Last winter, Elena Heraldo received an intriguing email.
It was related to her Instagram account, the account where the University of Virginia student posts viral videos of herself drumming. The account that has nearly 500,000 followers.
A co-executive producer of Netflix’s hit show “Sweet Magnolias,” a soapy, romantic drama, had been following her short social media videos, called “reels,” and wanted to cast her as a female drummer for the show, one of the top 10 currently streaming on the behemoth media outlet.
[Elena Heraldo playing the drums to “Heathens,” Twenty One Pilots]
You don’t know the half of the abuse
“Honestly, I saw the email and was like, ‘This is too good to be true,’” she said. “This has got to be a scam or fake.”
It was neither.
Once Heraldo realized the offer was legit, she eagerly said yes. Soon, she was on a plane to Atlanta for her brush with fame. “It was in the middle of midterms for me,” she said, “but honestly, it was awesome.”
Lights! Camera! Action!
After going through wardrobe last winter, Heraldo got some acting pointers from the showrunners. “They basically told me to be natural and confident,” she said. They also encouraged her to improvise her drum solo, which she said felt very natural.
The scene she is in, as Roxanne, is 56 seconds long. Heraldo said it took three or four hours to shoot. “And then, around lunchtime, we were finished, and I took a plane back home to Virginia.”
Heraldo films her Instagram reels at her home in Richmond. (Photo by Matt Riley, University Communications)
She said it was the behind-the-scenes work of a blockbuster show like “Sweet Magnolias” that amazed her.
“When you watch a TV show, you don’t realize how many people are actually behind it,” she said. “When we filmed it, it was in the early morning. It was dark outside. But they put up these lights to make it look like it was actually daytime.”
Heraldo, a second-year biochemistry major, had to keep the news of her performance on “Sweet Magnolias” a secret for a year, because she was asked to sign a non-disclosure agreement. “Now that the secret out, it’s fine,” she said.
