A Mercer University faculty member plays a military soldier in the fifth and final season of Netflix’s hit television series, Stranger Things. Dr. Christopher Schmitz, professor of music theory and composition, is among the soldiers fighting in the battle scene at the Military Access Control Zone in Episode 4.
The filming took place at a studio lot in Atlanta, where Dr. Schmitz spent three weeks in July 2024 rehearsing and filming the action-packed sequence. A behind-the-scenes video on the show’s YouTube channel calls it “one of the most complicated sequences in Stranger Things history.”
“There were so many complicated moving parts in the scene. You have a 250-caliber machine gun on top of a giant military vehicle that comes zooming in and other vehicles that are squealing through, and you’ve got all these troops running, and you’ve got the main characters,” Dr. Schmitz said. “And then you’ve got actors portraying monsters, and cranes are yanking them all over the place, and lights are going. When we were doing the filming, it was really complicated and chaotic. We had to get all of the coordination very precise before we started doing that.”
Dr. Schmitz has spent several summers working as a television and movie extra. The days are long, but there’s a lot of down time, allowing him to work on music research and compositions while he waits to be called.
The first film he worked on was Disney’s Jungle Cruise, starring Dwyane Johnson and Emily Blunt, and he orchestrated “Violin Concerto” on the set of The Conjuring 3. A friend sent him the casting call for Stranger Things.
Most of the men hired as soldiers already had a military background, Dr. Schmitz said. But since he answered a rush call for more soldiers, military experience was not required. That meant he had to be trained.
“During that first week, they had an actual drill sergeant there who taught us how to handle an M16, how to reload and fire and how to carry, how to engage the enemy and battle at close range. We had to learn how to coordinate when we’re running in and facing somebody,” he said.
After training, filming began. Each day started with visits to hair and makeup and then wardrobe. When he wasn’t on set, he could eat, rest, socialize with other extras and work in the trailer.
Dr. Schmitz had seen only one episode of Stranger Things before he was cast in the show. After he was hired, he watched a few more for reference. Of course, he recently tuned in to “Chapter 4: Sorcerer” to see his battle scene.
“I knew that being a background person with a whole bunch of soldiers that I wasn’t going to be front and center,” he said. “I can point to myself in several scenes to say, ‘That’s me,’ because I remember where I was positioned, and I could see myself fairly well, but you can’t make out facial features.”
While viewers might have a hard time identifying him in the show, they can see Dr. Schmitz dressed as a soldier in another behind-the-scenes video on the Stranger Things YouTube channel. (Check out the soldier in the bottom right at the 53-second mark.)
“It was a lot of fun,” Dr. Schmitz said. “It was just kind of a neat little old thing to do during the summer.”
