Directors Tell the Story

by Bethany Rooney

  For smaller roles, especially under 5s (roles with five lines or fewer), you may receive a DVD of a casting session that you did not attend or a link to a casting website where the taped auditions are uploaded. This type of review is done to avoid wasting your time during prep. (But if you are not overloaded in prep, you should express your preference for holding a casting session, during which you can give adjustments if needed. A personal session is always better than a recorded one for you to pick exactly the right actor for the part.) You should look at the DVD as soon as time allows and inform the casting director of your choices. Also tell her if you have a second or even third choice based on what you’ve seen. If you don’t have a strong feeling and all the actors who read were equally qualified for the job, remember that the casting director is part of your team and defer to her opinion about who should be cast. There may be an extenuating circumstance that might influence whom she suggests casting in a role. Casting directors are people who have friends or may want to help out an actor who is struggling to earn the last few hundred dollars that qualify the actor for health insurance for his family.

  If a casting director asks you to see an actor again whom you’ve already seen (or don’t particularly visualize in the role), by all means, do so. The casting director is probably more familiar with that actor’s work, just because it’s her job to know the talent pool. Acting is hard. It takes talent, craft, intelligence, and vulnerability. The skill set it takes to audition is not necessarily the same skill set it takes to do the job.

  Trust that your casting director understands the actors’ craft as well as the business side of her job. If the casting director sees potential in an actor whom you didn’t think performed well in the casting session, be open to looking at that actor with the additional information the casting director has to offer. That actor may be the perfect person for the role and it may be something as simple as the actor was having a bad day or something as big as that actor is out of rehab and is trying to resurrect his career and was just nervous. It has happened. We all know those stories.

  Acting is hard. It takes talent, craft, intelligence, and vulnerability. The skill set it takes to audition is not necessarily the same skill set it takes to do the job.

  FIGHTING FOR YOUR CASTING CHOICES

  You may not like an actor whom the executive producer or the network really wants in a role. How do you deal with this issue, which may be the first of many political situations that you will have to navigate? We talk more about this is in Section 4 of this book. If you think you can sway their thinking at all, we suggest that you use your position as director to openly discuss their idea—not because it is a bad choice, but because you have a better one. Do it carefully. Compliment the other’s idea, but be more enthusiastic about somebody else on the list. For example, you may reference a particular story point or moment because of your familiarity with the script and then suggest how you see another actor (or type of actor, usually referring to age or ethnicity), making that moment work better. Remember that disagreement probably has nothing to do with whether their choice of actor is talented. It’s about appropriateness and you telling the story. Sometimes your passion may sell it; sometimes not. If you can enlist the help of the showrunner and have a united front, you might say, “We just don’t see the audience believing him/her doing this.” Sometimes time and money will be your friend, when the casting department isn’t able to make a deal and agree on dates or terms with someone you don’t want in the role.

  LEARNING BY WATCHING

  If you don’t have much experience in casting, there are a couple things that you can do. First, try to sit in on a casting session for something you are not directing. If you get this opportunity, it is important to not share your opinion unless asked. Just be a fly on the wall. You will learn a lot by just watching. What you can do, though, is ask whether you can read the script. Then you will have the benefit of knowing the story and exploring how you would have cast it. But don’t be offended if you are not allowed to see the script because many shows guard the written word or sharing information about upcoming storylines like a Brinks truck full of cash … and to a network, their product is that valuable. On The Sopranos, even recurring characters did not get the whole script—only the pages for the scenes they were in. If you don’t read the script, you can often piece together information about the story from the different scenes you see in the audition, especially if a lot of characters are being cast.

  LEARNING BY FANTASY CASTING

  The second thing you can do to practice casting for a fantasy project. We’re not talking about fantasy as a genre, just any project that isn’t really going to happen. Here’s an exercise you can do over and over again.

  Casting a Novel

  Use any novel that you have recently read. Even better, read a novel that you know is going to be made into a movie but hasn’t been cast yet. Cast the main characters by listing an actor’s name next to the character’s name. Because this is a fantasy project, you can use actors who are alive or dead. You can even cast actors at any age in their career. For example, cast Robert Redford from Three Days of the Condor or Dakota Fanning from Steven Spielberg’s sci-fi masterpiece Taken. You can do this exercise with one or two results in mind: familiarity or suitability. If familiarity is your goal, you will get practice casting and learn the names of actors whom you haven’t known before. If suitability is your goal, you will get the experience of selecting the perfect talent to tell the story that so far you’ve only read on paper. Either are great skills to practice and important to your development as a director.

  TRAPS TO AVOID

  One thing we want to caution about casting: don’t fall into the trap of going for a “look,” rather than casting a better actor. In our experience, it is always safer to cast a better actor in a role than someone who simply looks right for the part.

  There are a couple reasons for this. First, with a good actor, you always have credibility: your audience will believe him in the role because that is what good acting is all about—“acting as if.” If your actor becomes the character and breathes life into the role he is playing, the audience will accept him, too. The added benefit is that you have chance to break a stereotype in the process. For example, not all bullies are big; not all dumb girls are blond. Bethany directed an episode of The Cleaner in which the main guest star part was a young man, in the process of becoming a woman, who had a drug addiction and worked as a cheap prostitute. The producers wanted a smaller-boned actor so that the transgender aspect would be more believable. The best actor for the part, however, was over six feet tall and well-muscled. But Bethany felt that he was the only actor who auditioned that could bring the severe internal conflicts of the character to life. So she fought for Reiley McClendon and assured the producers that she’d make it work. While casting the extras who were portraying prostitutes on the street corner in physical proximity to Reiley, she cast women who were exceptionally tall and added to that height by putting them in four-inch heels. So the tall actor whose character was masquerading as a woman did not look out of place. And he was brilliant.

  In our experience, it is always safer to cast a better actor in a role than someone who simply looks right for the part.

  You might also enter a casting session with no preconceived ideas about a role and find an actor who brings that character to life for you. The prolific Steven Bochco, who created NYPD Blue, LA Law, and Hill Street Blues, said “Casting is sort of like looking at paintings. You don’t know what you’ll like, but you recognize it when you see it.”3 Bethany was casting a TV movie years ago, looking for the antagonist in a women’s prison story called Locked Up: A Mother’s Rage. Multiple actresses had read for the part over many days, and no one seemed right, until a young and unknown Angela Bassett (What’s Love Got to Do With It, How Stella Got Her Groove Back, Green Lantern) came in and just nailed it. As the door closed behind Angela, Bethany jumped up and said, “That’s it! She’s it! Now I can make thi
s movie!”

  THE MAGIC OF CASTING

  There is so much about casting that is intuitive: that feeling in the gut, the hairs that stand up on your arms, the prickle on the back of your neck. You know it when you see it. The actor makes you believe that he inhabits the part: that he is the character.

  But sometimes there is an actor who is close to being perfect in the audition. Where your skill comes into play is knowing if you can take the raw material that the actor presents and form it into the character you’re looking for. Can you speak the simple, perfect words that provide the key to making a good actor great? You’ll find out more about how to do that in Chapter 10. But never forget where the magic starts, as we’ve discussed in these first three chapters. As director Peter Weir (Dead Poets Society, Master and Commander) said, “If you’ve cast the picture right and you don’t have script problems—those are the two essentials—then on the day you have this little piece of life in the story you’re telling and anything can happen.”4

  There is a wonderful secondary benefit to casting. You find out who the best actor is for the part, but you also find out more about the story by watching gifted actors bring their interpretations of the role to the casting session. The actors’ readings help the director discover the strengths and weaknesses of material (after you’ve listened to it twenty times, you can usually put your finger on the problem) and clarify hazy notions of intention and obstacle. Plus, it’s fun. It’s a place to play, to experiment, to hone in on your interpretation of the script as you give adjustments to actors. You see what works and what doesn’t. It’s a crucial part of prep, and an amazing gift to the director!

  There is so much about casting that is intuitive: that feeling in the gut, the hairs that stand up on your arms, the prickle on the back of your neck. You know it when you see it. The actor makes you believe that he inhabits the part: that he is the character.

  Insider Info

  How Do You Interact with the Director?

  Television is the writer/producer’s medium when it comes to casting. Depending on the project and the director, I find most of the input I receive is from the showrunner (producer/writer of the show) rather than the director, whether I’m casting a half-hour show, one-hour show, or a pilot. The director is always invited to the casting sessions, but it is usually at the producer’s availability. I have had directors call or email with ideas for casting, which I will incorporate into a discussion with the showrunner or into the casting session.

  What Do You Wish Directors Knew About Casting?

  When a director is at a casting session, I find that the more prepared they are with the script, the more their voice is heard as far as their ideas for the casting. It is my job as the casting director to bring in actors that fit the role and to think outside the box of a casting choice that the writer may not have thought of. The more knowledge the director has of the script, the more understanding he or she has as to where the character should go. The producer will ask your opinion. Usually, you are of like minds, but if you’re not, you need to be prepared to explain why you think it should go one way and be prepared if they choose to go another.

  What Advice Would You Give a Director Who is Just Starting Out?

  I have noticed that there are usually two kinds of directors. One kind is the director that is prepared with the shots, editing, and making the episode look great—all technique. The other kind is the director that does all of the first kind, but also knows how to speak to the actor about what the scene may need from his or her character. When a director knows how to speak to the actor, it makes all the difference in the world to the project. Directors should take acting classes, directing classes with actors—anything that will help them understand how to help an actor get what you are looking for within a scene and the best words to help them get there.

  Suzanne Goddard-Smythe

  Casting Director

  Warehouse 13, The Game

  Vocabulary

  actor’s director

  adjustment

  American Federation of Television and Radio

  Artists (AFTRA)

  backstory

  billing

  casting director

  costar

  crossover casting

  Directors Guild of America (DGA)

  make a deal

  offer-only

  pilot

  preread

  producer session

  quote

  recur

  Screen Actors Guild

  (SAG)

  shared card

  single card credit

  stunt casting

  top of show

  TVQ

  under 5s

  1. Roberts, Jerry, “John Frankenheimer and the Playing of Reindeer Games,” DGA Monthly, Vol. 24, March 2000. Available at: http://www.dga.org/news/v24_6/john_frankenheimer.php3.

  2. “The Top Ten Television Stunt Casting Stints, Celebuzz, July 26, 2008. Available at: http://www.celebuzz.com/top-10-television-stunt-casting-s32421/.

  3. Steven Bochco Quotes, Brainy Quotes, retrieved May 1, 2011, from http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/s/steven_bochco.html.

  4. Rafferty, Terrence, “Uncommon Man,” DGA Quarterly, Summer 2010, pp. 30–37.

  Chapter 4

  Production Design

  Back when most productions were shot on film, we knew that a camera recorded what was transpiring in front of it at a rate of 24 frames per second. And we could imagine that each of those frames was a literal picture: a moment in time that was frozen in a little box. And everything in that box—except the actors—was an element of the production design. Although now most “films” are shot digitally (and are thus are sadly lacking in frames), the concept remains the same. Everything within the “frame” that is not human is part of the production design.

  The production design helps tell the story. The color of the walls, the style of the furniture, the specificity of the props, the cut of the costumes—each choice helps the director clearly communicate the story that she is trying to tell. Although there are many, many people to assist the director in making those choices, ultimately it is the director’s responsibility alone. Just as President Harry Truman said, “The buck stops here,” so it does with the director, who is the president of the production. Therefore, in order to be best prepared to make such major (and minor) decisions, it is helpful to have some gained some background in art history, to have traveled and navigated different cultures, and to have read widely. Having done so gives the director a platform of learning that inspires self-confidence and perspective. It’s simplistic but true: if you’ve walked the streets of Barcelona (or Beijing, or Boston, or wherever your story takes place), you’ll have a different point of view than someone who has merely read about it. The job of the director is to have a point of view—a creative vision that pulls every department together to create a cohesive story. So the director ideally comes to the project with both a varied personal background and specific research regarding the script.

  The job of the director is to have a point of view—a creative vision that pulls every department together to create a cohesive story.

  COLLABORATING CREATIVELY WITH DEPARTMENT HEADS

  If the project is an episode of a television show, all the department heads (leaders of each division) will have already been hired and will remain consistent through the season of production. However, if you are making a movie (feature or TV) or pilot, it is the job of the director (with the producer) to interview and hire the department heads, who will supervise their particular area of expertise and help the director bring a script to life. The critical factors in hiring people are finding someone who:

  Shares the director’s sensibilities

  Brings inspiration and enthusiasm, contributing new and original ideas

  Can communicate those new ideas clearly

  Knows they are part of a team, not an independent voice

  Can work within the budget allowed


  The production designer is a particularly eminent hire because that person supervises several departments and is a pivotal link between the ideas in the director’s head and their realization on film, tape, or digital recording.

  Making a film is a very creative and therefore emotional experience. People give: they give their ideas, their loyalty, their time, and their effort. They do so in the interest of making the best project. And there will be differences of opinion that may lead to interpersonal disasters. It is crucial for the director and producer to find department heads who “fit”: who can work together with this staff and crew for an extended period of time in an environment, which—due to budget and deadline pressures—can be stressful.

  The production designer is a particularly eminent hire because that person supervises several departments and is a pivotal link between the ideas in the director’s head and their realization on film, tape, or digital recording.

  COMMUNICATING WELL IN CONCEPT MEETING

  Once everyone has been hired, there is a concept meeting. All of the department heads—along with the producer, the writer, and the director—gather to discuss the script and receive preliminary information from the director about the approach that will be taken. Let’s say that you are directing a family drama that takes place in London during the Blitz in 1940. At that first concept meeting, your staff and crew will want answers—direction—from you. What does the set look like? How much money and status does the family have? Is the environment one of positive energy or negative? What kind of transportation do they use? How do they dress? What set pieces or props are needed to help tell the story? How do you want the actors to look in costume, makeup, and hair? What is the overall color palette? In order to provide some answers, the director will have done some research.