Lights, camera . . . Forget scoring a goal. Instead, the 14 players on the Palatine Celtic United’s under-11 travel soccer team had their sights set on Hollywood late this summer when they staged a scrimmage in Lincoln Park for the television drama “ER” (the episode ran Oct. 1).
Instead of the normal one-hour game time, the “acting” version took six, but it was well worth the extra sweat and Gatorade, parents and players agreed.
The team headed to Chicago for the day of filming on Aug. 23, after answering a call for a soccer team set of extras, says Diane Kelleher, whose husband, Warren, coaches the team, and whose son, Sean, is a player.
Best part, according to Sean, a 5th grader at Pleasant Hills school in Palatine, was the fame, though admittedly fleeting, he and fellow team players Kyle Smith and Matthew Bradshaw received at school the next day.
“Everyone thought we were really cool,” says Sean, 10, who appeared in a scene in which actor Anthony Edwards pushed him out of the way to rush the field to help his on-screen daughter.
For Robert Jakubowski, a 5th grader at St. Thomas of Villanova School in Palatine, escaping the cutting room floor was no accident. He admits to working harder than during most real games. “I had to keep running up to the front to try to stay in front of the camera,” Robert says. “But it was worth it. I got on TV a lot. It was really neat.”
Even though the team is headed to Libertyville — not Hollywood — next, the kids have a real claim to fame, Diane Kelleher says.
“The kids and all of us parents had a blast,” she says. “It was a very positive, fun experience, and we were treated very nicely by the TV crew.”
