State Senator Steve McClure serves as an extra in Eastwood’s most recent film
By David Blanchette
The Clint Eastwood-directed film, “Juror #2,” which debuted in October 2024, is a highly-rated legal thriller that stars Nicholas Hoult, Zoey Deutch, Toni Collette, Gabriel Basso, Francesca Eastwood, J.K. Simmons, Kiefer Sutherland and — in his film debut — 54th District Illinois State Senator Steve McClure.
McClure’s brief appearance in the film as an extra was a dream come true for the lifelong fan of Clint Eastwood and his movies. McClure had met the actor and director before while attending parties for an animal charity championed by Eastwood’s daughter, but the November 2023 filming on location near Savannah, Georgia was the first time McClure took part in one of Eastwood’s movies.
“I saw an article that he was filming what was supposed to be his last movie and that they were looking for people to be in the movie who looked like attorneys,” McClure said. “So, I submitted a headshot and a couple of days later they contacted me and said they wanted me to be an extra in the film.”
Filming was supposed to start in July 2023, but the Writers Guild of America strike shut down most movie sets. Fortunately, when filming resumed in November 2023, McClure was still in demand as an extra and since the Illinois General Assembly was not in session at the time, he was free to join the movie’s cast and crew in Georgia.
McClure filmed several scenes as a “background attorney” over a three-day period from November 19-21. Four days had been allotted for shooting those scenes, but “Clint Eastwood is famous for getting done on time or ahead of schedule,” McClure said. The famed director is also known for another time-saving strategy on set.
“Toni Collette filmed a take and then told Clint, ‘I’d like to do that again because I want to give you another option to choose from,’” McClure recalled. “And Clint said, ‘Why? We’re using the first take.’ That’s what he’s famous for, always using the first take.”
Eastwood also doesn’t yell “action” to signal the start of filming.
“The assistant director would say ‘rolling’ and then someone would say ‘background,’ which was the cue for extras like me to start moving,” McClure said. “Then Eastwood would say ‘go ahead,’ which was the cue for the foreground actors to start.”
McClure and his brother Matt, who was there for just one day of filming as an extra, had to go to makeup in the morning, where only hair gel was applied, and then wardrobe, where the day’s lawyer-looking suits would be fitted. Then it was a waiting game as the McClures bided their time until they were summoned for scenes that for Steve McClure included a parking lot, the front of the courthouse, and inside the building.
Only one of Steve McClure’s scenes made it into the movie. He can be seen for a few seconds as he portrays an attorney who is having issues while trying to get through the courthouse metal detector. But McClure was very close to the main actors during filming and can point out scenes in the movie where he was just a few feet away while walking through his paces. He was also close to director Eastwood for several minutes at a time.
“We had to squeeze around Toni as she was delivering her lines to get down the stairs in one shot, and there was a little landing where Eastwood was and we had to squeeze past him and then just stand by him for several minutes,” McClure said. “Then we got to see him in action because he wasn’t happy with how some of the
other extras were acting.”
Eastwood felt that one male extra was too “robotic,” and the director suggested he loosen up a little bit by looking at a file folder while he was walking. A female extra entered her scene and decided that she would appear more natural if she acted like she was lost inside the building.
“Eastwood stopped filming and said, ‘This is turning into a background picture,’” McClure recalled. “He told her, ‘It looked like you were a movie extra pretending to be lost.’”
McClure had other brushes with Eastwood during the three days of filming, including inside the lunch trailer where he and brother Matt sat just a few feet away from the director. But there were no selfies or casual conversations with Eastwood, who was all business on the set.
“He’s there to get a job done. He made jokes every once in a while, but he’s busy doing his job,” McClure said. “Technically he was our boss, my brother and I were paid by the production company to be in the movie.”
Eastwood was more open during a previous time when McClure met him at an animal charity event.
“I said to him, ‘You were a mayor and I’m a state senator, I bet you got more phone calls than I do,’” McClure remembered. “And he said, ‘Well, you have a tough job, stick with it.’ And that’s when I had a photo taken with him.”
When “Juror #2” debuted in October 2024, McClure was invited to Los Angeles to see the premiere at the Chinese Theater in Hollywood.
“It’s pretty cool to see my face briefly on the screen at that famous theater, even though I’m not in the film credits because I didn’t have a speaking role,” McClure said. “If Clint Eastwood does another movie, and I hope he does, I would love to be in it.”
Is being a Clint Eastwood film extra more fun than serving as a state senator for the past six years?
“It’s definitely less responsibility,” McClure chuckled. “It’s pretty easy being an extra except for the fact that it takes all day.”
The film rating website Rotten Tomatoes has given “Juror #2” an impressive 93 percent rating. The film follows family man Justin Kemp (Nicholas Hoult) who serves as a juror in a high-profile murder trial and finds himself struggling with a moral dilemma that could sway the jury verdict.
