-worn hat to his scuffed boots. “It could be a lot of fun.”

Not so, said Fillmore City Clerk Noreen Whithers. “I was an extra once and it was the most boring thing in the world,” she said. “All you do is sit and wait and sit and wait.”

For some, the chance to be discovered is worth all the waiting.

Bob Shaw, 62, drove for nearly an hour from Van Nuys after his case worker at the Employment Development Department told him about the casting call. “I don’t mind coming all this way,” he said. “I like to act and I need to eat.”

Shaw said he had appeared in an episode of the television program, “That’s Incredible,” as a motorcycle racer. “My dad was in vaudeville and my mother was a movie extra, so it’s in my blood,” he said.

Employment Development Department employees from Ventura and Santa Clarita have informed their clients of the casting calls for weeks, said Ignacio Abeyta, a spokesman for the Ventura office.

“It’s temporary work, but it’s better than nothing,” Abeyta said. “It can be kind of exciting.”