This time around in “Extra Land” (that’s Hollywood talk), I’m a Knicks fan for Aziz Ansari’s Master of None. Fortunately, I own a vintage Anthony Mason jersey, which was my ticket.
Photo courtesy NME
I’m psyched. It’s not every day that I get to work in Madison Square Garden. As usual, the evening before the shoot, I call casting’s horrible recording for instructions. The message warns us not to bring “any weapons, illegal substances, babies, or animals.” (Bad news: I was planning on getting my friend’s German Shepherd, infant twins, a machete, and some very potent weed.)
I report to the Garden, the self-proclaimed “World’s Most Famous Arena,” on time, just before 8:30 a.m. If you’re so famous, must you announce it? Security doesn’t grant me any special treatment whatsoever. I get stroked with a security wand, and I take the elevator down to the bowels of the Garden, where I walk past hockey goals and folded basketball hoops. Lots of BG are lounging about on foldout chairs.
They’ve been here for hours. Earlier, they shot a scene in the luxury boxes. Extras posed as VIPs. Me? I’m just a regular Joe Blow, Knicks fan.
Wardrobe green-lights my three outfits, and they request that I put on my striped orange and blue—yes, Knicks colors—polo, which was rescued from a discount rack. I’ve never worn it because it looks so damn odd. If the Knicks had a zebra as a mascot, I’d be in business. Wardrobe informs me that my Mason jersey is for my third change. But Mase will probably get no burn today. It’s highly doubtful that we’ll get to a second or third change because production will be fined if they’re not entirely out of the Garden by 2 o’clock.
Courtesy YouTube
As I wait with the others in the Garden’s basement, I observe a friendly man handing out business cards. Outside of this, he’s a Tupac Shakur tribute act. There’s one major problem with his product: aside from the bandana, he doesn’t resemble Tupac.
After not too long, the wardrobe separates us into three lines, so they can carefully examine us before shooting. In production-speak, this is a “lineup.” Wardrobe wants to confirm that we’re camera-ready—or in need of adjustment. A PA couples me up with a stylish Asian woman in all black. The “couple” next to us immediately starts discussing their imaginary relationship history—and that’s my partner’s cue.
“You purchased me online,” Lucy abruptly declares, not looking at me.
Weird.
Lucy’s saying she’s a prostitute — and that I paid for her. (Memo to Lucy: I’m not Richard Gere, and you’re not Julia Roberts.) I refuse to engage in this fantasy, and I don’t reply, not even facially. Lucy gets the hint. “We met on Tinder,” she finally says.
After we enter the empty Garden, my fake Tinder date and I are placed in about the fifth row. Production has its work cut out for it. Our group of sixty must give the illusion that the Garden is packed, and they must shoot about three pages in two hours. This amount of material usually takes at least twice that time. Lucy and I have evolved to tedious, albeit evasive, small talk.
She doesn’t want me to know her age. I’m not complaining. At least the back-and-forth is cordial. Just as we’re finding a rhythm, a PA orders me to sit up front, where I’ll be closer to the principals. I don’t want to be. I don’t care for my zebra polo, and I’d rather be with Lucy and all her baggage. We’ve come so far! Of course, I have no choice.
Just before the director yells “Action!” someone points at me. My heart sinks. I knew my zebra polo looked weird. Production will not proceed with my socks. Apparently, they’re too short, and the camera is picking up too much leg, which is a distraction. Of course, if I’d been sitting up in the stands with Lucy, this wouldn’t have come up.
I’m a bad extra with bad socks.
Wardrobe rushes me some long gray socks, and I hustle them on, so shooting may commence. We do the scene. Aziz is courtside with his friend, a character actor whom everyone recognizes but no one knows by name. He might’ve played the father of the bride in the movie Working Girl. The actors pretend to watch a basketball game, but it isn’t a real game at all. Four very tall Black extras and a relatively small White referee run up and down the court as the actors recite dialogue. No one dribbles or shoots because the noise would interfere with the dialogue.
At one point in the scene, Aziz orders nachos—but a young boy intercepts. When Aziz confronts the kid, he learns that he’s alone. As I understand it, this is the crux of the scene: Why is a young kid at a Knicks game alone?
Between takes, the director and Aziz direct the young actor and the muscular, dark-haired man playing the security guard, who also looks familiar. They order the security guard to say the lines as he did during his audition.
We run through the scene a few times. Real Knick players and coaches, none of whom I recognize, quietly sit across from us, off camera, of course, and watch. I pretend to slurp a soda, courtesy of props, and mime a conversation with a businessman, who’s holding chicken fingers. The businessman is Russian. There seems to be an inordinate number of individuals with a Russian background. We watch the five men run down the court and mime cheering.
As much as I want to, I don’t watch Aziz and the other actors interact. Then, abruptly, there are some murmurs from the rafters. No, this isn’t part of the scene. Someone forgot to tell the World’s Most Famous Arena’s tour department that we’re shooting. They’re quickly shooed away.
Just before 1:00, it’s a wrap. No fine for production. We quietly single-file out of the arena and are dismissed. Lucy and I don’t exchange goodbyes.
And no, I won’t watch this scene. In that way, I’m like Adam Driver, who doesn’t watch his work either. What’s done is done. I can’t call a do-over.
(Read about the episode here.)
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Jon’s most recent book is Unfortunately, I Was Available (Peace Frogs United, 2025), illustrated by Cover Kitchen.
