Hundreds of starstruck locals vied for coveted 'movie extra' places at Holkham this weekend, after London production team Celador Films - of Oscar-nominated Dirty Pretty Things fame - put out a casting call via Radio Broadland.
As cameras rolled, seventy new Norfolk stars were born on the same vast beach where Gwyneth Paltrow famously strutted her stuff at the end of Shakespeare in Love. But a little goes a long way in modern cinematography: movie-effects geeks multiplied their hand-picked squad of locals into a 500-strong search party, pivotal to a key scene in coming-of-age tale, The Scounting Book for Boys.The shooting session repeated the spectacle seen in Holkham and Cley in November 2007, when UEA-trained Director Saul Dibb recruited hundreds of extras to appear in smash-hit period costume drama The Duchess, starring Keira Knightley and Ralph Fiennes.
Dibb - keen to show off the best assets of
the local community - hired Hunstanton's Emma Dent as Knightley's body double for bedrom scenes with lusty love-interest, Earl Grey. He also cast Fakenham mum-of-two Catherine Farrell for key 'extras' role as the wet nurse to whom Knightley surrenders illegitimate baby Eliza in a major scene, shot on Cley Marshes at a bleak 6.30am. 
With some of the biggest, best and most memorable natural landscapes in the British Isles, Norfolk is no stranger to the silver screen. Blockbusters Stardust, Atonement, 007's Die Another Day, Shakespeare In Love and The Dambusters have all immortalised Norfolk locations.
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