Casting Process Guide
This resource was created by Sofia Vargas to assist with the Casting Process. If you are a Casting Director in search of a more in depth dive, please see her full document on the process.
Casting Calls
An engaging digital casting call flyer does a lot when it comes a lot to engaging interest from local actors. You can refer to the casting call examples on the Cast It! Site to get an idea of what some of them generally look like.
The casting call usually has the following information:
- Production Company (The School)
- Title of Film
- Character Names
- Age Range of Character
- Pronouns of Character
- Character Descriptions
- Interest Deadline
- Filming Dates
- Location of Filming
- Where to Contact if Interested (Casting Email)
- If it’s a Union or Non Union set
- If it's a Paid or Unpaid Set
Once the casting call is created you can use Cast It!, Facebook and Instagram to post and share it around!
Social Media Captions
Social media is a great resource for gathering interest, specifically Facebook groups. A lot of Facebook groups will request specific information in the caption when posting your casting call so make sure to read the group requirements so you can accommodate accordingly.
Please include the above information when making your captions!
Film Fair
UNCSA’s Film Fair is a great and super fun resource when it comes to gathering interest from people at our school.
There is usually a Film Fair in the fall for 3rd Year Films, and one in the Spring for 2nd Year Films. This event begins with screening the film’s sizzle reels then transitioning to a Key Crew Meet and Greet. It is a wonderful way to promote your project to Drama students, so keep in mind this will be their first impression!
Emails
Create a casting gmail that you and your casting team all have access to. Usually the email is the title of the film + casting @gmail.com for example: fableoffeycasting@gmail.com.
The password can be anything you want it to be. Have fun with it! Just make sure everyone on the casting team has access to it so they can log in if needed.
The Casting Director and/or Casting Assistant are in charge of the emails. Therefore they are the main people who reply to, send and organize emails on this account. The Director, Producer, and Writer, shouldn’t reply to emails unless there is clear and specific communication to do so.
You can use email templates (included in the full guide) when sending and replying to emails with actors. It helps with the process and speed of replying to general interest and audition emails.
There will definitely be replies that will require more specific responses so always make sure to read the emails to make sure the template emails are appropriate for the email type.
If you, as the Director, Writer, Producer, etc, have access to the email and open an email that has not been replied to yet by the Casting Director or Casting Assistant, please mark it as unread so it doesn’t get lost with the emails that have already been seen and replied to.