I am happy to say that the video auditions were a success. It worked out perfectly and I highly recommend this approach to other indie filmmakers. There were definitely more pros than cons with this approach. The only con, for me, was all the emails I had to respond to. On most days I would spend about two hours a day on emails. I would respond to all the email that came in over night, when I woke up in the morning and the emails that I received during that day, I would spend another hour responding to later that night. I would get up in the morning and immediately begin to respond to emails, before I got ready for work, which usually took about an hour. And then at night, after I got everything situated in my home life, i.e. made dinner for my daughter, went over homework and got her ready for bed, I would do about an hour of emails before I retired for the night. I would send out some emails during the day, if they only required a short, 2-3 line reply, but most I responded to at night. And I did that every day and night.
But there were so many pros to this process. Because I had to pay for the audition rental space out of my own pocket, I wanted to make sure i was getting my money’s worth. I paid and reserved the rental space for 5 hours.
For the audition I paired up most of the actors. They were made aware of this beforehand. So, I planned to pair someone that was reading for the role of Alexandria with someone who was reading for the role of Clarissa. And it was an awesome experience. The characters that were invited to the second round of auditions were very talented actors and this allowed me to sit back and observe what they could really do with the character in an actually scene from the film. And I was blown away by a few of them. It was truly amazing to see my words brought to life, by such talented actors.
So I recommend this method of casting to small independent films. It allows you to really reach out to a lot of talented people in your area and gives you the opportunity to meet actors that can really help bring your words and vision to life.
These are the steps I took when casting my film. Feel free to tweak them:
1) Make a list of your characters and determine if they have any distinct features that the actor must have to portray them i.e. ethnicity, height, age range, body type, etc.
2) Make sure you have wifi in your home, so that you will be able to hold the actually auditions. I gave the auditions the option of using FaceTime or Skype.
3) Post your casting call notice on different Facebook casting groups that are located in your area or that are at least within a reasonable driving distance. Specify that the actors need to live within a certain distance for casting purposes. This will cut down on the number of emails you will receive from actors who live outside of your casting area. It will decrease the number, but probably won’t eliminate it completely, because some people are so excited about wanting to be a part of your project that they won’t fully read your post. Even though I did specify that the actors needed to live in the Chicagoland area, I still received emails from actors in Florida, Georgia, New Jersey and Kentucky. I even received a post from a gentleman who lived in Spain and another in South America.
4) You can also post on casting websites. I only posted on websites that allowed be to post for free. In the posts, I included the basic information for the film. I gave the title, the longline and the character names and short description. I put that anyone interest should contact me via email. And I also included that they need to live in the Chicagoland area, for filming purposes.
5) Determine what days and times you want to set aside for your auditions. For instance, I held my auditions on March 14-15, March 21-22, April 4-5 and April 11-12 12pm-5pm. I figured each audition would take no more than about 15 minutes, so that’s how I scheduled them.
6) When I got an email from an actor, if they hadn’t included their headshot and resume I would request them. If they had included them, I would copy and paste an email I had drafted, which told them more about me and the film. I would also inform them that the film was not yet funded, but that I would be creating a kickstarter campaign to raise the money for the film. I also told them about the different characters that fit their description and also characters that didn’t have any particular physical requirements. At the end of the email, I told them that if they were still interested to just email me and we could schedule a time to do the audition. At this stage, some people wouldn’t respond back. I’m not sure if it was because the film wasn’t yet funded or because the movie seemed to dark. The title of the film is a little misleading, but that’s one of the things I like about it.
7) Upon receiving the actor’s next email, I would schedule them. I usually asked what day they preferred and then i would schedule a time for them on that day.
8) I would send them the sides for one of the characters and ask them to also prepare a monologue.
And that was basically it. When that date rolled around, we did the auditions. And on April 13, I sent the invitation to the actors who I wanted to see in the second round of auditions.
If you are casting a film in the future, do you think you will use video auditions to cast your film?
Once We Leave the Garden 