TESTING TIMES AND CASTING CHALLENGES
Veteran casting director Nikki Barrett speaks with The Equity Magazine about the continuing rise of self-tests and her hope for more live auditions this year. She also draws on her years of experience to offer advice on overcoming feelings of rejection when a coveted role slips from your grasp.
Nikki Barrett has been casting Australian and international film and television for more than 20 years. Her work includes such acclaimed features as Fury Road, Hacksaw Ridge, The Nightingale, I Am Mother, The Babadook, The Great Gatsby, The Water Diviner, Slow West, Mao’s Last Dancer, The Sapphires, Somersault, Oranges and Sunshine, The Proposition, Candy, The Railway Man and Ride Like a Girl, as well as HBO’s The Leftovers and Foxtel series, Picnic at Hanging Rock. Recent work includes The Invisible Man, George Miller’s Three Thousand Years of Longing and Jane Campion’s The Power of the Dog. Barrett is currently working on Ron Howard’s Thirteen Lives, Benjamin Millepied’s Carmen and Baz Luhrmann’s untitled Elvis biopic.
So many actors didn’t have an opportunity to audition or work last year, but it seems things in screen have picked up?
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a better time for actors. There is so much work coming into Australia and being generated within the country, it’s insane. It’s a mixture of local and offshore productions. It’s interesting — given actors can’t travel to LA at the moment, LA is kind of coming here, so it doesn’t really matter.
Are you still auditioning predominantly via self-tests?
It really depends on the project. We have one project where we are literally not allowed to audition people in the room — that’s part of the protocol — but then we work on other things where we have been seeing people in the room. It also varies depending on state lockdowns and restrictions; we’re just shifting all the time and I know that’s difficult for actors.
Has self-testing become more prevalent because of COVID?
Self-testing didn’t come about because of COVID. It was already on the rise because it made it much easier to see people interstate. The days when producers would fly you to Melbourne to do four days of testing of actors just doesn’t exist. I think COVID did what it did in a lot of technological fields — it accelerated a process that was already happening.
I remember people saying to me two years ago that to some extent there was no point going to LA for pilot seasons because nobody got to audition in the first round — they were still asked to self-test — so the Americans have been pushing towards this for a while. There are good and bad things about that, obviously, but it’s dictated to some extent by necessity.
What are the pros and cons of self-testing from a casting director’s perspective?
It does allow you to audition more people than you probably could in a room, but it also protracts the experience, because if someone is in a room and they do a take, you can give them some feedback, get them to do another take on the spot.
I personally really miss being in the room with actors — that’s the fun part of my job — and I hope to see more actors in the room this year.
Are actors with less technological expertise at a disadvantage when it comes to self-testing?
No. Doing a good audition on a self-tape is exactly the same as doing a good audition in the room, it’s just that you’re filming it yourself. That is the whole difference. We’re not going to bring someone in because their technology was great.
I’ve watched atrocious self-tapes, but if I see something interesting, I will go back and ask that person to retake or try to find some way around it.
People at our end don’t expect super-high technological quality. We’re used to watching tapes done on iPhones and things like that. So long as we can see you and hear you, we don’t really care how fancy it is.
How do you see actors who don’t have an agent?
Showcast is a really big thing for us; we use it so much to find what we are looking for. Also try to get into short films or indie theatre productions. Be visible. It is harder, obviously, if you don’t have an agent, but it’s not impossible. You just have to ensure your work is available everywhere. Make sure everyone knows about you, you have contacted all the casting people, and sent your photo and your clips, maybe every couple of months. It’s not necessary to bombard us because we get too many emails to cope with that.
What about actors who feel they are not being put forward by their agents for projects they believe they’re suitable for?
I think it’s really important to be able to trust your agent, that they are putting you forward when it is appropriate. That’s really a conversation between the actor and the agent about their career direction. When we send out a brief, agents can’t send us every performer, no matter how much loyalty they may have to that performer. To be heard by us, an agent needs to make meaningful suggestions.
How mindful are you of diversity and representation when casting?
It’s at the forefront of discussion now on every project. I’ve also noted a real increase in representation coming through in material and a desire to then cast those roles genuinely. It’s also great to see broadcasters and streaming services like the ABC and Netflix really driving change in this area.
What is your advice for actors struggling with being rejected after auditioning?
Being an actor is a really courageous existence.
In no other job do you go for five interviews a week or get rejected five times in a fortnight.
I constantly say this to students, and it sounds token, but I really do believe it. There is so much you cannot control; no matter how much information you have, you cannot control the outcome of auditions. The one thing you can control is your performance, focusing on doing the best audition you can, preparing and knowing as much as you can, and being the most detailed actor you can. Keeping waking up and being an actor; watching stuff, listening to stuff, seeing stuff, and remembering that you have this skill and you have this love for acting, and not letting it all just be dependent on acceptance and rejection, because it can become about that which is dispiriting.
What is your advice for actors when they come close and then miss out on a role?
If an actor comes down to the final two and they don’t get it, then I always get a call saying, What did I do wrong? And what I say is, You did everything right, that’s why you were in the final two, but only one person can get it.
There are a hundred reasons they may have got it that are completely arbitrary and beyond your control and have absolutely nothing to do with your audition performance or your skill as an actor.
The other actor may have been more physically right or older or younger or had the right energy to go with this person who was already cast. And yes, that’s really frustrating, but it’s also really important to know you did nothing wrong.
