Actors, Where is Your Chemistry?
Imagine this: you’re watching a show or a film, and you notice that there seems to be a friendship growing between the characters, maybe even the hint of a romantic relationship between them.
But wait, why does it not feel natural? Why do conversations seem so minimal and awkward? Suddenly, as the dynamics keep building, it’s clear that there’s something missing between the actors in their fictional relationship — whether platonically, familially, or romantically. There is something clearly lacking in the chemistry.
In the entertainment industry, it is important for the fictionalized dynamic between numerous actors to appear as realistically as possible. This can allow audiences to cheer for the characters as they go through their story and even crave the possible romances given to certain characters. There is a simple method used to assist that sense of realism: chemistry reads!
A chemistry read is “an occasion when actors who are being considered for particular parts in a movie, TV show, etc. read some of the script together, to see if they work well together and seem to have chemistry.” This practice typically takes place after initial auditions and is overseen by the producers and directors. Actors go through many stages of a chemistry read, as after an initial read, the producer will bring the ones who had the best chemistry and narrow it down from there in another chemistry test.
A notable example of a clear chemistry read/test in recent entertainment is the friendship dynamic between Walker Scobell, Leah Sava Jeffries, and Aryan Simhadri for the Disney+ show Percy Jackson and the Olympians. In an interview with TV Insider, Jeffries revealed that chemistry reads were done for the individual dynamics — stating the first one was for her and Scobell as Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase — between the characters, eventually ending with the trio’s test. They were assigned to read the scene of the characters on the Greyhound bus, and that’s where Simhadri detailed, “I vividly remember that day, after my chemistry read with them, [the producers] were like, ‘okay, we’re going to mix it up a little bit,’ and Walker was so exhausted because he had done nine or 10 variations before I even came in.” And that is where Scobell unveils that in actuality, there were 11 Grover variations that he had a chemistry read with before Simhadri!
During the show, the relationship between the three and their individual relationships with other characters appear genuine. This is not a common practice among other shows and movies anymore, as is the case with the Netflix series One Day. In an interview with On Demand Entertainment, the lead actors — Ambika Mod and Leo Woodall — joked that they did not feel any chemistry between them, especially as the series — and their fictional relationship — went on. “If anything it plateaued,” Mod said jokingly in the interview, “so many situations with each other that it’s hard to nail what the relationship is. We’re just glad it works.” If the leading actors can’t see themselves as the fictional couple, how is it that the show — which hinges on their relationship — made it through production?
Chemistry reads are ultimately up to the director’s or showrunner’s preference; leading to a possibility that the director decided to cast blindly and hope for the best. While the casting director is in charge of picking the original actors for auditions, the director can ultimately reject or accept which actor they want for each role. They can make the rules. However, they could change the script to better fit the chemistry between the actors chosen during rehearsals, with an example being the originally planned romance between Denzel Washington and Julia Roberts in The Pelican Belief. As the filming of the movie was going on, Washington requested that any scenes of the two actors being romantically involved be removed from the script, “as he did not feel comfortable kissing a woman who was not of his ethnicity.” Though whether or not these script and scene changes benefit the character dynamics is ultimately up to the audience when the final product is released.
Even so, the rise of action-centered films made in the last decade has impacted the importance of chemistry between actors. As stated by Script Hollywood, “Action movies have long captivated audiences with their larger-than-life characters, heart-pounding stunts, and adrenaline-fueled narratives.” While there can be emotion deep at its core, action films are not meant to center around the relationship between two characters, but on the dangerous scenarios as well as the physical and emotional journey that individual characters need to go through and develop from. And with its popularity and public demand in modern times, the film industry would rather put their time and energy into flashy action set pieces than character relationships.
Without effective and attractive character relationships, there is very little within the narrative that audiences can attach themselves to, much less identify with. It is not the gratuitous action set pieces that keep audiences invested and hungry for more, but the meaningful relationships between both characters and actors that fuel audience interest. The recent praise for Rick Riordan’s choice of actors and their palpable relationship with one another on- and off-screen will hopefully lead the way for the resurgence of chemistry reads for future films and television series.
Photo Courtesy of Netflix
