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Casting call for black cats, Los Angeles, 1961. The studio was seeking cats for the Roger Corman movie Tales of Terror.

In the performing arts, casting (or casting call) is a vital pre-production process for selecting a cast (a meaning of the word recorded since 1631) of actors, dancers, singers, models and other talent for a live or recorded performance.

[edit] Casting process

It sometimes involves a series of auditions before a casting panel, composed of individuals such as the producer, director and/or choreographer. In the early stages of the process, candidate performers often may present prepared audition pieces such as monologues or songs. Later stages may involve groups of candidates attempting material from the work under consideration in various combinations; the casting panel considers both the talent of the individual actors and the chemistry of their combination.

Depending on the prestige of the role, casting calls may go out to the public at large (typical for community theatre), to professional and semi-professional local actors (for supporting roles in theatre and film) or to specifically selected actors (for leading roles, especially in films).

• In the production of film and television, a similar process is followed. However, especially for major productions, the process of selecting candidates for sometimes hundreds of parts and possibly thousands of extras may often require specialized staff; while the last word remains with the people in artistic and production charge, a Casting director (and/or Casting Assistant, Casting Associate) may be in charge of most of the daily work involved in this recruiting process during pre-production; in addition the "CD" may also remain as liaison between director, actors and their agents once the parts have been cast. Some of them build an impressive career, e.g. working on numerous ambitious Hollywood productions, such as Mary Jo Slater, Mary Selway, Lynn Stalmaster, Tammara Billik, Mindy Marin, Marci Liroff, and Vinnie Potestivo. The significant organization of professional screen - and theater casting in the US is the Casting Society of America (CSA), but membership is optional.

At least in the early stages and for extras, casting may be decentralized geographically, often in conjunction with actual shooting planned in different states, e.g. in Hollywood or New York (studio) and one or more exotic locations (e.g. Hawaii, the Far East) and/or budget locations, e.g. Canada, Ireland. Another reason may be tapping in to each home market in the case of an international co-production. However for the top parts, the choice of one or more celebrities, whose presence is of enormous commercial importance, may rather follow strictly personal channels, e.g. direct contact with the director.

• The resulting list of actors filling the parts is called a cast list.

[edit] See also

• Stunt casting
• Character actor
• Stock character
• Dramatis personae
• Ensemble cast
• Casting couch
• Back Stage (a casting publication)

[edit] References

This article does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (November 2009)

[edit] External links

• CastingSociety.com: The Casting Society of America (CSA), the largest professional association of
• IMDb's definition of "casting"