Kelli Michelle Berglund
Born – February 9th, 1996
The Young Icons Interview, an intro to Kelli
Kelli Berglund is a triple threat-actress, dancer and singer. Starting February 27, 2012, Berglund will be seen starring on the new Disney XD TV Series, “Lab Rats,” as “Bree” – a bionic teenager with lightning speed.
Berglund began her career at a young age, gracing the small screen as a series regular on TLC’s “Hip Hop Harry.” TV appearances also include “Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader,” and “America’s Next Producer.”
Berglund also appeared in the indie film, “Bye Bye Benjamin.” Her commercial credits include campaigns for Old Navy, Hyundai, Bratz, McDonald’s and Mattel, among others. She has also appeared in print and modeling campaigns for Reebok and the Camarillo Academy of Performing Arts.
Berglund has been honored with many awards in dance for her lyrical contemporary, hip-hop, tap, and jazz techniques. Though she is equally versatile in these types of dance, her favorite style is contemporary – a blend of ballet and jazz. When not working on the set, Berglund loves to spend time with her younger sister, who is also an exceptional dancer.
Berglund loves fashion, and loves shopping. She choreographs dance moves with her high school team, creates and edits cool videos, and is a budding photographer as well.
Let Kelli Berglund tells you …
What It Was Like to Be on the Entourage Party Yacht
Two days in the life of an extra surrounded by Vince, Turtle, Drama, Eric, and topless women.
Last January, a yacht was afloat and beautiful people abounded, but instead of the Mediterranean hotspot, filming took place off the coast of Miami’s Bill Baggs State Park in Key Biscayne. I was there, one of a horde of extras who were paid $100 to $300 per day, including 49 party girls, six “hottie” party girls, two yacht bartenders, four party guys, three older rich men, one Euro dude, two yacht crew, and three topless girls. The topless girls made $500 per day, though. One of them named Priscilla told me so.
There was glamor, and, of course, breasts. Oh, the breasts. Bikini-clad beauties were plentiful on the 154-foot luxury super-yacht for the next two days, tanned to perfection and sprayed down with oil and body makeup. The fleet captain explained that this yacht was one of five owned by billionaire software entrepreneur Michael Saylor, a notorious womanizer and serial partier. Built for a cool $52 million in 2007, it cost $225,000 a week to rent. The ship’s name was Usher, not after the R&B crooner, but after one of Saylor’s software products.
DAY 1
The opening scene of the Entourage movie, set to be released on June 3, is perhaps its most important, a first impression meant to set the tone of the entire film. So crucial was it to director and writer Doug Ellin that he requested an animation be made, shot for shot, of how the dramatic, party-filled yacht sequence would unfold. He showed off the animation on his phone to friends. He knew it was just what he wanted.
But there’s a lot of room for contingencies between animating an elaborate scene and filming it, and almost immediately it was clear that things were not going as planned because of one culprit: the wind. It was so strong that Connolly joked about it blowing him off the ship, and later the unthinkable happened as a sudden gust flung Dillon’s fedora straight from his head and into the ocean. “I got a piece of it,” moped Ferrara. “That would have been a great save.”
“You don’t have great hands,” Ellin chided Dillon.
A hat flying over a yacht is only a catastrophe when time is of the essence and the wardrobe department’s backup hats are a shuttle, a golf cart, and a ferry boat ride away. The shoot cost around $250,000 to $400,000 per day and was being crammed into two days of filming. “We can throw the girls out there and tell them to pretend it’s warm but we can’t deal with the wind,” Ellin said. “There’s nothing we can do about the wind. I’d take five degrees less for no wind.”
Tomorrow would be crunch time.
HOW IT HAPPENED
Ellin, who wrote and directed the film, is a Brooklyn native. He comes across as a confident bro in the body of a 47-year-old Jewish guy, although he looks closer to 37. Yes, Entourage is partially thanks to Mark Wahlberg, who is producing the film and whose life served as the inspiration behind the series’ lead character, Vincent Chase, but Ellin is the creator of the franchise. He dreamed up the idea and wrote much of the show, slyly throwing in plot points taken from his own life. As with the lead character, most of the people he calls his best friends are, in fact, his friends from childhood. They’re invited on set, to private dinners with celebrities, and along for nights out with beautiful women. His fiancée Maddie Diehl (who makes a cameo in the film during party scenes) has a body that could rival most Victoria’s Secret models. Ellin is Entourage.
Despite the series finale’s cliffhanger, it’s a miracle everything came together for the movie to actually happen. A week before the first days of shooting were planned to take place, plenty was still up in the air. The script was being reworked, there were concerns about the weather, and Connolly’s schedule for his new CBS show Friends with Better Lives was an issue (the show would end up getting canceled after nine episodes). Add to that the fact that contract negotiations nearly put a halt to the entire movie. Just four months before shooting the yacht scene, when Ellin was asked on Twitter what the odds were that the Entourage movie would come to fruition, he told fans that he “wouldn’t bet on it,” and that it looked “less and less likely every day.”
The actors had reportedly been upset that Piven had been offered more than them, and they were holding out. On one hand, Piven was the only cast member with three Emmy Awards and a Golden Globe, and there was little doubt that he turned in the series’ best performance. On the other hand, each cast member was equally important to making this movie happen, and all five needed to sign on. If one said no, it was a no-go. There would be no film without the entire entourage. With the series still the biggest success for all five major players, though, it was clear that everyone wanted this movie to happen despite how unlikely it may have looked. And for that very reason, it did.
DAY 2
The wind had subsided and, compared to the day before, the 66-degree temperature felt more like a crip 90. A scene featuring all four main guys on the deck in the middle of a raucous yacht party was about to start shooting. There were topless models, half-naked models, and bulked-up guys in swim trunks. Waiters carried trays of scrumptious appetizers, and cocktails flowed like water, albeit with a slight Hollywood twist: The food was inedible, Stella Artois bottles were filled with SmartWater, champagne was Martinelli’s sparkling apple cider, and screwdrivers were simply orange juice. Though actual alcohol was not involved, everyone onboard was relaxed and having plenty of fun.
“Whoa!” shouted Connolly to a guy beginning to unzip his shorts on the yacht’s upper sun deck. “The only thing I ask is that you keep your pants zipped!”
Eyes turned upward toward the embarrassed extra. “Sorry, I’m supposed to be wearing a bathing suit,” he said as he shamefully removed his shorts to uncover a flashy, revealing Speedo, one that he was clearly hoping to expose at the last moment possible.
“Oh. Sorry. I get it now,” said Connolly, laughing. “I thought something else was going to be revealed.”
I was told I could be an extra, so there I was, in a modest one-piece and sarong, somewhere in between the partygoers cavorting, trying to look like how I imagined Cara Delevingne would if she were there, with my arms in the air, dancing with my Stella Artois filled with water near one of the Euro-looking extras who sported a small diamond stud in one ear and a winged tattoo across his back.
During one take, I watched him strategically working his way around the party so that he was always in the frame as the cameraman circled around the movie’s leading men. He had created an entire storyline for himself, pretending that one of the topless girls had walked away from him and he was going to chase after her—Method extra-ing. Eventually he bumped the cameraman and was told to stay put in one spot. So much for his big debut.
The prettiest girls were brought to the front. Paparazzi on nearby boats snapped photos from a distance while the Flight Facilities song “Crave You” played over the speakers. “I walked into the room dripping in gold/Yeah dripping in gold,” Giselle’s hypnotic voice sang.
“Won’t people be able to see that boat in the background?” Connolly said in between takes, pointing to a boat floating nearby. Sure enough, a few minutes later crew members began to scream about how the nearby boat needed to “get to the Usher‘s bow immediately! You’re holding up the shot!”
Connolly could have easily been mistaken for an assistant director. He was constantly pointing out continuity issues (“Shouldn’t Nina get out of the tub like she did in the other shot?”), the time between takes, and issues with the background music. “Can we please play any song but that song?” he complained when Foster the People’s “Pumped Up Kicks” played during a party scene. While such a vocal actor might be a major faux pas on any other set, Connolly was usually right, so no one seemed to mind the extra eyes and ears.
Then there was Dillon, who much like his character on the show, seemed adorably awkward with women. He offered models in bikinis his coat during breaks and chanted “It’s good to be king!” while posing with them for photos. Grenier was mostly interested in talking about the new whale documentary he was producing and how much he loved The Skins, a new band he was managing. Ferrara talked baseball with his co-stars in between takes.
The big opening helicopter scene was about to happen, but it was proving hard to make a bunch of sober Miamians pretend to look drunk and dance. “Throw your hands in the air!” screamed a crew member. “But stop looking up at the helicopter!”
Sports Illustrated and Victoria’s Secret model Nina Agdal stood nearby on the boat’s edge in a royal blue bikini, her hair full of glorious curled extensions, a single gold necklace dangling in front of her chest.
She was making her movie debut in the opening scene playing Brigitte, a French beauty onboard. Adriana Lima was considered for the part but was deemed “too recognizable” to have a role in which she didn’t play herself. She wasn’t the only one who didn’t make it to the final cast list. Emily Ratajkowski ended up with a role that was originally written for Kate Upton, who apparently decided, or was advised, not to play herself. A role planned for Rihanna was rewritten for UFC Women’s Champion Ronda Rousey when Rihanna didn’t work out.
“I want to see someone twerk!” Agdal yelled, as a tiny woman in a leopard-print bikini fulfilled her wishes and began shaking.
The helicopter swarmed overhead as two women on jet skis crisscrossed near the stern of the yacht as a separate boat carried Ferrara, Dillon, and Connolly. Someone was yelling from the water and I looked down to see one of the two jet ski girls trying to get the attention of someone on the crew. “How much longer is this?” she pleaded, visibly shaking. “We are freezing! I’m going numb.”
“Oh no!” cooed Agdal. “I wish I could switch with her. I really would.”
Supermodels are known for working half-naked in frigid conditions, so I got the impression Agdal might have been serious.
“That’s a wrap!” someone yelled, as the ship lit up in cheers and the helicopter flew away into the distance.
“Nobody makes movies about good times anymore unless you have a stupid comedy,” said a woman named Claudette, a still photographer with a thick European accent. She was talking with a cameraman about whether there would be more Entourage films to follow. “There’s an Entourage crowd,” she continued. “It’s all over the world believe or not, in France and England and Germany. They’ll do it, one, two, three.” The world needs more films like Entourage, she argued, films about good times.
“Do you guys still feel like you’re on the boat? I keep swaying like I’m still on the boat,” said Ferrara hours after filming had wrapped and he had joined Dillon, Connolly, Grenier, Ellin, and Agdal at Prime 112 steak house along with a few other crew members and close friends. Diners inside stared and gawked.
“Entourage is here!” they whispered.
Yankees pitcher CC Sabathia, a fan of the show, was also dining at the restaurant and came over to say hello before the crew headed to the wrap party at the new Miami nightclub E11even.
Transportation from dinner to the club came in the form of a giant party bus lined with booths and fitted with disco lights, a smoke machine, and bottle service. Grenier grabbed a harmonica and began playing along to the songs while the cast and crew danced, holding on to the sides of the bus as it made its way down the Miami streets. It was everything the yacht party was and wasn’t—all the glam but with actual booze and music that didn’t stop playing. It looked like a scene straight out of the show, but this time it was real. The entourage was back.