As a co-host and producer of Channel 3's Good Company, Andrea Vecchio is a regular visitor to Hollywood, interviewing the likes of Meryl Streep and George Clooney. But last August, Hollywood visited Vecchio.
With East Ninth Street resembling a disaster area for the filming of this month's highly anticipated The Avengers, Vecchio was recruited to portray a TV news reporter describing the mayhem. The Magnificat graduate was given her lines, had her dress covered with soot, and the cameras rolled.
"It was the coolest thing I've ever done in my life," Vecchio says. "I was standing there, 10 feet away from [Captain America actor] Chris Evans, and it looked like a war zone. Then I watched his stunt double get tossed through a window and onto a car below."
Vecchio landed the role thanks to a friend who works for Marvel Studios. The two were walking past Lola during filming, when they noticed someone waving at them from inside. That someone was The Avengers director Joss Whedon, who was dining with three of the movie's producers. Introductions were made, and a few days later, Vecchio was ready for her close-up.
"I ad-lib every day for my job, but this was different," she says. "I wasn't expecting a script. I did scenes as Reporter No. 1 and Reporter No. 2, and then they asked me to do another ad-lib scene about the chaos in the streets. It gave me a whole new appreciation for what actors do every day."
By virtue of her speaking role, Vecchio received a nice check for one afternoon of work. Although she hadn't seen the film at press time, a producer told her she made the final cut.
"I would have paid them," she says. "Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought of doing something like this. It was the best experience I've ever had."
