Famous NYC Day Player and Movie Extra, Craig "Radioman" Castaldo, made an appearance at the Anthology Film Archives this week for a screening of a documentary focusing on him and his work, appropriately titled: RADIOMAN. The film was one of the opening movies for NewFilmmakers New York WinterFest 2013, a week long film and video festival to kick off the Winter Series, which screens new films every week. Radioman was in good spirits on January 2nd as he and his friends waited outside for the show to begin, preferring the blistering cold to the cozy, but crowded Anthology lobby. They talked shop about the state of the film industry, romanticized stories of the past and projected a great deal of hope for the future. This was before the film even began.

Radioman has acted in 100+ films, worked for some of Hollywood's most established directors, he has shared screen time with some of the highest paid actors in the industry and is one of the most sought after extras in the business. The film focuses on Radioman, mainly his celebrity in the city's film community, his connections with some of Hollywood's most powerful players and dabbles a bit into his family history and life growing up in Brooklyn. We learn that he used to be a homeless alcoholic and that a brief stint at Bellevue's psychiatric ward prompted him to give up drinking cold turkey. We see interviews with people like Robin Williams, Josh Brolin and George Clooney, saying genuinely nice things about their friend Radio. A rather wonderful moment comes from the set of the TV Mini-Series John Adams, when Radio and Paul Giamatti re-enact a moment where someone threw a piece of Mozzarella at Paul.

The film takes us back and forth, with the humor of the character peppered throughout, specifically the jokes geared toward or made by his celebrity friends. The human core of the film was the focus on the tragedy of an early life to ground us to the reality of this very true and amazing story. While many of the celebrity participants are genuine in their appreciation for Radio, we get a glimpse of those who might be putting on a facade of appreciation for camera's sake, as happens in a sequence where Radio goes off to Los Angeles to attend the Academy Awards and many of his celebrity friends were startled and a little taken aback by his presence there. Some seemed genuinely annoyed that Radio showed up. This was the most difficult sequence for me to watch, as it clearly illustrates the divide between Radio and his friends – while he continues to commute by bicycle, everyone else commutes by SUV and limousine. While he travels alone, everyone else travels with assistants and friends. The visual comparison in and of itself is heart wrenching.

The film screening was followed by a Q&A with Radio and a couple of his friends who he has worked with on various film sets. He answered many typical questions about his favorite movies, actors and so forth, plus questions about how Radio goes about getting NYC's movie shoot schedule before everyone else. You can view some of his answers in a brief highlights video that NewFilmmakers has put up on their YouTube Channel.

Caption: Radioman and Eric Norcross at the Anthology Film Archives in New York City.

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