LOVE, CRY, BITCH, MOAN, LOVE…

Attention Actors: I can tell when you are full of crap and have no idea what you are saying or doing and you think you can get by on charm and looks. This is Los Angeles, there are many charming, good looking actors who DO KNOW WHAT THEY ARE DOING AT AN AUDITION and if you think you are going to waltz in and floor me with your amazing bullshit – it isn’t going to happen. Read the script, be prepared and know what and whom you are auditioning for or do not come in and waste my time with your half-arsed (for all you Brits) lame audition.

I feel like I repeat myself over and over with actors. Casting directors WANT the actor to walk through the door and nail the audition. If that doesn’t happen, we at least want to be able to figure out what part you COULD be right for in the current project or upcoming films, or even films that my friends who are casting directors are casting. Yes, we casting folk talk to each other, a lot. I get emails or calls nearly every other day from colleagues who want to bounce an idea off of me, or need some help with lists.

I have mentioned before how it feels like I work in a bubble. Casting directors love to talk to each other. We especially love to moan and bitch to each other because no one else understands what we do or how we operate on a film day to day. There is an art to putting a film together. Managing personalities, expectations, agents, managers, producers, actors and information is complicated and fragile. I have worked on films that have fallen apart because the expectation of the producer did not meet the understanding of a director. The politics of film making a very real and only experience can spot the red flags or potential problems in the pipeline.

I just finished casting a film, and it was a great experience. The producer cast many films on his own but this time the cast was too large for a producer to cast and I was lucky enough to get the job. My taste matched the director and the producer and over the course of the casting period, a bond of trust developed where I was left to do my job – cast the film! I was not micromanaged. I am very proud of the work on the film, it felt collaborative and at the same time I feel that I put a personal “style-stamp” on the film. “Style-stamp” I just made that up…

This week I have had some interesting phone conversations. I was on the phone with a manager for over an hour talking about work, the business, actors, etc… It was nice to connect to someone whom I talk to all of the time but never really got a chance to know. Talking on the phone as much as I do to people who couldn’t point me out in a police line up, but feeling like I know them, is a weird sensation. It was kind of like we were on a date. We talked about work, then it went to family and some personal stuff, but not too personal. I guess we felt that after talking to each other for the past 10 years, it was time to get to know more about each other. I have to say, it felt nice. I mean I wouldn’t step in front of a bullet for her, but I did feel like we knew more about each other than in an average working relationship.

I guess I am writing about this, because, well, it can be very lonely working in my world. Freelance work is dog-eat-dog, survival of the fittest kind of stuff, and having allies is important. It is to me at least. I guess actors see casting directors as allies in their journey too success and in some ways, I see agents and managers in the same way. I need them; I need access to them in order to get the films I cast the best possible cast. Ultimately, actors decide what they want to do but having talent representation on your team certainly helps and access to amazing talent impresses my bosses – the producers.

It is also important to me to have allies in casting. I have a few casting directors whom I look up to (whether they know it or not) and their opinion matters to me. I like being able to call on them for advise, because like in therapy, whatever I am going through has been gone through before by someone else, maybe not in the same way, but pretty darn close and having a shoulder to lean on, or sometimes cry on, is a comfort to me. Of course, after the good cry, bitch or moan, you move on, because if you don’t, there will be someone else who will and well, we just can’t be dealing with that….

One more thing: my relationship with actors is very important to me. I respect hard working, prepared, talented actors. I always have and always will. Those actors, who know me personally, know that I champion them and want them to get hired. I say this because re-reading what I wrote at the top of this blog, I really want to emphasize that I am trying to give actors the opportunities that I never had as an actor. I wish someone told it to me like it is but also came from a place of understanding of the creative process and the art of acting. I do understand all of this, believe me, I do, or I wouldn’t be doing what I was doing or writing this blog…