In my column “How to Become a Casting Director” [BSW, July 4, 2002], casting director Sarah Halley Finn mentioned that there is no class one can take to learn how to become a casting director. “Maybe someday there will be a class,” she said. Well, someday is now.
Having just wrapped its initial run at UCLA Extension, Mark Paladini‘s “Casting for Film and Television” is a course for aspiring casting directors, producers, directors, writers, and actors who want to learn—over six weeks—the nuts and bolts of casting.
What is covered in class?
Paladini, whose casting credits include series like Titans, All Souls, Babylon 5, and Beverly Hills, 90210, as well as the features Mortal Kombat, Spy Hard, and The Mask, began the course with an introduction to headshots, resumes, demo reels, and terminology. He also covered job descriptions, billing, deal memos, contracts, union paperwork, and provided hands-on experience at all levels of casting sessions (preread, callback, producer session).
Students in his class were given assignments on a rotating basis. In one week, the assignment for one student included bringing in a list of actors she would consider for the role they’d cast in the mock session the following week. Another student’s assignment was to bring in actor headshots and resumes to discuss what works and what doesn’t work about them. And another student had the job of bringing in actors to participate in a mock casting session—providing sides, directing and redirecting their work, and providing feedback. The actors brought in by students were invited to stay with the class after the mock casting sessions—and most did choose to do so, taking copious notes.
The bulk of the class time was spent on the mock casting sessions and the feedback that followed. One actor asked Paladini, “Do you have any notes for me?” Paladini’s answer referred back to the moment before, in which the student acting as casting director told the actor he’d done a good job. “Yeah. When a casting director says, ‘That was good,’ say thank you!” Further notes included the importance of never trying to talk the casting director out of enjoying what the actor just did. “Actors walk into the room looking for a reason to not get the part,” he said. “And truly, most casting decisions come down to a sense of ‘it came to life in front of me.’ That’s as much science as goes into it sometimes.”
For aspiring actors, it’s the downtime that counts
Before class began—and during the entire break—Paladini was swamped with questions from eager students (and guest actors) specific to each person’s individual situation. For example, an actor brought in to do a mock casting session came armed with 4x6s from his recent headshot photo shoot. He handed the stack to Paladini, who quickly laid the photos out on a table, so that he could see them all at once and discuss with the actor what each said to him. “What is the primary adjective of what you are?” Paladini asked the actor.
Before the actor could answer, Paladini explained the reason that knowing your adjectives is so vital to an actor’s marketing strategy. “The character breakdowns go out with about six adjectives to describe each character. You need to make sure that you know the primary adjectives I’m going to glean from your picture. There are lots of actors out there who are not brought in for the right role because of their pictures’ quality or the fact that those pictures misrepresent the actor somehow.
“Actors market themselves incorrectly,” Paladini continued. “But agents do too. Sometimes the agent cares more about getting an actor in the door than serving our material. Serving the material is all we care about as casting directors. And our job is not to find one person to play the role. Our job is to find choices.”
Further advice Paladini doled out to the actor centered around a five-year plan. “Where do you see yourself?” Paladini asked.
“I want a series regular role on a show like The Practice,” the young man replied.
“OK—let’s think David E. Kelley,” Paladini began. “The cast on Kelley shows tends to be made up of actors with a certain sense of humor and acting chops, right? Well, all your 4x6s say one-hour drama to me—so that’s a good start—but what else do they say? Write your own role for me right now,” he instructed.
The actor pondered and then offered, “Cynical, professional lawyer with a sensitive side, a dry sense of humor, committed family man who can be condescending.”
“Good,” Paladini encouraged. “And the condescending thing isn’t a primary thing but the ‘if you’re around him enough you see it’ kind of thing, right?” The actor nodded in agreement and Paladini continued. “You want to be sure, when you look at the photo, that your secondary element is not showing up as your primary thing.”
“So,” I asked the actor, “How much of that character you described is simply you?”
“All of it,” he replied. “Except the lawyer part.”
“But that’s how actors at the beginning get their break,” Paladini explained. “They bring themselves to the role. They play themselves with depth. If there’s no depth, they play themselves only and never grow into other roles and that one job was it for them. Every casting director’s dream each pilot season is that some guy comes to town with that depth, so they’ve discovered someone who’ll go on to do more work after that pilot.”
Another actor approached Paladini with his two—very different—headshots and told us that he wants to play cop roles. “Well,” Paladini began, “someone may say, ‘He could be a cop,’ but it’s not what either picture is saying. This picture says, ‘I’m kind of like the assistant DA,’ but more stagey. This one says, ‘I’m a thug.’ Think about the message the picture is sending,” he advised. “Either embrace that niche or make it a broader picture.”
Is this a good class for actors?
Yes. If you want to really get to know the ins and outs of deal-making (I had no idea the extent to which casting directors must be aware of SAG rules, contract issues, and political strategies in dealing with various players), understand the mindset of the casting director during casting sessions, and even get some feedback on your own craft and marketing tools, you will benefit from such a class. For aspiring casting directors, it’s a no-brainer. This class should come before any attempt at interning in a casting office. Then, your rise through the ranks of intern, assistant, associate, and partner will come much more quickly than perhaps that of someone who doesn’t understand the importance of negotiating an actor’s head size on all posters promoting the film.
This observation was conducted on January 28, 2003, and it originally appeared in Casting Qs: A Collection of Casting Director Interviews by Bonnie Gillespie, available at Amazon.