Film Crew Gives Warren Residents, Police Officer Five Minutes of Fame

A couple of Warren residents and a officer got their five minutes of fame during a film shooting in Warren on Monday morning.

The crew from "Something Slow," an independent movie being shot primarily in Warren, spent Monday morning shooting a scene at the Warren Town Wharf. Three lucky locals, including a Warren police officer, got a chance to be part of the background cast.

According Lt. Roland Brule, the crew stopped in to the police department on Monday morning and asked if they could borrow an officer and a cruiser for an hour on the set.

"When I walked in to the station, [my co-workers] said, 'you're the guy they need for a movie,' " Brule joked. 

The scene shot at the wharf called for a police officer to drive by slowly, suspiciously watching the two actors walking on the dock. The crew did two takes and Brule was right back to work.

Brule admits this is not the first time he was asked to drive a cruiser for a movie shoot.

"Back in the late ’80s, early ’90s, I had to drive a cruiser in another movie that was being filmed in Providence," Brule said. "So it's not my first time."

Warren residents David Pion and James Salamon also got the luck of the draw when they were asked to play parts in the movie. According to Salamon, the two were just sitting at a picnic bench on the wharf when a crew member approached them and asked them to help out.

"Basically they asked us to stand on the dock and look like dock workers," Salamon said. "It worked out perfect because we just happened to be here."

"It was very exciting!" Pion said after the crew finished shooting. "Now we have to go get autographs or else no one will believe us."

The two stars of the scene, Jessalyn Gilsig ("Glee," "Nip/Tuck") and Grahm Patrick Martin ("The Bill Engvall Show," "Two and a Half Men"), graciously signed autographs for Pion and Salamon and admitted that they loved working in Warren.

"I love it here," said Gilsig, who noted that she has only been in town for a couple of days but that she has been recognized by many locals. 

According to producer Mike Anderson, the crew of 18 plans to be in town for another week shooting scenes all over town and in Touisset.

"We really like working in Warren," Anderson said. "The director summered here and his family owns a house here in Touisset. There are a few of us from the East Coast so we're happy to be shooting here, and all of the residents are really welcoming and curious, so we can't complain."

According to Anderson, the hardest part of the crew's shooting process so far has been the rainy weather from last week. 

"It was downpouring for a few days and we all got the flu, so that was a problem," he said. "We all travel together and work together like a family, so once one person got it, we all had it."

Anderson reports that everyone is getting over the bug and the actors and crews are ready to continue shooting the movie. 

"Something Slow" stars Gilsig, who plays a young woman whose life is changed after witnessing a robbery. The movie follows her and the people she meets along her path to self discovery as she travels back to a home where she remembers vacationing in the summer (Touisset).