Almost Famous: An Award Show Seat-Filler

The value of a warm body simply cannot be underestimated in this town.

As the number of televised awards shows continues to grow, producers can’t afford to stage an event that looks about as A-list as a city council meeting.

“There’s a consensus--among people who do these kinds of events for television--that empty seats don’t look good,” said Don Cornelius, who has produced the Soul Train Music Awards telecast for the past 15 years. “Any awards show that had the benefit of a network time period--the Emmys or the Grammys or the American Music Awards--if they want to keep that time period, the show has to deliver ratings.”

So it should come as no surprise that the city that refined style over content has cultivated a booming seat-filler industry, populated by volunteers who cut out of work for several days, don formal wear and wait outside the auditorium for hours.

Just to reinforce Hollywood’s caste system of stars and drones, the seat-filler companies present the responsibility with an effective combination of enthusiasm and neglect.

“Women are strongly encouraged to wear reasonably comfortable shoes, as you will be standing quite a bit at the beginning of the evening. There will be no secure area to leave any belongings,” reads the informational sheet from a seat-filler company, Dynamic People Club. “We suggest you eat before you come. No food or drink will be allowed from 1 p.m. till 7 p.m.”

On a recent 45-degree drizzly afternoon, Jodell Leonetti carried her clipboard and cell phone into the open-air parking garage next to the Shrine Auditorium and approached a sign that read, “The Dynamic People Club,” which she started last summer. An hour later, more than 100 well-dressed women (and a few men) listened attentively as she laid out instructions.

“I’ve already turned away 10 people today because they weren’t dressed appropriately,” Leonetti said.

Among the 100 people she accepted was an 18-year-old who survived a freeway accident the week before. (She defied bed rest orders from her doctor and strapped on three-inch silver heels). Another woman realized her red Plymouth Sundance was being towed away as Leonetti laid out rules prohibiting cell phones and cameras inside the auditorium.

The shivering seat-fillers had “earned” their place here by spending two days at the taping of sitcoms earlier in the winter, helping sate Hollywood’s appetite for live applause and laughter on the sitcom track.

“For so long, you’ll be a dedicated fan, and you’ll be obsessed,” said Eboni Jackson, 18, who flew down from San Francisco with three friends, spent the night in a hotel and got her hair and nails done. “If you get a chance like this, you have to do it.”

Jackson hoped to take the seat of the person next to a star who went to the bathroom, or headed to the stage for an award or a performance.

Others hope for studio executive proximity.

“For me, it’s about networking, about getting your name out there,” said Arnita Jennings, a writer who left Philadelphia for Tinseltown last October. “I usually sit up front by getting here early. You try to dress where you’re going to make an impression,” she said, wearing all black and carrying a bag lunch.

Jennings was a seat-filler at the TV Guide Awards earlier this winter, but because she had just relocated, she didn’t have new business cards. It was a missed opportunity, she said regretfully, ticking off names of “powerful people” who sat within whispering distance of her at the show. (None of the names sounded remotely familiar, except for Tom Cavanagh, who plays the title role in NBC’s new Thursday night comedy, “Ed.”)

After standing in the damp, cold garage for three hours, organizers corralled the seat-fillers into a hallway next to the auditorium, where they watched the show’s rehearsal on a closed-circuit television. A young woman in a gold top and black wrist corsage dozed off behind the monitor. Seat-filler organizers led women to the bathroom in groups of five.

This is, to be sure, serious business, with producers consistently turning to two main seat-filler businesses to ensure the look of their televised audience. Leonetti’s Dynamic People Club operates from within Audiences Unlimited Inc., the world’s largest supplier of live studio audiences. It seems like a perfect marriage, because Audiences Unlimited can reward its laughers and clappers with a chance to fill seats at a televised awards show. Leonetti’s competition, Seat Fillers.com, the country’s largest seat-filler company, maintains a symbiotic relationship with her. They subcontract with each other if they can’t provide enough seat-fillers on a given day.

And both companies say they uphold strict standards.

“We can’t have people who are so star-struck that they start crying like they’re seeing the Beatles for the first time,” said seat-filler coordinator Christian Moralde, 28. Wearing a headset, green contact lenses and a black, ribbed turtleneck, he explained that the seat-filler industry is a dignified alternative to screaming groupies.

“The [seat-filler’s] job is an elegant game of musical chairs,” he said, trying to ignore a group of seat-fillers who had taken off their high heels and plopped down on the carpeted floor of the holding room.

Meanwhile, Tammy Murphy of Seat Fillers.com spied the sleeping woman behind the monitor. It seemed like a premonition of the worst-case scenario.

“If a band gets up, with their wives, their managers and then another band goes behind stage as the next performance, you’ve got 60 empty seats, and it looks like no one is at the show,” she said, groaning.

During the recent Soul Train Music Awards, Jackson took the seat of a no-show, enabling her to stay put for the duration of the taping. She complained only about the mandatory navy blue plastic wristband that designated her as a lowly seat-filler. In all, she logged an 11-hour day for the privilege of occupying a seat, with the hopes that the television camera might scan her section.

Jackson awoke the next morning with a scratchy throat and sore feet.

“I had a lot of fun, and I’m glad I did it,” she said, sipping hot tea.

Hollywood’s awards season, in February and March, ramps up to the mother of all awards shows: the Academy Awards, which take place on Sunday. But if seat-fillers think good behavior will earn them a ticket to the biggest awards show of the year, they’re wrong. The Academy Awards producer shrinks at the thought of farming out seat-filling responsibilities to the general public.

“It’s kind of a security concern. The more people know, the more people use it as a way to crash,” said Mikel Kaufman, associate director of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. “We use academy staff and families and staff of our legal and accounting firms.”

During the last few years, the pool of 200 friends has been instructed not to divulge details of the production. Greg, a veteran Academy Awards seat-filler, who agreed to speak to The Times on the condition that his last name not be published, said the hush-hush attitude was inconsequential after he found himself next to actors Dustin Hoffman and Jack Nicholson.

“There’s a few things you don’t do. First of all, you have to learn the seat-filler’s shuffle: You can’t step on anyone’s feet as you get out of your own,” Greg said. “You don’t talk to anyone, and you don’t ask for autographs.”

The seat-filler industry thrives on the attitude that television validates one’s existence. And, lest the volunteers forget--even the volunteers for the Academy Awards-- Greg reminds seat-filler hopefuls, it is a privilege of which they are barely worthy: “There’s a chance that part of your head might be seen by billions of people around the world.”