Behind the camera on David Copperfield Movie

We spoke to former Chairman of Bury St Edmunds Tour Guides Mike Dean about what it was like being a film extra on the set of The Personal History of David Copperfield in Bury St Edmunds.

I heard of the opportunity via the Theatre Royal, where I'm a guide, as the venue was going to be used for location shots. My appetite was whetted so I went for it and jumped through all the qualification hoops!

It was a very special feeling indeed. I had to travel all the way down to Warner Brothers studios at Leavesden, where Harry Potter was filmed, on the longest day of 2018. So the location gave an additional frisson, which added to the impact of seeing myself in a full length mirror for the first time. My family consider, now, that I was born in the wrong century.

I could say yes and blag it, but in reality no, as the filming schedule is quite frenetic and time constrained. That said, I passed the lead Dev Patel on one of his breaks at the theatre and said hello to him; he responded hoping I was bearing up in the heat, so I sort of met him.

Sitting in the second row at the theatre, dressed in the finery of the epoch, watching the intricacies of the technology and hearing, quite clearly, the verbal direction from the Director himself, Armando Lannucci. He came over as very human and approachable.

Indeed I am as are all the rest of the family. Whether it actually comes to pass and for how long is difficult to ascertain as there were nearly 100 extras taking part. Who knows, I may be in full shot or may, at this very moment, be on Cutting Room floor(* Mike made it into the final cut).

No (unless by accident) – even at my advanced age this has been my first (and a most enjoyable) experience.

I already have, especially as my role as a guide at the Theatre Royal which is such a gem anyway. I also explain to visitors on town tours, when we are on Angel Hill, how the whole area was literally transformed to the 1860's and how the back drops of The Angel Hotel,The Athenaeum and Chequer Square were used in the filming of the location shots.

The amount of staff and extras involved and appreciation of the complexity, detailed planning and delivery operation of all of the shoots, many of them completely out of chronological order, How the actors cope with this hard to fathom. The days were very long and tiring as well, at the peak of last year's heatwave.

There wasn't just one, but many. How everything came to vivid life on the clarion call of 'Action!', whether it was the filthy back streets of London or the Victorian splendour of the Theatre Royal and a one man reading by Charles Dickens himself.