Additional things beyond what is required or usual, often used for background actors in movies or small additional items.
Extra comes from Latin 'extra' meaning 'outside' or 'beyond', which became common in English in the 1600s. The plural 'extras' specifically became popular with the film industry in the early 1900s.
Movie extras are fascinating because they're essential to making scenes feel real and lived-in, but they're so invisible that many people don't realize they're seeing the same extras multiple times in different crowd scenes—it's like visual recycling!
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