Although it isn’t a written rule, an “extra”—a background player in a movie or TV show—usually has no spoken lines. If a line, or a few lines, are spoken, the person is often referred to as a “bit player” instead of an extra. (If a major star or a “known” actor is an extra in a movie, their non-speaking appearance is called a “cameo.”)

The famous people listed below all made one or more appearances as movie extras before they went on to bigger and better things.

1. Sylvester Stallone

Sylvester Stallone was an extra in Woody Allen’s 1971 film Bananas as a subway mugger. He was also an extra in Jane Fonda’s 1971 psychological thriller, Klute, as a disco patron (uncredited).

2. Brad Pitt

In 1987′s Less Than Zero, Brad Pitt was an extra billed as “Partygoer / Preppie Guy at Fight.”

3. Clint Eastwood

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Today’s mentalfloss.com Brain Game Wednesday Wordplay challenge is a word ladder. Good luck!

By changing one letter in each step to form English words, and leaving all other letters in their original positions, convert THUMB into BENDS in the fewest possible steps.

T H U M B
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B E N D S

Look up! Today’s 5 Question challenge is The Hill Quiz

Should people be required to earn a GED to receive unemployment benefits? It might sound like a good idea, but it’s a burden on educational facilities, older workers, and hardworking but intellectually deficient people.
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President Obama shot marshmallows from a cannon inside the White House at the Science Fair yesterday. No, Mom won’t let you do that in the house, but you’re not the president, are you?
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The Lair of the Clockwork Book is the latest serial from Thrilling Tales of the Downright Unusual, about a book that constantly adds to its own knowledge, including knowledge about those who consult it. The serial began a year ago, so you can read just about all of it now.
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Here’s a valentine for female movie buffs: Hot Guys Saying “I Love You.” A supercut of what you really want to hear from a leading man.
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Chicago Man Gets Stuck In Elevator Twice In One Day. There’s an elevator maintenance company somewhere that just might lose its contract.
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The oldest human paintings yet discovered are Neanderthal depictions of seals found in a cave in Spain. They’ve held up pretty well over 42,000 years.
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The 1982 film Koyaanisqatsi, sped up to fit into five minutes, is a wild ride. The resulting short film is called Balance Out of Life.
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Your daily dose of adorable comes in 20 pictures of cute koalas. Asleep. In trees.
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A federal court overturned Proposition 8, California’s ban on same-sex marriage, in a landmark decision. But no weddings will be performed until the other side gets a chance to appeal.
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The Stories Behind 5 Old American Brands. For example, Baker’s chocolate is both a descriptive name and was named after a baker named Baker.

The First World War was an unprecedented catastrophe that killed millions and set the continent of Europe on the path to further calamity two decades later. But it didn’t come out of nowhere.

With the centennial of the outbreak of hostilities coming up in 2014, Erik Sass will be looking back at the lead-up to the war, when seemingly minor moments of friction accumulated until the situation was ready to explode. He’ll be covering those events 100 years after they occurred. This is the fourth installment in the series.

February 7, 1912: The Army and Navy Bills

After the Second Moroccan Crisis, as European leaders confronted the suddenly very real possibility of a continent-wide war, internal political tensions in Germany moved into the foreground. The sweeping victory by left-wing Social Democrats in Reichstag elections threw Germany’s conservative elites into a panic — but Kaiser Wilhelm II (pictured) and Chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg had a plan to co-opt the socialists and defuse the Marxist menace.

Essentially their plan aimed to rally working-class Germans behind the elites by appealing to their nationalist pride, which in turn required stoking conflicts with foreign powers who appeared to be “threatening” Germany (in fact it was usually the other way around). The socialists would be forced either to support their policies, including increased military spending, or open themselves to being labeled as unpatriotic – both of which would undermine their political support. Critically, the conservatives knew that despite their long opposition to “militarism,” the socialists were more likely to vote in favor of military spending that required raising new taxes, hoping this might set the precedent for raising taxes for social spending.

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Sure, we were all psyched about the commercials before last weekend’s Super Bowl, but will any of them spawn Emmy Award-winning TV specials? The California Raisins, which began as a 1986 commercial on behalf of the California Raisin Advisory Board, did just that in the late 1980s. Here’s a look back at their most memorable moments.

“I Heard it Through the Grapevine”

Done in the styling of Mr. Michael Jackson. This version of the song even made it onto Billboard‘s Hot 100 list, peaking at #84 in 1988.

Meet the Raisins!

On November 4, 1988, the Raisins made their primetime debut in this spoof on standard musical documentaries. The show follows the group’s humble beginnings, rise to success, fall from stardom, and eventual comeback. (more…)

Official White House Photo by Pete Souza

Last summer we ran a profile of Taylor Wilson in mental_floss magazine. Today the kid was at the White House!

Here’s what he was doing there, according to WhiteHouse.gov:

President Barack Obama hosts the second White House Science Fair celebrating the student winners of a broad range of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) competitions from across the country, in the State Dining Room of the White House, Feb. 7, 2012. Taylor Wilson, 17, of Reno, Nevada, conducted research on novel techniques for detecting nuclear threats and developed an environmentally friendly, cost-effective, and highly sensitive system capable of detecting small quantities of nuclear material.

We’re getting a ton of search traffic on “Taylor Wilson” right now, so here’s a link to that article:

Mad Scientist of the Month

by Judy Dutton

At 10, he built his first bomb. At 14, he made a nuclear reactor. Now he’s 17…

Read the full story: Who’s Afraid of Taylor Wilson?

Back in 1933, the first issue of Time Magazine featured Joseph G. Cannon, the retired Speaker of the House. You shouldn’t be expected to know this. But perhaps you’ll do better with some of these magazines. Can you figure out who was pictured on the inaugural cover?

Take the Quiz: Who Was on Issue #1?

Blizzard image via Shutterstock

Forty years ago this week, the deadliest blizzard on record ripped through the lower Caucasus and into Iran, where it left 4,000 people dead. The Blizzard of 1972, as this hellish storm has come to be known, wasn’t your run of the mill squall; it wiped entire villages—200 villages, to be exact—off the map.

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They say it’s an honor just to be nominated, but do people really remember the nominees? How many of the Best Picture nominees from 2008 through this year can you name in 10 minutes? (When we say “2008,” we mean the Academy Awards that were held in 2008, so those movies came out in 2007. We’re including the winners. And we’re including this year’s nominees.) Good luck!

Take the Quiz: Name the Best Picture Nominees Since 2008