5. Casting

When Mira first started in film, there were no casting directors in India, and she had to find actors through the grapevine. Only later in her career would she discover the value that a casting director can bring to the process, with their wide connections and access to talent. The best casting directors will share your own sensibility, and yet also bring to the table unexpected and creative choices—options that may end up transforming your own vision for a character or scene.

Sometimes the best talent for a role will be clear as day. When Mira saw an independent film with a riveting performance by Shefali Shah, she called the actress immediately about playing the role of Ria in Monsoon Wedding.

Other times, a role will call for non-traditional casting, and a search for new talent begins. The best way to ensure that your casting process will result in fruitful discoveries is to make sure actors feel comfortable and relaxed during their auditions. Actors who feel pressured and judged will be less willing to take risks, and thus less likely to reveal something exciting. Your goal, then, should be to help them breathe easy, by creating an affectionate and warm atmosphere where experimentation and play is welcome. Look for performances that bring something fresh and unexpected to the table, and then respond and encourage further exploration.

An important quality to look for in new talent is a lack of vanity. Mira looks to cast actors who are honest, unassuming, and pure in their performance. The spirit that someone radiates is just as important as their acting skill. For The Reluctant Fundamentalist, Mira spent a year searching for someone to play the film’s lead,

Changez—A worldly young man who would be equally at home in Lahore and New York’s Wall Street. She finally discovered Riz Ahmed, a relatively unknown stage and television actor in London. Many other candidates had the right look and the right voice, but only Riz was able to instill the role with the proper intelligence and worldlyness. Similarly, the main character of Queen of Katwe was a chess champion, and had to be played by someone whose expressions evoke in the viewer the feeling that the character is strategizing her next move on the chess board. Filming someone who is merely thinking required many takes and a transporting of emotional intelligence.

When working to identify and develop actors for your film, establishing trust is essential. Mira gained valuable practice in building trust as a documentary filmmaker, entering worlds as an outside observer and gradually earning her subjects’ confidence. This experience informs her fiction, especially when working with non-actors who haven’t yet learned the tricks of the trade. They often need a nurturing and feel safe enough to play the fool.

There is often a fascinating fusion that occurs when non-actors are paired with experienced actors. Non-actors are challenged to rise to professional standards, and professional actors are delighted and energized by the fresh, pure, and unprocessed performances of amateur talent. Children are the best examples of this, and a wonderful alchemy can often result from such mixed-ability casting.

Before casting for a non-actor to play an important role in your film, it is wise to test how well they cope with the pressures of production. When a camera, lights, crew, and other actors are added to the mix, can they still perform their lines well? Look for a casualness, comic timing, and lack of self-consciousness—even when surrounded by all the distractions of a busy set. When a film includes numerous roles for children, as was the case in Salaam Bombay!, Mira will hold several weeks of workshops with candidates. She conducts acting games and exercises in the early weeks, and then brings in the cameras. Participants learn about continuity, watch rehearsal footage of their performances, and strive for consistency while also avoiding posturing and artificiality. By the end of those intensive workshops, it will become clear who can rise to the challenge.

In some ways, finding and molding new talent can be easier for a first-time director than attracting big-name talent. Few things earn a professional actor’s trust more than being able to see concrete evidence that you know what you are doing. Having a successful first film under your belt can prove to actors that you will do right by them, and they can entrust their performance to you. But if this is your first time helming a production, chances are the big name actors you approach will say no. Don’t give up hope, though. As Mira herself found, the actors in your first film may be unknown—but you could be making them into stars.

DID YOU KNOW

Mira mentions there were few casting directors in India when her career first started, but she found her collaborators in Uma Da Cunha, Dinaz Stafford, and Dilip Shankar, who share her discerning enthusiasm for discovering non-actors who have the mettle to share the screen with legendary actors.

ASSIGNMENT

Part 1: Prepare your casting call

Review your screenplay, pull out the names of each and every character (as well as unnamed roles and extras), and create a cast list. Identify your main characters, and think about the bigname stars who you imagine playing those roles.

Who would be in your dream cast, if you had an unlimited budget and the influence of Spielberg?

Now, come back down to earth and translate the qualities of your dream cast into a description of the type of person you are looking for to inhabit each role. Brainstorm the personality traits, facial features, body type, mannerisms, and voice that you imagine for each character as they are written in the script. If it helps, skip forward to the lookbook activity in Chapter 12: Developing a Visual Palette, and gather photos from magazines and other sources of people who fit your mental image.

Next, identify the scene or moment from your script that best reveals each character’s essence. What actions or lines of dialogue are most crucial to identifying an actor who could embody that role? Note these scenes as potential excerpts to use during auditions.

Keep these notes handy for when you are ready to cast your film. When the time comes to post a casting call, write a short description of the key characteristics you are looking for in each role. (Try not to be too rigid in your specifications— leave wiggle room to be surprised by actors who stretch or challenge your expectations.) There are an overwhelming number of casting websites that you can use to post your audition opportunity, but below are four of the most reputable:

Actors access

 Actors Access is a casting website that allows actors and casting agents to upload and view headshots, resumes, and reels. It is free to create an account, with the ability to purchase additional perks.

Backstage

Backstage is a long-established and trusted resource for actors and casting agents. They publish a weekly magazine and maintain a casting platform that includes a calendar of auditions, resources for industry insiders, and access to over thousands of roles being cast for projects across the United States.

Casting frontier

One of the better free casting websites, Casting

Frontier is a digital platform that permits casting agents to upload audition materials and casting calls, and enables actors to upload a headshot and resume. You can upgrade to a paid membership plan for additional perks such as voice and video reels.

mandy.com

Known widely both inside and outside the industry,

Mandy.com is a useful resource for casting. The site is entirely free, and facilitates the posting of job opportunities not only for performance talent, but for technical and production services as well. There is also a community forum where users can ask questions and share advice.

 

Part 2: Conduct your auditions

 

As you set up your space on audition day, think about ways to create a comfortable environment for your aspiring cast hopefuls. Make sure you have clear signage and that you have one or two staff members checking in actors, who are able to answer questions and give clear directions to the bathroom. Because auditions often run behind schedule, and actors tend to arrive at least 15 minutes before their scheduled time, provide amenities in the waiting room such as magazines, wi-fi access, bottled water, and snacks. Finally, designate one person on your team to guide actors from the waiting room to the audition space—never make them find their own way!

Make the audition room a safe, friendly, and inviting space. The guide who leads the actor into the room can also hand out the actor’s headshot and resume and make the introductions. The goal is to offload any nerve-wracking procedural steps so the actors don’t need to worry about anything except his performance.

Start with some small talk and light questioning about their resume. For instance, inquire about their experience on a previous film, or an interesting skill or hobby that they listed. You don’t need to dedicate much more than one or two minutes to this type of conversation; the aim is simply to get a feel for the actor’s personality and to reassure them that you’re human too. Lastly, ask whether they have any questions before they begin. This will give them the opportunity to resolve any confusion or hesitations they have about how to play the part, and will provide you with the chance to encourage them to make bold choices.

As you conduct each audition, look for the following qualities to an actor’s performance:

Believable

Actors should create a convincing impression of a character actually going through the imagined scenario in their scene. Their performance should feel authentic.

Vulnerable

Characters are most interesting when they are being emotionally impacted by an experience, perhaps even at risk of failing or falling short of their goals. There should be a feeling to the performance that something real is at stake.

Collaborative

Look for clues that this person will be enjoyable to work with. Are they friendly, relaxed, and willing to experiment? Do they respond well to feedback, with positivity rather than frustration? Or do they complain and resist? Choose performers to work with who are willing to cooperate and join your team.

Authentic

Truth is often far more powerful and stronger than fiction, even in the casting process. Mira’s training in the theater and working in the real streets compels her to cast people of similar background to her characters. She believes that the “map of life” is written on the faces of street children, so she vowed not to cast an upper class educated child to play a character who has been exposed to the brutality of the streets. After you feel you have fully explored possibilities with an actor, don’t just leave them hanging. Share clear expectations about next steps: how to check out of the audition; how callbacks will work; when a final decision will be made; and how those who auditioned will be notified. Give them an opportunity to ask any final questions, and then thank them sincerely for their time and their effort.

LEARN MORE

If the budget for your first film can’t support a casting director, it’s time to learn the tricks of the trade yourself. Casting Revealed: A Guide for Film Directors, 2nd Edition, by Hester Schell (Routledge, 2016) is an insider manual on the art of casting. Learn industry standards for how to run auditions, draw up contracts, and make offers, and hear from casting directors about what to look for in a performance. Check out the companion website for even more resources to build your casting skill sets.

Mira’s book Salaam Bombay! (Penguin Books, 1989) is a diary of how the award-winning film was made and cast. It serves as a helpful coaching manual for aspiring actors, as well as a behind-the-curtain peek at the skills, art, and craft of casting.