Auditioning Death
As I mentioned in my blog entry from Monday, today we had our very first actor audition for the production 'A Good One'. Even though the number of applicants for that day fell down to one, we were more than happy to receive our actor Michael and enter into this part of pre-production, with which we have been extremely successful so far:
As I have not yet hold an professional audition, I felt that I needed to do a bit of research before in order to know what to think of, prepare for, and what actors might even expect from us. So I looked up a couple of resources and made the following findings, split up in preparation
Preparation :
1) Be as organised as possible.
2) Write casting calls (or casting notices) that clearly state what you want and need.
3) Also use social networks to get casting calls out there as well, try to invite and see as many actors as possible and try to allocate 15-30 min per actor.
4) Look for actors with experience and sort through resumés, headshots, etc. to make appropriate decisions.
5) Prepare the script and know what you want from your actors, but also be able to answer their questions. Ask them whether they have any questions regarding the script, the delivery, or an interpretation.
6) Use a quit, tranquil, and bright room that does not distract the actors. Create as much comfort in that room as feasible and possible as that often facilitates a better performance. Offer beverages in advance and dedicate a person to take care of arriving actors before their scheduled audition.
7) Bring a copy of your script that you can give to the actor and the reader and don't exceed three pages in total as this will become a lot for the actor and might water down the performance.
8) Ensure to prepare a production schedule and put down actor's availability times as this may sometimes make or break which actor you are going with.
9) Get someone to read lines and cues to the actor so that they can properly act on their parts.
10) Upon arrival, assess the actor and examine what they might need. Are they nervous and do need a bit of a chat to calm down or do they already have their head in the game and are ready to go, not ready to get distracted?
11) Be friendly, but professional at all times. You are not there to make friends.
12) Allow actors to use space or props if needed. Provide a large enough space to act their bit as this might cast a completely different and even favourable light on their performance.
13) Record the audition for later reference and recall. Ask them to say their name, phone number, name their agent and their agent's phone number (if appropriate) at the beginning of their tape to have it easily accessible.
14) Give bonus reads for another characters in case they fit their briefs better than the original one.
Tips:
Don’t intimidate the actor as it will greatly affect your work with them!
Cast the right actors for the right roles and do avoid casting people who look too similar (as this may lead to confusion of characters in the final film).
Never criticise actors! You are holding an audition, not a rehearsal!
But compliment one aspect of their acting after each take to motivate them for their next take and say something positive at the end of the audition.
Hold open casting sessions, that invite a mixture of various people if you need to get to know a lot of actors in the area - this is especially helpful in independent productions.
Never make false promises regarding roles or further communication if you know fully well you cannot keep them.
With that beast of a list, I felt much more prepared to help run an audition. While we certainly could not apply all the above mentioned points into our first audition (we modelled our production schedule around the actor's schedule instead of the other way round as this was the most decisive criterium in planning AND we did not give a bonus read as the actor really only fit that particular character in our script), we adapted what was sensible to the size of our production and the facilities we had at hand.
Thus, we booked the studio and a camera kit in order to film the audition and to watch it back later on. We took the equipment out, and I cleaned the studio and set everything up to ensure enough acting space and I attempted to create a bit of a comfort zone as well (as much as possible in an studio environment anyway).
Has bought beverages and brought a spare copy of my script along, while Chloe made sure to sign our actor in for audition at reception and to receive him in person. Since Has has also brought his personal DSLR, I opted to film handheld shots of that audition while Katie chose operating the AVC and the sound equipment in tandem with me.
Now we only needed to wait for our actor.
Straight from entering the room, I knew that we had an interesting and interested actor on hand, as he already came dressed up in his role, asking interested and profound questions about the message of the script, bringing his own annotated copy of it. He was absolutely ready and already within his own role.
So we immediately started with the audition, filming it to get a feeling of how this actor and his persona would play out on camera. Katie, who really helped us out here, filmed with a static wide shot with an AVC and listened into the sound, while I filmed in order to get a couple of handheld close up shots and cover both a wide shot as well as (medium) close ups of our actor's performance.
After only twenty minutes, the audition was over as we managed to get through all the three pages provided and even did a bit of the ending upon our actors request. From his performance, it was immediately clear to all of us that we have found our actor for Death. Chloe took his preferred dates and brought him back to reception, while we started packing together the equipment and clean out the studio.
He was so convincing in his act, thoughtful about every line he delivered, offered up various takes on his delivery, and brought his own interpretation into the role that was subtle and thus extremely believable. He achieved what I hoped my script would transport: To create a character of Death that was likeable, taking away the fear of death without taking away the tension you would naturally feel with an encounter of that kind.
I was happy that we were able to schedule for this audition and that we managed to get this actor on board. I am also thankful for having such a motivated and invested crew this time around, as I know that I can rely on every one of my crew members to do their part and to help to the best of their abilities.
I am really, really looking forward to that production and I will hopefully be able to upload the auditioning footage soon!
References:
Jones, C. (2013) How to run auditions for casting your film [online] http://www.chrisjonesblog.com/2013/06/how-to-run-auditions-for-casting-your-film.html [Accessed on 28 March 2018]
Lights Film School (n.d.) How to Audition Actors [online] https://www.lightsfilmschool.com/blog/how-to-audition-cast-actors [Accessed on 28 March 2018]
Renée, V. (2015) 10 Tips for Holding Better Auditions [online] https://nofilmschool.com/2015/10/10-tips-holding-better-auditions [Accessed on 28 March 2018]