The popular image of auditions today is defined by the cruelty and embarrassment of reality television. “People expect Nicole Scherzinger to say, ‘You’ve made it to the judges’ houses!’ and Rylan to cry,” says freelance casting director Jatinder Chera, raising a skeptical eyebrow. In the media, heartless rejection and impossible dreams seem to be the currency of auditions. “But there’s a lot more to it than people really know.”
This is why casting directors get a bad rap. They are seen as gatekeepers, rejects and ghosts. When Bryony Jarvis-Taylor, vice head of casting at the National Theatre, tells someone new about her job, they are often asked if it is fun to be so bad. “This couldn’t be further from what I am trying to do!”
Their job is to find the best people for a show. “If a show was a painting,” Chera says, “we would do the first draft.” He recently optioned James Fritz’s kaleidoscopic period drama The Flea at the Yard in London and Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’s The Comeuppance at the Almeida. Finding the right person for a role is an art, not a science; it’s a task that combines gut, head and heart. “It’s that unexpected moment when there’s something so interesting and compelling about their onstage qualities,” Chera says. The great joy of the job, Jarvis-Taylor says, is that “very rarely is someone wrong for a role.” He likens it to parallel universes: “It’s a different version of a character in a different version of the play.”
When a theater casting director first reads a script, they compile an initial list of actors’ names for each role. And they get similar lists from the director, producer, and sometimes the writer, and those are added to the main list. The casting summary, which describes the role and its requirements, is then listed in Spotlight. Chera says it’s “like LinkedIn for actors,” a database where agents can see what roles are auditioning and submit their actors. “A casting director might also put out an open call,” he explains, which “opens up the pool to untrained actors or unrepresented actors who might miss out through more traditional means.” In the casting room, the play’s director will perform for the casting director and perhaps the writer.
Casting is increasingly recognised as an important creative art form in its own right. The Black British Theatre Awards were one of the first to recognise the role with an award, and it has also been announced as a new category for the Oscars. “It’s a fantastic step for us as casting directors,” says Heather Basten, who was behind the casting of Tyrell Williams’ brilliant football drama Red Pitch and runs her own casting agency.
So how does Basten know when he’s found the right person? “There are a lot of moving parts before we get to that gut-wrenching moment,” he warns. “We draw on years of knowledge and experience: people we’ve met, actors on our radar, established names and talent we’re trying to break into the industry.” He thinks back to the moments when things just click. “When you see the real deal,” he shrugs, “you know that’s the person. Then it’s our job to create a strong pitch for that person”—usually to the director or producer, who has the final say.
For Red Pitch, a show about loyalty and brotherhood, getting the three leads to gel was critical. Basten held a series of workshops, mixing and matching potential actors until the perfect trio was found. “We’ve got three wonderful actors who are now very close,” says Basten, who cast Kedar Williams-Stirling, Emeka Sesay and Francis Lovehall. “I think you can feel the chemistry between them is real.”
When it comes to casting, the decision-making process can be more in the hands of the director or producer. While some stars come to shows with prior commitments, that’s not the case in the new adaptation of Elton John’s musical The Devil Wears Prada. Vanessa Williams will play the lead role as Miranda Priestly. “We all had long lists of Mirandas,” says Jill Green, the prolific casting director behind musicals such as The Lion King, Kinky Boots and Jersey Boys, “but then Jerry called.” The show’s Tony-winning director, Jerry Mitchell, spoke to Williams, who was interested. “It was so exciting!” So the lists were scrapped, and the secret had to be kept under wraps for months. “I didn’t even tell my husband,” Green says. “We have so many secrets, I’m so nervous to step into this.”
As Jarvis-Taylor explains, when you have a core section like that – or a “tent pole” – it can often set a rough rule for the rest of the show. The casting of Joseph Fiennes as Gareth Southgate in James Graham’s Dear England set a precedent for a certain physical similarity for that show’s actors. “Suddenly I had to worry about height in a way I never had before,” he says, “because everyone knows what the England team looks like, and Harry Maguire has to be the tallest person in that scene.”
Street casting for stage plays is rare, but Jarvis-Taylor recalls in Dear England, “I was walking around thinking: You Does he look like Raheem Sterling?” Basten, who has worked in television and theatre, is more accustomed to finding outsiders in unlikely places for a role. “I scouted at boxing clubs, community centres and more.”
The path to becoming a casting director is not clearly marked. Chera, who started out as an actor, had grown tired of the two-dimensional stereotypes he was cast in. “I was lucky to get auditions,” he says, “but at some point I realized I was auditioning for the same roles over and over again.” He knew his brand: he was the funny guy. But he realized that his race was perceived as his defining characteristic, which defined how he was seen in auditions. “At that point, it was trendy to be cast as a terrorist,” he says dryly. “How do you get that breakout role if, as a community of minority actors, we’re constantly being defined by those roles?”
Chera switched sides of the audition room table and went into casting. Now she’s eager to find new or unheard voices. “Casting should never be defined by stereotypes or preconceived notions of certain communities,” she says. “There will always be casting that feels safe and casting that feels radical. I’m interested in the latter.”
All the casting directors I spoke to said diversity is now at the forefront of their minds. But all four agreed that change isn’t happening fast enough. “I go to auditions or workshops quite often and I see a huge lack of diversity across all the teams working on the shows,” Green says. “People are trying to change things, but it needs to happen faster.”
But there is gradual progress to be celebrated. Green speaks with great pleasure of winning the WhatsOnStage award for best casting direction for The Little Big Things, which he believes is the first major musical to feature a lead actor in a wheelchair. “It was exciting to discover this incredible amount of untapped talent for musicals,” he says. “It was only possible because we had an accessible theatre [@sohoplace]”because our producer Michael Harrison kept saying ‘yes’ and Nickie Miles-Wildin, who uses a wheelchair, came on as dramaturg and assistant director. Having lived experience as part of the creative team is really important to telling a story authentically.”
But as well as making dreams come true, casting directors inevitably disappoint many actors. “We put out the casting brief for War Horse yesterday,” Green says. The hit play is set to return to British stages soon – “and we had 4,500 applications in 24 hours.” Her team make sure to let people know as early as possible if they’ve got a part, and those who audition are rarely completely cut out, with every good actor being placed on a colour-coded list somewhere. “There are 100 portraits of you living in your head all the time,” Chera says. But your head is constantly being refreshed with new talent – and Chera is always pleasantly surprised when she hears older casting directors talking about finding people on TikTok.
“It’s never easy to say no,” adds Green, who has been in the business for nearly three decades. “I’ve never understood that old-fashioned, tough way of treating people. I know it still happens because players tell me, but creating a good energy is the way to get the best out of everybody.”
Courtesy also works the other way. “There’s a lot of competition now, so you want to work with good people, both on and off stage,” he says. “If you find that someone’s hard to get in the room with, then …” he raises his hands to a name thrown out from a color-coded list. “Life’s too short!”