This week’s blog is written by Nancy Chartier. Nancy is a working actor and a member of the Screen Actors Guild (SAG). She has been coaching actors since 1995. She loves and is passionate about acting, but her favorite thing is when her “stars” are working. She loves empowering actors to be brilliant and to trust your creative instincts and ultimately yourselves. Casting is an extremely important part of the filmmaking process, and it can either make or break a film. Nancy explains below its significance.
Filmmaking is definitely a collaborative art form, which is what makes it so much fun to me. But if there is one thing vital to the success of any film, I would say that is Casting.
97% of directing is good casting. You can take a mediocre script, and cast skilled actors with amazing chemistry and they will elevate the project immensely. Casting well, allows the Director to trust the talent to do the homework and come to set prepared with nuanced performance. This gives him/her the freedom to focus more on setting up the shot, lighting, and problem solving to achieve his/her vision and tell the story.
Director’s usually only give notes when the talent isn’t doing what they liked in the audition, so it’s important that the talent is bringing what they ‘promised’. They are so busy problem solving on the set that many directors don’t notice mistakes in performance and assume the actors are doing what they did in the audition. They may not see them until the editing phase, when it’s too late to do anything other than ‘fix it in post’ (shudder). Casting can help make sure they bring seasoned actors who bring layers to the role, or newer talent that is vetted through the audition process.
Chemistry is important! It’s there or it isn’t. You can cast immensely talented actors, but if the spark isn’t there, even though they are fully prepared and beyond talented, you cannot direct chemistry. We have all seen those films with name actors who have zero chemistry resulting in awkward love scenes, and failure for the audience to connect, etc. Actors are the emotional conduit for the audience, and if they don’t have a spark, or feel the connection, neither does your audience, and you have lost them.
Casting Directors can weed out future problems Directors may have on set. Through auditions and callbacks, C.D.’s can see if an actor is fully memorized or paraphrases, follows direction live and in the email, (since 99.9% of auditions are self-tapes) how creative and outside-of-the-box-thinking they are, and if they submit early or are waiting to the last minute, indicating procrastination which can mean they may be late to set. They can see who is capable of taking any direction, no mater how antithetical to the script or obscure. This lets the Director know that the Actor can execute any vision, and won’t be limited to the words on the page or their own interpretation.
I’ve seen productions try to cut corners and ‘save money’, by either not hiring a Casting Director, or asking someone to Cast who’s never done it before. Experience in Casting is invaluable, and can only be achieved through time, and learning from their own mistakes. There are so many ‘tells’ an Actor has that will indicate potential problems on set. A veteran Casting Director has ways of filtering these out, and saving time, money, and frustration on set to help ensure the final product is an artistic collaboration versus triage editing.
And finally, I can’t believe how long it has taken for Casting to be a category at the Oscars! YAYYY, Casting Directors!! Exciting times ahead.
Connect with me:
Nancy Chartier Actor/Acting Coach – www.nancychartierstudios.com
Instagram: @nancychartierstudios
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NancyChartierStudios
