Maniac Casting Director Avy Kaufman on Matching Parts and Players
Avy Kaufman segued from casting print ads to film and television 30 years ago, and based on the success and scope of her work since then; casting director is the role she was born to play. Her 256 credits, according to imdb.com, include a range of genres produced by big studios and indie filmmakers alike. ...
Emmy-nominated Casting Director on Finding the Kids of Stranger Things
Supernatural thriller Stranger Things co-creators Matt and Ross Duffer not only made the inspired choice to bring Winona Ryder out of semi-retirement to star as the show’s unhinged mother-in-crisis; they also assembled primetime’s most endearing ensemble of twelve-year olds to portray four adorable boys and one mesmerizing mystery girl. Emmy-nominated casting director Carmen Cuba, teamed ...
Oscar Watch: Picking Three Actors for One Role in Moonlight
Yesi Ramirez knew she wanted to pick the actors for Moonlight as soon as she read the script — twice. "The first time I read the script I cried," she says. "The second time, I cried again." The Los Angeles-based casting director had never worked with Moonlight writer-director Barry Jenkins before, but she liked what ...
Talking to Casting Director Fiona Weir About Brooklyn, Room & More
It remains a baffling omission that casting directors don't have their own Academy Award category. There is hardly a more important aspect of pre-production, and few decisions can make or break a film like those charged to the casting director. From Selma's Aisha Coley to the legendary Bonnie Timmerman (The Karate Kid, Bull Durham, Black Hawk ...
The Kids are All Right: Casting Director Ronna Kress on Paper Towns
Casting director Ronna Kress has worked on everything from The Great Gatsby, to Mad Max: Fury Road and Terminator Genisys. Kress talks to The Credits about casting British supermodel Cara Delevingne in her breakout role as Margot in Paper Towns, which is based on the book of the same name by bestselling teen author John ...
Making History: Selma Casting Director Aisha Coley
By now we all know that actor David Oyelowo didn’t get nominated for his utterly captivating performance as Martin Luther King Jr. in Ava DuVernay’s Selma. Nor did DuVernay get the nod for director. The film, however, was nominated for Best Picture, and there’s zero doubt that Oyelowo and DuVernay could and likely should have ...
Legendary Casting Director Bonnie Timmerman On Blackhat & More
To say that Casting Director Bonnie Timmermann’s influence on the movie business over the last 40 years has been enormous is no understatement. George Clooney, Alec Baldwin, Ben Stiller, Sandra Bullock, Reese Witherspoon, Diane Lane, Jennifer Connelly, Jessica Alba, Jim Carrey, and Halle Berry are just a few of the now superstar actors discovered by ...
Looking Back on Some of our Favorite Stories of 2013
When we launched The Credits a little more than a year ago, we aimed to shed a light on the many talented filmmakers who often don’t get much press for their work. While we’ve occasionally spoken to folks who need no introduction (John Waters, for example), most of the filmmakers we’ve focused on have a ...
Breaking Down Rom-Com Master Richard Curtis’s About Time
Richard Curtis wrote three of the most beloved romantic comedies of the mid 90s and early 2000s—in a remarkable string, he penned Four Weddings and a Funeral, Notting Hill, and Bridget Jones Diary (which he co-wrote with Helen Fielding and Andrew Davies). His directorial debut in 2003, Love Actually, which he also wrote, was an international ...
HBO’s Casting By Shines a Light on Casting Legend Marion Dougherty
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences recently announced the creation of a new casting director’s branch, finally elevating the women and men who provide films with that somewhat vital ingredient—the cast—to full membership. This comes after years of lobbying on the part of filmmakers and actors themselves to give casting directors their due. ...
Where to Watch: New Site Offers Films & Shows, Legally & Seamlessly
Since our launch last September, The Credits has interviewed a diverse group of filmmakers, working our way through all the different jobs one could have in pre-production, on a film set, and in post. Directors, actors, cinematographers, screenwriters, art directors, costume designers, composers, editors, visual effects supervisors, casting directors, music supervisors, stunt performers and more have ...
The Greatest Gatsby: Before Leo,There was Redford
When Paramount purchased the film rights to F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel for $350,000 (more than fifty times what the author earned for the book in his lifetime), studio head Robert Evans had no way of knowing just how different the 1974 film would look from his original vision. For a story that’s all about dwelling ...
The Queen of Casting: Meet Emmy Award Winning Casting Director & Baltimore Legend Pat Moran
The plight of the casting director is well known to people who follow the industry—they are crucial, they are highly skilled, and they are almost comically overlooked when it comes to having their contributions to filmmaking recognized (the TV world is, however, more egalitarian—they are honored at the Emmys). The gap between their worth to ...
