June 9, 2025 • 39 mins
Welcome to Episode 32 to the Actor’s Guide to the End of the World podcast!
Still coming down from last week’s epic episode with last week’s guest Kirsten Sheridan, E-Kan and Rían recap major takeaways and lessons learned. Be sure to check out her summer workshop happening this month in LA, info below.
They get onto a little blast from the past when E-Kan worked with a screen acting legend and all because he was an intern at the casting office. Listen in to hear how E-Kan’s ass got his first studio credit. Rían also shares his first movie experience with Joel Schumacher and how he also worked at a casting office. You’ll hear what he learned about auditioning from watching and reading with so many actors as well as why “sexy indifference” is so appealing.
Rían also brings up wisdom from incredible actor Michael Kostroff that changed how he looks at auditions and how it helped to remember “you’re not going to get the fucking job.”
And then they discuss a controversial post about "self-tapes truths" from a former casting director that has caused a stir online. No ring light? Don’t act, just be yourself? No "bold choices"?? The guys get into it and what actors need to remember, especially newer ones. You’re going to want to hear this one.
New episodes every Monday, wherever you find your podcasts, including video on Youtube and Substack!
Follow @actorsguidepodcast on all social media including IG and TikTok.
Kirsten Sheridan’s website- www.kirstensheridan.net
Summer workshop - www.bowstreet.ie/kirsten-sheridan-workshop
Aaron Paul “Breaking Bad” audition
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-6vWahav9E
Amy Adam’s “June Bug” audition
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxxVcAc4gZc
Emma stone’s audition “Easy A”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6f0UgVxpe9E
Hidden gems: Museum of Moving Image (Astoria, NY) Jim Henson and Mission Impossible https://movingimage.org/whats-on/screenings-and-series/?gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=22307333704&gbraid=0AAAAAogSa6Wx8yyXir9YTjwyjqeZFYzj5&gclid=Cj0KCQjwjJrCBhCXARIsAI5x66XlXeI3vGlrWaJ2gD1A1MEz2nVXJz1fo9cnMikUedk5lfQr6S7bsjgaAmNzEALw_wcB
Nexus by Yuval Noah Harari https://www.amazon.com/Nexus-Brief-History-Information-Networks/dp/059373422X
Time stamps
(0:00) Intro
(2:45) Kirsten Sheridan recap
(7:05) Working with legend Tom Hanks
(12:50) Rían first film experience with Joel Shumacher
(17:00) Lessons learned from interning at a casting office
(18:00) Audition workshop from "The Wire" actor Michael Kostroff
(23:30) "Self-Tape Truths" debunked
(35:24) Learn from the best auditions online
(37:00) Hidden gems
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
I worked at a casting office. They do
huge projects and they're like, "Hey, all
the actors, hey put yourself
on tape, put yourself on tape."
We all get a chance to put ourselves on
tape and it just so
happened Tom Hanks literally picked
three of the interns.
Alright, welcome to the actor's guide to
the end of the world podcast where we
talk about acting in
(00:21):
Hollywood in a way people understand.
I'm your host E-Kan
Soong and this is my co-host
Rían Sheehy Kelly, how you doing?
What's up, buddy? What's up?
As always follow us wherever you find
your podcasts at Actors Guide podcast.
We have video on YouTube and sub stack
follow us on all social
media at Actors Guide podcast.
Leave us a like leave us a review. It
(00:43):
really helps the podcast and we really
appreciate the ones
that we've gotten already.
So thank you. On the show for today, we
recap a little bit about our conversation
with Kirsten Sheridan last week.
Some things that stuck out to us a lot of
things that we appreciated from all of
her wisdom working in the industry.
We also talk about a little gem of
(01:04):
information E.K.E.N. has been sitting on
all this time that I wasn't aware of
about working with a very famous actor
slash director in a movie some years ago.
So stay tuned for me.
Yes, yes, I love that tease. We have that
little tidbit. We also
talk about self-tape myths.
Self-tape myths in the era of social
(01:26):
media advice, which
can be tricky. Exactly.
Pitfalls of that. And self-tape gurus
online. So it's gonna be a good one. Sit
back, relax, enjoy the episode.
And now a word from our sponsor. Does
your pet get the yips in auditions?
Does your little friend literally shit
the bed at callbacks?
Welcome to the Royal Academy for Dramatic
(01:47):
Barks, where your puppies will be trained
by acting legends Ellen Barkin,
Mark Ruffalo and Sir
Patrick Stewart. Sign up today.
How is the East Coast? Oh, it's always
good. I'll get into that. I'm recording
once again in the nook over here.
Another shout out for Capital One Cafe.
We are not giving Capital
(02:08):
One for people to recipe.
They don't need it. They've got Samuel L.
Jackson. They got Charles Barkley.
Yeah, that's true. They already have
plenty of sponsors. It just
so happens that they had a
grand opening for the Soho location in
New York. So a lot of
donuts were being passed around.
I'm so hopped up on caffeine. It's
insane. So let's just get into it. If you
(02:32):
guys haven't heard our last episode,
Kirsten Sheridan's interview, it was a
blast. It was packed with a lot of
information. We talked
behind the scenes of the films that she
worked on in America, working
with Kelly and Murphy. Anyway,
so I figure we could kind of talk about
things that stuck out to us. She was
(02:52):
great. So appreciative
of her time. She was so generous and she
was so thoughtful about
everything we asked her and
just generous in her answers and
insightful. It was really helpful to me
to hear her thoughts
as a director, as a writer, how she
approaches work, how she works with
actors. I really enjoyed
the conversation and I'm so grateful that
(03:13):
she came and gave us her
time like that. I can't wait to
see what she does with the Bow Street
model here in LA and creating
a community of filmmakers and
actors and writers. I'm thrilled that
that was our first
interview. It was brilliant.
In all honesty, even looking back on it,
there was actually a lot of things that I
wanted to ask or some things that maybe
(03:37):
next time, but to hear
how she works with actors,
it's a type of director that you hope
that you have, creating a
safe space, no ego. There's no
ego involved in the collaboration and
that's what you hope. Even Kirsten said,
(03:58):
it's like actors are
out on a limb. It's like you hope that
you have a director who's really
appreciating and really
cherishes the relationship with the actor
that, "Hey, we're out on
the limb. They just want to
help support." This summer, she's going
to be starting this
workshop. It sounds like an
incredible opportunity if you're in Los
(04:19):
Angeles. It's an opportunity
to work with a working director
and writer, but also in an environment
that you're going to collaborate with
other actors and maybe
other writers. We talked about it with LA
being so disconnected and
how often do you actually have
(04:40):
that safe space? I think it's a great
opportunity. We're going into the summer.
We're going into the
period that's slower. So it's like of all
the opportunities to be
trying to do something and
trying to jumpstart something. I think
that's a great opportunity
and also in person. So that's
(05:02):
great for LA. In person and to just be a
part of a community, which I think I
didn't know I was even
lacking in the way that I was lacking it
until I went to Lesley Khan
and realized that I need that.
And I think what Kirsten is doing is all
of the things you mentioned
(05:23):
and you get to be part of a
community that can support you and that
you can make things into the future. I
think it's brilliant.
And talking about ego there, I know she
joked and said, "I'm a big
headed bitch." I didn't detect an
ounce of ego. That was in relation to the
(05:44):
confidence to direct
when she was in her 20s.
I love her confidence, but she was very
self-deprecating, but very, very
talented. And I didn't detect
that. It's great of an ego in her at all.
Yeah. I think that's a
great point. And also in the
the other thing is when she was talking
about working with Kelly
(06:04):
Murphy, who Kelly Murphy had
all the... Let's just say even at 25 in
his 20s, viciously
protecting his art and protecting his
craft and her being able to work with
that and not take it
personally or feel defensive about it.
(06:25):
There you go. That's the type of set and
that's the type of set and
the type of relationship that
you hope for. Yeah. And to sort of
intuitively understand what
an actor needs is, I'm sure,
what makes her such a great director. And
I can't wait to see what
she does next with the Grace
(06:46):
O'Malley project. And it was really great
to get that kind of a
conversation with someone that
talented and with that many years of
experience in the industry and with all
the things she's made
and all the people she's worked with. It
was great. And speaking of
people people have worked with,
I found out by accident this week that
(07:08):
E-Can was directed by none
other than Mr. Tom Hanks.
This was... I was like, where were you
hiding that one? Yeah, we could talk
about that a little bit.
So I worked on a Tom Hanks movie, one of
his lesser known
films. But that being said,
it was one of the few films that he
directed. It's called Larry Crown. So
(07:28):
funny story about that.
Tom Hanks is as amazing and giving as you
would hope. I got this
job because I interned at a
casting office. So this might come up
every so often. I know you had
experiences interning.
These opportunities don't really exist
anymore. But back then, I
(07:49):
worked at a casting office. I
fought to get in because a lot of actors
were trying to get in. So
just put this in perspective.
You're working to put on... Like you're
doing paperwork for the
casting office. We're also
unpaid interns, right? Which is part of
the reason why they don't do it anymore.
And you get to see all these great actors
come in and audition. They do huge
(08:11):
projects like this Tom
Hanks movie. And they're like, hey, all
the actors, hey, put yourself on tape.
Put yourself on tape.
I don't even remember the lines, but he
basically works at a
Walmart type store. And he's the
manager and he's looking for his
employees. So we're just
yelling out lines like, hey,
blah, blah, blah. It's $5.99. Little
(08:34):
lines like that. So just
imagine, first of all, we were so
happy to audition for these tiny roles.
But just imagine how many
actors actually read for them.
We're interns. We all get a chance to put
ourselves on tape.
And it just so happened,
of course, no one knew that we were
interns. Tom Hanks didn't
know. Tom Hanks literally picked,
(08:58):
get this, three of the interns. And I was
one of them. Literally just picked us.
That does not seem like a coincidence.
That seems like there's something to
reading with actors over and over again.
And seeing what works
and seeing what doesn't.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a great point. I
thought you were going to
say that he actually knew that
we were interns and hooked us up. But
yeah, yeah. Anyway, so they were very
(09:19):
quiet and make sure not to talk about the
inter not to talk to that we were working
at the office because that might be a
conflict. Anyway, we were
working for a week on set with
Tom Hanks. It is a blast. And so here's
the kicker. We're waiting
for the movie to come out.
Most of those scenes are cut. Okay.
(09:40):
He found out you were
interns. And he's like,
get that fucking movie.
We Oh, by the way, we even got invited to
the wrap party, which was great.
Oh, that's lovely.
Yeah, yeah. We were invited to the wrap
party. It was a great
hangout. Oh, my God. It was just
everyone was so loving. And we just took
pictures with everyone
anyway. So those main scenes and
(10:02):
you know, it's a lot of montages. There's
a lot of you never
know what's in the edit.
Those scenes, most of them were cut. The
opening shot when he's
driving into the Walmart or into
the parking lot, you see me in the
background walking into the
Walmart. And you just see my
the back of me, you just see my ass from
(10:23):
like half a mile away just
walking into the Walmart.
That's the only part that I caught of
myself. Right. Okay. But
here's the kicker. We were
extra worried that we
weren't going to get residuals.
Fear not. We actually did get residuals
for that movie. And hey,
that's cool. That's better than
(10:44):
nothing. So it's a studio credit. You
work with Tom Hanks. And
then the other kicker was
the credits at the end of the movie in
order of appearance. So
it's Tom Hanks and then E.
Consung. It is Tom Hanks and then E. Cons
ass from half a mile away
(11:04):
walking into the Walmart
and with the top of the credits. So
anyway, it's great experience.
So that's worth more than your residuals.
So did you get direction from him? Did he
say much to you? Did you? In all honesty,
a lot of those group shots montages, it's
hey, let's do this bit. See if it works.
(11:26):
Let's do this bit. From what I remember,
this was kind of a while ago. It was a
lot of playing and
exploring. Let's get this. Let's
get this. Let's get this. And then
ultimately you see what works in the
edit. And ultimately,
by the way, I should add, this is a two
hander with Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts.
(11:47):
So they have a this is a rom com with
Julia Roberts. And Julia Roberts, I
believe, is a college
professor. So they fall in love because
he gets canned by the
Walmart, something like that.
So ultimately, it's hey, they use less of
the Walmart scenes and
probably gave a little more
to Julia Roberts, her world. And then
(12:07):
there must have been a tough call,
though, for like the
editors when they're looking at, okay, do
we use the scene of Julia
Roberts or he can't walk in a
car. That's a tough choice. I don't envy
them. I don't envy them.
It's a very shrewd editor. Hey, that's
Hollywood, folks. That's
Hollywood. I believe one of the
college students in that movie was a
(12:29):
young Romy Malik. Oh, well,
unknown Romy Malik. Anyway, so
how old were you? I absolutely don't
know. But you can look on IMDB. That
movie might be a little
over 10 ish years old. Wow. One of my
first movie experiences was
when I was, I must have been
(12:50):
18 or so. I think I just started working
at Dublin Airport. I went
to I was an extra in the
Veronica Giren movie directed by Joel
Schumacher. And it was an
airport scene. Yeah, I heard that
name. Yeah. So it was an airport scene
shot out in Leopards Town racecourse in
Dublin that, you know,
put it in the built an airport set. And
(13:12):
there was a couple of scenes in the
airport, but one of them
I had brought I brought my uniform from
the airport because I
was like, it's an airport
scene. And I was working in the duty for
you at the time, you know,
but I was in college. And I
was like, I'm going to bring my my
airport uniform. And I went up and you
know, they were checking
people in. I was like, I actually have my
uniform with me. And they're
like, great. Yeah, jump in.
(13:33):
So but it turned out they couldn't use
because I had Ari into
which was the airport management
company at the time, they couldn't use
most of it. So they like dress me in
different clothes, whatever.
And then so they stood me behind a desk.
And there's a scene where
Kieran Hines comes up and
he's buying a ticket to flee the country.
He's playing a real life
(13:54):
character called John trainer.
And he's he's coming up and he's buying a
ticket to get out of the
country. And I'm behind the desk
and they were going to have me say the
line and then they gave it
to a girl and then and then
Joel Schumacher, I was wearing a white
shirt and and Joel Schumacher comes up
and he's like, I'm a
bit worried about this guy's shirt. Can
we get this guy a jacket? And
they bring me a jacket. And I
was like, this is easy. I think movies
are easy. I'm going to be
(14:15):
in this movie. This is great.
I was not in the movie. I did not appear
in the final cut of the
movie. But it was it was so
exciting just watching them, you know,
that's also more. I'll
shoot Macra 18 years old. That's
that's cool to see. That's cool. Yeah, I
was cool. It was a great and
it was it's a really good movie
as well. She was an investigative
(14:36):
journalist and she was
killed. That was her. Was it? It was
co-planter. Oh, there you go. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Good catch there. Who
did a very good Irish accent?
I mean, she's brilliant. Yeah. She was a
journalist in in Ireland who was an
investigative journalist
and was actually killed by by the head of
(14:58):
one of the one of the
gangs in in Ireland or he had
ordered the killing. And as a result of
that, I think the Criminal
Assets Bureau was set up,
which gave the Irish Garde the police
wider powers to to sort of
go after gangs and criminals
and drug traffickers and stuff. So it it
(15:20):
affected a lot of change in
Ireland, but it was a really
well made movie with a lot of really good
actors in it. Back to this
whole, you know, working at a
casting office, it's it's safe to say not
only are acting interns
not around anymore, casting
is rarely in an office. So you have to be
a really great casting
director to even have an office.
(15:43):
So to my point is, is those were great
experiences that, you
know, you and I have gotten to
partake in. And as an actor now, what
what is there? That's a
good that's a good point. Yeah.
It's like, you're not going to intern for
an office. You're not
going to be reading. Like we
were reading. I was reading with stars
(16:03):
coming into the office.
And so this is how different
the game is. There's no interns and we're
at self tapes. And what
are people doing right now?
It's like you have to be on social media
and get on TikTok and start
dancing. That's that's the
the difference in the game. The reader
thing is a great point because I'd
(16:25):
recommend anybody to be a
reader with a casting director if you get
the opportunity. It was
brilliant. I did. I was a
reader for Claire Simon casting in
Chicago for a couple of
times, but for a season of of rep
theater in in. Oh, wow. That is cool.
Hasselow, Asselow rep or
(16:46):
something like that. I'm probably
pronouncing that wrong. But it's a big
theater down in Florida where
they cast a whole season at one
go. And I'm sure they cast in a few
different cities, but they
were they did three days of
of casting for this. And I was reading
opposite a ton of actors.
But it was it was a really good
lesson in like how people come into the
room and how prepared they
are and what works and what
(17:07):
doesn't work and people's confidence. And
like it's that thing of,
you know, they say it on
smart list, the sexy indifference that
people just come in and they're just
like, here it is. And
then they you're like, wow. And they're
prepared. I mean, it's like you can't
just come in and just
be like, fuck it, fuck it. And then
stumble over your lines. But people who
are prepared but don't
(17:27):
need it. There's something very powerful
about that combination.
We're like, oh, they don't need
this job. Maybe maybe we should give it
to them. Yeah. Yeah. You
could smell the desperation on on
yeah. And in some instances, I did this
brilliant. I did I talk about this part
is brilliant workshop
in Chicago with an actor who was in the
(17:50):
wire. I talk about that.
Michael Kostrov is his name.
And he was he played Maury Levy, who was
the drug lawyer in the wire
for a bunch of seasons. And
he's a New York actor, really good actor,
really generous, lovely
guy. But he did these series of
workshops. And for I think was pay what
(18:10):
you can. It was like a
suggested donation of $40 or $80 or
something like that at the time. And you
spend the whole day in a
theater and he gives a workshop on
like how he how he changed his career via
auditioning, you know, in a
better way. And one of his his
his kind of the thing that changed the
(18:32):
form, the philosophy that
sort of helped him get to that
point was he would go into every
audition. Eventually, this
is when he'd sort of when it
clicked with him after years of
frustration, but he would go into every
audition telling himself,
you're not getting the fucking job in
exactly those words. You're
not getting the fucking job.
So that for him freed him up to just go
(18:52):
in and go, here you go. He one
of he said his first TV role,
I think he booked was where he had to be
in a police station. And
he was doing a crossword.
And they bring someone in the guy, we
ever had one of these people before. And
he and his only line was something like,
(19:13):
not that I can remember. And he said,
in the past, he would have gone in and
tried to put loads on ago.
Hmm, how would I say that, you
know, hmm, not that I can remember, or
not that I can remember. All
he did was when he went into
the audition, he told himself just
actually do the crossword. So he was
genuinely doing the crossword
as the game the line today, we have one
(19:34):
of these in here before. He
goes, I can remember. And he
just kept doing the crossword and he
booked the job. And then
it kind of led to more. But
it was a really novel way to auditioning
for me at the time.
And it really helped me
a lot. And I don't I don't use exactly
that phrasing in my head
that didn't land with me
quite as much as some other things have.
(19:55):
But, but the thought
behind it is great. You know,
the lack of preciousness about it and the
lack of attachment to
the outcome of the job
helped me kind of go, all right. I mean,
Brian Cranston has
talked about it lots of
lots of people have talked about it in
different ways, but it's sort
of the lack of attachment to
the outcome. So let me let me just make
sure I'm connecting the dots
(20:15):
here. So it's this need this
detachment from a result or needing the
job, wanting the job and
just being present in the
audition. And then that allowed him to
come up with the choice
of, hey, you know, honestly,
(20:37):
it's probably more interesting if I just
do the crossword. Is that
kind of like, are those two
things linking together? Yeah, pretty
much. I mean, he just he
just he took himself out of the
conversation of, oh, I need this job or I
need to get this job and
just it freed him up to just
try things in the scene. And I think
instead of being an actor
acting or this is my idea of the
(20:58):
scene, an actor going in gone, please, I
need this job. Or, you know, how can I
try to give somebody
what they want, which is a dangerous
place to be as we discussed before. But
he, one of the things
he said was, you're the doctor, they're
the patient, go in and
take care of them. It's like,
it's up to you to go in and make them
feel like it's okay, I got
(21:18):
this. I love that. I love that
metaphor. I love that. I love that.
Another phrase he used was I hear you
have a I hear you have a
casting problem. Maybe I can solve it for
you, you know, like they're like,
everybody's looking for
the same thing. Everybody wants, you
know, they want to find the perfect
person. They want you to
be great when you're walking the room.
And that's something to help
(21:39):
me because I, you know, I made
a mistake of thinking a lot of times that
like, oh, my God, they
hate me or like that they were
weren't on my side. But they absolutely
of course they want, of
course they want you to be the best
version of that character that they've
ever seen. I can see a lot of actors
saying to themselves, you're not going to
(21:59):
get the fucking job.
That negative connotation
without the opinion that actually might,
without the opinion that
actually might discourage some
people that actually might make some
people anxious. But it's
just funny, he's East coaster,
and I could easily I can easily see that
that's kind of like, you
(22:19):
know, you know, we talked about
good thoughts and bad thoughts. Good good
actor thoughts, bad actor
thoughts in Leslie's. But it's
just funny how that's kind of important
is to be able to use that
mantra as something that's
uplifting instead of discouraging. Yeah.
And like I say, it doesn't work for
everybody. It didn't
right. It didn't necessarily land for me
(22:40):
in exactly that way. But it just I'd
never heard anything
like that before. And I was like, Oh,
that's interesting. It's
whatever gets you to that point,
whatever helps you let go. I mean, as he
talks about it, in terms of,
you know, she'll ask people
about what what makes you nervous, what,
what, what starts? Why are
(23:01):
you nervous? What's happening
in your body? And they'll talk about
what's happening in the
body. And she goes, Okay,
but what's happening? What else is
happening? And it's thoughts. It's like,
they're gonna hate me,
or I'm gonna forget my lines or all
these, you know, what we
call bad actor thoughts,
she calls bad actor thoughts. And that's
all it is. So whatever gets
(23:21):
you there, if it's you're not
getting the fucking job, really use that,
you know, if you're
something else. But I think I had to
find a way to because I was a terrible
audition. There was
something that someone sent to me.
It was an Instagram post from a casting
director, I should note, a former, a
former casting director
(23:44):
giving out her do's and don'ts for self
tapes, self tape, truths.
Exactly. Thank you. There was
a kind of back and forth with another
former casting director.
So let's talk about these
self tape truths. Because it's one thing
to have opinions of this is
what I think works in self
tapes. Oh, that's kind of risky. Oh, I
(24:04):
want to do that. This is what a lot of
casting directors say.
Okay, yeah. There's another thing to just
have black and white, hard
lines. And then for you and I,
as you know, I would say fairly
knowledgeable actors, we've been dealing
with self tapes, we've
booked off of self tapes, we're pretty in
(24:25):
the game. I'm reading some
of these hard fest truths. And
I'm like, I don't even understand what
that's about. I don't even
like, it's like, I have to
wrap my head around it. You can look this
up. I'm probably not going
to put the link there because
I don't want people to get confused that
we're vouching for this,
for these, as we believe in
(24:46):
it. But this is for the purpose of
discussion. Let's go through some of
these hard fest truths,
because I feel like a lot of actors who
are seeing this blow up
online are going to get dissuaded
are going to get misled. And we're going
to talk about it. Because
a lot of this conversation
does not exist on social media. And also
the point of this is, be careful where
(25:08):
you get your advice.
Because guess what? A lot of the people
who are self taped gurus on
Instagram and online that all
of us are watching, guess what? They're
not on a show. They're not
working as a casting director.
And they don't have a job. Just like you
and me. There's nothing wrong
with that. But just like you
(25:29):
and me, they are out of work. And they're
also selling something
online. Speak for yourself.
Just be very careful where you're getting
your advice. Okay, so
let's jump into this.
So right off the bat, she says, don't use
a ring light. No, no,
(25:49):
no, no, no, no context.
Just don't use a ring light, which is
already pretty, you know, polarizing.
If you don't have, I mean, you're lit.
Well, I'm thinking
about that, though. I mean,
I don't understand why. Is it is it
distracting? Is that the maybe I want to
(26:12):
say sometimes there's
a ring light and you could see it in your
pupils that you could see
a little ring in the eyes,
you could see the ring in the eyes, which
is such a specific issue.
And I was like, of all the
things that you're going to talk about
that that's that's where
you that's where you go.
I would seriously doubt if that's a deal
breaker for most
productions. I agree. I agree. Seems
all right, but whatever. Okay, so this is
(26:33):
what she said. It's just a conversation.
Okay, first of all, I would love I think
Leslie would be screaming
for about hour and a half
on this point of it's just a
conversation. I don't even understand
what that's referring to. She means an
(26:55):
audition is just a
conversation. So that means that
you're I'm going to guess your self tape
is so natural that it's
like you're actually with
someone in real life and you're just
having a conversation,
which is so bonkers because you
have no idea what the scene is. You have
no idea what the TV show is.
(27:16):
I'm going to guess that and
I'm just speculating here that what she
may mean from that I don't know is that a
scene is essentially
between two people a conversation and to
not make it a performance. I
don't know if that's what she
means. Even if that's what she means. I
don't personally find that
particularly helpful because
of course it's a conversation that's
anything where two people
(27:37):
are talking is a conversation.
And I will add she also has defended
herself because she's gotten some fire.
She's defending herself and say hey, some
people are saying this is
the opposite of some casting
directors advice that I've heard and she
(27:57):
would respond to the
effect of well, are they Emmy
winning casting directors? Okay, this is
where we are online and to iron this out
if you look on her IMDb and here's the
thing we're not attacking anyone. Okay,
but these are just going through the nuts
and bolts of the facts.
She worked on a show that did win Emmys
(28:21):
that was many years ago
and she was an assistant
and an associate. So diving into the
weeds here, those are
levels of casting directors.
There's a head casting director under
that is the associate
under that is assistant and
(28:44):
that is kind of what she is using to
build up her reputation
making these posts and then also
selling her classes for a successful
former casting director.
So we just need to preface
this that she's not some random who's not
in the industry but. Yeah, a
(29:05):
few thoughts on this but one
and we've talked about different casting
directors and what
they've said on this podcast and
talked about it with each other in a
moment in the industry. No
one person has the answers.
No one casting director. It's like
Kirsten said the other day,
you get 20 actors, you got 20
(29:26):
different methods. Everybody does their
thing slightly differently
and that's fine. You know
what I mean? I'm not going to worry too
much about what one casting director.
Well, to clarify that
because to clarify that though, this is
actually less about the craft
and more about what possible
self-taped standards would be though. No,
(29:47):
that's the question. Yeah,
she has her opinions on how
she does her job. Look, she's got
experience in the industry. She's done it
for a long time. Whatever,
whether or not she's good or bad. I don't
know. I don't know if she's a good
casting director or not.
But I think my issue with this is if
you're a younger actor or
someone new to the business,
you could take this as gospel and you
(30:09):
know, it could affect what
you do and how you approach
auditions. Oh, damaging. Yes. Guess how
many people are
following this casting director?
21,000. How many people like this post?
500. That's actors
around the world saying, "Yes,
thank you for sending the record
straight. We love it." And that's why
(30:30):
we're talking about this
because this is the type of
misinformation that is swirling around
online. But I think that's a
good lesson in, you know, nobody don't
take anything as gospel,
particularly online and
particularly where somebody is selling
something because I'm
looking through these things now.
One of the first, the top one I didn't
realize was it's just a
(30:50):
conversation. Okay, that's not
very helpful to me personally. You are
listening and being affected.
Yeah, of course. Don't use a
virtual reader. It kills the scene. Okay,
that's fine to say. And
obviously it's not ideal, but
sometimes you have to. You know what I
mean? Sometimes there's
no other option. So just
going through these things, I think
anything that's fear-based
advice to me, really just I
(31:14):
have a reaction to anything, which is
like the second page of this
post is what not to do on a
self-tape. Don't walk into the frame.
Okay, well, maybe in some
instances that the scene requires,
or you know, it would make it more
interesting. Don't make in quotation
marks bold choices. I
don't know what that means. Don't make
bold choices. Good God. I
know exactly. Let's talk
(31:34):
about that one a little bit. How do
people use the words when they
say a bold choice as an actor?
What does that even mean? I don't even
know what that means. And
I don't think we have to
talk about that. I'm just saying that be
careful how you use your words and
context is everything.
So I completely agree. Don't make bold
(31:55):
choices, even though it's in
the script, it's written in
the script, it's written in the scene. I
don't even know what she's getting at.
And there's no context.
I think bold is a misleading word,
because I think accurate
choices would be way more helpful.
Make accurate choices. Don't make bold
choices. And my problem with
this, with a lot of this advice,
and again, it's not personal to this
particular casting director. I
don't know anything about it.
(32:16):
But I think the problem with the advice
here is twofold. One,
it's fear-based. And two,
it's not actionable. Like, it's not
helpful because it's not
actionable. I don't know what
don't make bold choices means. I can only
assume that she means maybe
don't make crazy choices that
are not accurate or for the sake of them.
(32:38):
I think the least
helpful note in here is don't,
in quotation marks, act, just be you. I
think that is one,
ridiculous and not helpful. Because
just be you. Are you a mechanic from
Pittsburgh? If not, then
being you is not going to help you
be this character. So I think what the
(32:59):
issue with a lot of this
is it's an overcorrection to
some actors' performances that were bold,
that were them acting and
not being themselves. And
then that's why they put out these
hard-fessed rules in which
obviously can be misleading. And
here we are. I think bold is a... Again,
(33:22):
I think it's very
misleading because I think
like a strong choice, if it's accurate,
is great. I mean, a strong
choice is what you want. You don't
want to be middle of the road. I fucked
around for a lot of years
just trying to be myself in
auditions and being very natural and
believable. It wasn't
especially helpful for me because it
wasn't character-based. You know, I was
(33:44):
bringing me to the role,
which again is very vague and not
actionable, but also very unhelpful for
me personally. You're
playing a character,
so play that character. And also the
character that was written, a lot of
actors are portraying
or acting their idea of their character
(34:04):
or what they would do. And
the irony is, is sometimes
the bold, crazy choice is the one that
the writer wrote for
you. The one that the writer
wrote for you and just doing what they're
asking is actually going to
set yourself apart from all
the other actors. And that's the irony.
Right. Well, I'll tell you, I was talking
(34:25):
about this with some
friends I don't know. Arguably the
greatest character actor of all time,
Philip Seymour Hoffman,
made some incredible choices in some of
the relatives playing,
some of the characters
who played just some brilliant choices.
There was a guy who made
bold choices all the time,
but they were accurate for the character
that he was playing. And I
(34:46):
don't know. I don't know.
It's a really great point. Done it
better. You know. So the
fear-based advice of like,
don't make bold choices, don't walk into
a scene. Do. If it's
accurate to the character, do it.
Exactly. Don't be
fearful. I think a huge,
fear is such a killer in this industry.
Because if you go in with
fear loaded in your mind,
(35:07):
you're trying to give somebody a version
of the thing, you know, a version of this
character that you think they like and
you're afraid to make mistakes.
Go online and go on YouTube and look up
actors audition tapes like famous actors,
(35:28):
audition tapes from different roles and
see some of them are not well lit.
Some of them are not, you know, they're
in distracting background.
Some of them break all the rules that
people talk about, like this
casting director has has mentioned here,
and they still got the role because
they were they were
playing the character.
They were playing an interesting, you
know, lived version of that.
(35:49):
I love I love that.
And just on that note, some
ones that famously stick out,
Aaron Paul is reading for Breaking Bad,
drops his line and stays in it
and obviously got the
role and he's a great actor.
So we're going to put
that link in the description.
Also, Amy Adams.
Oh, yeah. Amy Adams.
Oh, Amy Adams. That's it.
Amy Adams and June Bug.
(36:11):
She, you know, hilariously
drops it, but stays in it.
And she's a she's a great
actor and also booked that role.
So we're going to put those those are
famous auditions to look at.
And I think Emma Stone in.
Oh, I didn't realize
that she fumbled something.
No, no, not fumble.
But when you see her audition tape, it's
like not a not a classic.
(36:32):
Yeah, her easy audition.
Yeah, that's what that's
the one I'm thinking of.
Like she's just in a bedroom.
The lighting's not great.
Sitting on a bed.
Yeah. Yeah. I agree.
I don't think there's a direct camera.
It's a brilliant audition.
Yeah. Yeah. I agree.
I don't think there's
anything wrong with that.
It's a brilliant audition, though.
So that was great.
(36:53):
Let's do hidden gems real quick.
Oh, God. Hidden gems.
Yeah. So I mean, I
hidden gems, my hidden gem.
I actually just got a
chance to go to this museum.
It's in Astoria, which is a
small little area in Queens,
the Museum of Moving Image.
If you haven't been there, it's a little
out of the way from
(37:13):
from actual Manhattan.
But it's great.
It is a museum
specifically for film buffs, movies.
They have a standing
exhibition for Jim Henson.
Blow your mind.
He does the Muppets that
you could spend all day there.
Oh, by the way, it's free
every Thursday, starting at 2 p.m..
(37:34):
So this museum is amazing.
Jim Henson, Jim Henson, the Muppets,
Fraggle Rock goes
through his whole history.
But they have a special exhibit right now
for Mission Impossible.
They have a whole set up for all of Tom
Cruise's stunts through
every Mission Impossible.
I will hopefully be putting together a
(37:54):
video and throwing it on my YouTube soon.
But we had way too much
fun over there anyway.
So you see it's just a huge exhibit for
Mission Impossible,
which is out right now.
So anyway, that's a great museum.
If you get a chance to go
out to Astoria, check it out.
And that's my hidden gem.
Can I do a hidden gem?
A bit of book I haven't read.
(38:16):
Well, OK. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well, tell us why you
why you want to read it.
Well, one, I was talking to a friend of
mine this morning and he
recommended this book to me.
It's called Nexus by Yuval Noah Harari.
And he talked about it
extensively and in depth.
It's about, you know, how information
networks have shaped human history,
particularly with a
(38:37):
sort of reference to A.I.
or a focus on A.I. and
how A.I. is developing.
But the way my friend described it in so
much detail, I was like,
that sounds fascinating.
OK, cool. I didn't know that.
But about that book, that sounds cool.
Yeah. At the end of the conversation, I
could not wait to read it.
And I understand that, you know, the
difficulty in recommending
something I haven't read yet.
(38:57):
But I was like, wow,
that sounds incredible.
Hey, well, there you go.
I think that's a worthy
hidden gem. I love that.
There's yeah, there's a hypothetical
hidden gem that we will
revisit in a few weeks
when I've read the book.
I can tell you if that was good or not.
All right. All right.
He's putting it out there.
We got to hold him to it.
And in all honesty, I didn't even know
that he wrote this book
and I never heard of it.
So that's great. It's the news to me.
(39:17):
Just as we talk about a lot, I thought,
OK, I'm going to I'm
going to get stuck on.
Love it. OK, guys, that's our show.
Hope you enjoyed it.
Leave us a review. Leave us a like if you
get a chance and see you next week.
See you next week, guys.
I worked at a casting office. They do
huge projects and they're like, "Hey, all
the actors, hey put yourself
on tape, put yourself on tape."
We all get a chance to put ourselves on
tape and it just so
happened Tom Hanks literally picked
three of the interns.
Alright, welcome to the actor's guide to
the end of the world podcast where we
talk about acting in
(00:21):
Hollywood in a way people understand.
I'm your host E-Kan
Soong and this is my co-host
Rían Sheehy Kelly, how you doing?
What's up, buddy? What's up?
As always follow us wherever you find
your podcasts at Actors Guide podcast.
We have video on YouTube and sub stack
follow us on all social
media at Actors Guide podcast.
Leave us a like leave us a review. It
(00:43):
really helps the podcast and we really
appreciate the ones
that we've gotten already.
So thank you. On the show for today, we
recap a little bit about our conversation
with Kirsten Sheridan last week.
Some things that stuck out to us a lot of
things that we appreciated from all of
her wisdom working in the industry.
We also talk about a little gem of
(01:04):
information E.K.E.N. has been sitting on
all this time that I wasn't aware of
about working with a very famous actor
slash director in a movie some years ago.
So stay tuned for me.
Yes, yes, I love that tease. We have that
little tidbit. We also
talk about self-tape myths.
Self-tape myths in the era of social
(01:26):
media advice, which
can be tricky. Exactly.
Pitfalls of that. And self-tape gurus
online. So it's gonna be a good one. Sit
back, relax, enjoy the episode.
And now a word from our sponsor. Does
your pet get the yips in auditions?
Does your little friend literally shit
the bed at callbacks?
Welcome to the Royal Academy for Dramatic
(01:47):
Barks, where your puppies will be trained
by acting legends Ellen Barkin,
Mark Ruffalo and Sir
Patrick Stewart. Sign up today.
How is the East Coast? Oh, it's always
good. I'll get into that. I'm recording
once again in the nook over here.
Another shout out for Capital One Cafe.
We are not giving Capital
(02:08):
One for people to recipe.
They don't need it. They've got Samuel L.
Jackson. They got Charles Barkley.
Yeah, that's true. They already have
plenty of sponsors. It just
so happens that they had a
grand opening for the Soho location in
New York. So a lot of
donuts were being passed around.
I'm so hopped up on caffeine. It's
insane. So let's just get into it. If you
(02:32):
guys haven't heard our last episode,
Kirsten Sheridan's interview, it was a
blast. It was packed with a lot of
information. We talked
behind the scenes of the films that she
worked on in America, working
with Kelly and Murphy. Anyway,
so I figure we could kind of talk about
things that stuck out to us. She was
(02:52):
great. So appreciative
of her time. She was so generous and she
was so thoughtful about
everything we asked her and
just generous in her answers and
insightful. It was really helpful to me
to hear her thoughts
as a director, as a writer, how she
approaches work, how she works with
actors. I really enjoyed
the conversation and I'm so grateful that
(03:13):
she came and gave us her
time like that. I can't wait to
see what she does with the Bow Street
model here in LA and creating
a community of filmmakers and
actors and writers. I'm thrilled that
that was our first
interview. It was brilliant.
In all honesty, even looking back on it,
there was actually a lot of things that I
wanted to ask or some things that maybe
(03:37):
next time, but to hear
how she works with actors,
it's a type of director that you hope
that you have, creating a
safe space, no ego. There's no
ego involved in the collaboration and
that's what you hope. Even Kirsten said,
(03:58):
it's like actors are
out on a limb. It's like you hope that
you have a director who's really
appreciating and really
cherishes the relationship with the actor
that, "Hey, we're out on
the limb. They just want to
help support." This summer, she's going
to be starting this
workshop. It sounds like an
incredible opportunity if you're in Los
(04:19):
Angeles. It's an opportunity
to work with a working director
and writer, but also in an environment
that you're going to collaborate with
other actors and maybe
other writers. We talked about it with LA
being so disconnected and
how often do you actually have
(04:40):
that safe space? I think it's a great
opportunity. We're going into the summer.
We're going into the
period that's slower. So it's like of all
the opportunities to be
trying to do something and
trying to jumpstart something. I think
that's a great opportunity
and also in person. So that's
(05:02):
great for LA. In person and to just be a
part of a community, which I think I
didn't know I was even
lacking in the way that I was lacking it
until I went to Lesley Khan
and realized that I need that.
And I think what Kirsten is doing is all
of the things you mentioned
(05:23):
and you get to be part of a
community that can support you and that
you can make things into the future. I
think it's brilliant.
And talking about ego there, I know she
joked and said, "I'm a big
headed bitch." I didn't detect an
ounce of ego. That was in relation to the
(05:44):
confidence to direct
when she was in her 20s.
I love her confidence, but she was very
self-deprecating, but very, very
talented. And I didn't detect
that. It's great of an ego in her at all.
Yeah. I think that's a
great point. And also in the
the other thing is when she was talking
about working with Kelly
(06:04):
Murphy, who Kelly Murphy had
all the... Let's just say even at 25 in
his 20s, viciously
protecting his art and protecting his
craft and her being able to work with
that and not take it
personally or feel defensive about it.
(06:25):
There you go. That's the type of set and
that's the type of set and
the type of relationship that
you hope for. Yeah. And to sort of
intuitively understand what
an actor needs is, I'm sure,
what makes her such a great director. And
I can't wait to see what
she does next with the Grace
(06:46):
O'Malley project. And it was really great
to get that kind of a
conversation with someone that
talented and with that many years of
experience in the industry and with all
the things she's made
and all the people she's worked with. It
was great. And speaking of
people people have worked with,
I found out by accident this week that
(07:08):
E-Can was directed by none
other than Mr. Tom Hanks.
This was... I was like, where were you
hiding that one? Yeah, we could talk
about that a little bit.
So I worked on a Tom Hanks movie, one of
his lesser known
films. But that being said,
it was one of the few films that he
directed. It's called Larry Crown. So
(07:28):
funny story about that.
Tom Hanks is as amazing and giving as you
would hope. I got this
job because I interned at a
casting office. So this might come up
every so often. I know you had
experiences interning.
These opportunities don't really exist
anymore. But back then, I
(07:49):
worked at a casting office. I
fought to get in because a lot of actors
were trying to get in. So
just put this in perspective.
You're working to put on... Like you're
doing paperwork for the
casting office. We're also
unpaid interns, right? Which is part of
the reason why they don't do it anymore.
And you get to see all these great actors
come in and audition. They do huge
(08:11):
projects like this Tom
Hanks movie. And they're like, hey, all
the actors, hey, put yourself on tape.
Put yourself on tape.
I don't even remember the lines, but he
basically works at a
Walmart type store. And he's the
manager and he's looking for his
employees. So we're just
yelling out lines like, hey,
blah, blah, blah. It's $5.99. Little
(08:34):
lines like that. So just
imagine, first of all, we were so
happy to audition for these tiny roles.
But just imagine how many
actors actually read for them.
We're interns. We all get a chance to put
ourselves on tape.
And it just so happened,
of course, no one knew that we were
interns. Tom Hanks didn't
know. Tom Hanks literally picked,
(08:58):
get this, three of the interns. And I was
one of them. Literally just picked us.
That does not seem like a coincidence.
That seems like there's something to
reading with actors over and over again.
And seeing what works
and seeing what doesn't.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a great point. I
thought you were going to
say that he actually knew that
we were interns and hooked us up. But
yeah, yeah. Anyway, so they were very
(09:19):
quiet and make sure not to talk about the
inter not to talk to that we were working
at the office because that might be a
conflict. Anyway, we were
working for a week on set with
Tom Hanks. It is a blast. And so here's
the kicker. We're waiting
for the movie to come out.
Most of those scenes are cut. Okay.
(09:40):
He found out you were
interns. And he's like,
get that fucking movie.
We Oh, by the way, we even got invited to
the wrap party, which was great.
Oh, that's lovely.
Yeah, yeah. We were invited to the wrap
party. It was a great
hangout. Oh, my God. It was just
everyone was so loving. And we just took
pictures with everyone
anyway. So those main scenes and
(10:02):
you know, it's a lot of montages. There's
a lot of you never
know what's in the edit.
Those scenes, most of them were cut. The
opening shot when he's
driving into the Walmart or into
the parking lot, you see me in the
background walking into the
Walmart. And you just see my
the back of me, you just see my ass from
(10:23):
like half a mile away just
walking into the Walmart.
That's the only part that I caught of
myself. Right. Okay. But
here's the kicker. We were
extra worried that we
weren't going to get residuals.
Fear not. We actually did get residuals
for that movie. And hey,
that's cool. That's better than
(10:44):
nothing. So it's a studio credit. You
work with Tom Hanks. And
then the other kicker was
the credits at the end of the movie in
order of appearance. So
it's Tom Hanks and then E.
Consung. It is Tom Hanks and then E. Cons
ass from half a mile away
(11:04):
walking into the Walmart
and with the top of the credits. So
anyway, it's great experience.
So that's worth more than your residuals.
So did you get direction from him? Did he
say much to you? Did you? In all honesty,
a lot of those group shots montages, it's
hey, let's do this bit. See if it works.
(11:26):
Let's do this bit. From what I remember,
this was kind of a while ago. It was a
lot of playing and
exploring. Let's get this. Let's
get this. Let's get this. And then
ultimately you see what works in the
edit. And ultimately,
by the way, I should add, this is a two
hander with Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts.
(11:47):
So they have a this is a rom com with
Julia Roberts. And Julia Roberts, I
believe, is a college
professor. So they fall in love because
he gets canned by the
Walmart, something like that.
So ultimately, it's hey, they use less of
the Walmart scenes and
probably gave a little more
to Julia Roberts, her world. And then
(12:07):
there must have been a tough call,
though, for like the
editors when they're looking at, okay, do
we use the scene of Julia
Roberts or he can't walk in a
car. That's a tough choice. I don't envy
them. I don't envy them.
It's a very shrewd editor. Hey, that's
Hollywood, folks. That's
Hollywood. I believe one of the
college students in that movie was a
(12:29):
young Romy Malik. Oh, well,
unknown Romy Malik. Anyway, so
how old were you? I absolutely don't
know. But you can look on IMDB. That
movie might be a little
over 10 ish years old. Wow. One of my
first movie experiences was
when I was, I must have been
(12:50):
18 or so. I think I just started working
at Dublin Airport. I went
to I was an extra in the
Veronica Giren movie directed by Joel
Schumacher. And it was an
airport scene. Yeah, I heard that
name. Yeah. So it was an airport scene
shot out in Leopards Town racecourse in
Dublin that, you know,
put it in the built an airport set. And
(13:12):
there was a couple of scenes in the
airport, but one of them
I had brought I brought my uniform from
the airport because I
was like, it's an airport
scene. And I was working in the duty for
you at the time, you know,
but I was in college. And I
was like, I'm going to bring my my
airport uniform. And I went up and you
know, they were checking
people in. I was like, I actually have my
uniform with me. And they're
like, great. Yeah, jump in.
(13:33):
So but it turned out they couldn't use
because I had Ari into
which was the airport management
company at the time, they couldn't use
most of it. So they like dress me in
different clothes, whatever.
And then so they stood me behind a desk.
And there's a scene where
Kieran Hines comes up and
he's buying a ticket to flee the country.
He's playing a real life
(13:54):
character called John trainer.
And he's he's coming up and he's buying a
ticket to get out of the
country. And I'm behind the desk
and they were going to have me say the
line and then they gave it
to a girl and then and then
Joel Schumacher, I was wearing a white
shirt and and Joel Schumacher comes up
and he's like, I'm a
bit worried about this guy's shirt. Can
we get this guy a jacket? And
they bring me a jacket. And I
was like, this is easy. I think movies
are easy. I'm going to be
(14:15):
in this movie. This is great.
I was not in the movie. I did not appear
in the final cut of the
movie. But it was it was so
exciting just watching them, you know,
that's also more. I'll
shoot Macra 18 years old. That's
that's cool to see. That's cool. Yeah, I
was cool. It was a great and
it was it's a really good movie
as well. She was an investigative
(14:36):
journalist and she was
killed. That was her. Was it? It was
co-planter. Oh, there you go. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Good catch there. Who
did a very good Irish accent?
I mean, she's brilliant. Yeah. She was a
journalist in in Ireland who was an
investigative journalist
and was actually killed by by the head of
(14:58):
one of the one of the
gangs in in Ireland or he had
ordered the killing. And as a result of
that, I think the Criminal
Assets Bureau was set up,
which gave the Irish Garde the police
wider powers to to sort of
go after gangs and criminals
and drug traffickers and stuff. So it it
(15:20):
affected a lot of change in
Ireland, but it was a really
well made movie with a lot of really good
actors in it. Back to this
whole, you know, working at a
casting office, it's it's safe to say not
only are acting interns
not around anymore, casting
is rarely in an office. So you have to be
a really great casting
director to even have an office.
(15:43):
So to my point is, is those were great
experiences that, you
know, you and I have gotten to
partake in. And as an actor now, what
what is there? That's a
good that's a good point. Yeah.
It's like, you're not going to intern for
an office. You're not
going to be reading. Like we
were reading. I was reading with stars
(16:03):
coming into the office.
And so this is how different
the game is. There's no interns and we're
at self tapes. And what
are people doing right now?
It's like you have to be on social media
and get on TikTok and start
dancing. That's that's the
the difference in the game. The reader
thing is a great point because I'd
(16:25):
recommend anybody to be a
reader with a casting director if you get
the opportunity. It was
brilliant. I did. I was a
reader for Claire Simon casting in
Chicago for a couple of
times, but for a season of of rep
theater in in. Oh, wow. That is cool.
Hasselow, Asselow rep or
(16:46):
something like that. I'm probably
pronouncing that wrong. But it's a big
theater down in Florida where
they cast a whole season at one
go. And I'm sure they cast in a few
different cities, but they
were they did three days of
of casting for this. And I was reading
opposite a ton of actors.
But it was it was a really good
lesson in like how people come into the
room and how prepared they
are and what works and what
(17:07):
doesn't work and people's confidence. And
like it's that thing of,
you know, they say it on
smart list, the sexy indifference that
people just come in and they're just
like, here it is. And
then they you're like, wow. And they're
prepared. I mean, it's like you can't
just come in and just
be like, fuck it, fuck it. And then
stumble over your lines. But people who
are prepared but don't
(17:27):
need it. There's something very powerful
about that combination.
We're like, oh, they don't need
this job. Maybe maybe we should give it
to them. Yeah. Yeah. You
could smell the desperation on on
yeah. And in some instances, I did this
brilliant. I did I talk about this part
is brilliant workshop
in Chicago with an actor who was in the
(17:50):
wire. I talk about that.
Michael Kostrov is his name.
And he was he played Maury Levy, who was
the drug lawyer in the wire
for a bunch of seasons. And
he's a New York actor, really good actor,
really generous, lovely
guy. But he did these series of
workshops. And for I think was pay what
(18:10):
you can. It was like a
suggested donation of $40 or $80 or
something like that at the time. And you
spend the whole day in a
theater and he gives a workshop on
like how he how he changed his career via
auditioning, you know, in a
better way. And one of his his
his kind of the thing that changed the
(18:32):
form, the philosophy that
sort of helped him get to that
point was he would go into every
audition. Eventually, this
is when he'd sort of when it
clicked with him after years of
frustration, but he would go into every
audition telling himself,
you're not getting the fucking job in
exactly those words. You're
not getting the fucking job.
So that for him freed him up to just go
(18:52):
in and go, here you go. He one
of he said his first TV role,
I think he booked was where he had to be
in a police station. And
he was doing a crossword.
And they bring someone in the guy, we
ever had one of these people before. And
he and his only line was something like,
(19:13):
not that I can remember. And he said,
in the past, he would have gone in and
tried to put loads on ago.
Hmm, how would I say that, you
know, hmm, not that I can remember, or
not that I can remember. All
he did was when he went into
the audition, he told himself just
actually do the crossword. So he was
genuinely doing the crossword
as the game the line today, we have one
(19:34):
of these in here before. He
goes, I can remember. And he
just kept doing the crossword and he
booked the job. And then
it kind of led to more. But
it was a really novel way to auditioning
for me at the time.
And it really helped me
a lot. And I don't I don't use exactly
that phrasing in my head
that didn't land with me
quite as much as some other things have.
(19:55):
But, but the thought
behind it is great. You know,
the lack of preciousness about it and the
lack of attachment to
the outcome of the job
helped me kind of go, all right. I mean,
Brian Cranston has
talked about it lots of
lots of people have talked about it in
different ways, but it's sort
of the lack of attachment to
the outcome. So let me let me just make
sure I'm connecting the dots
(20:15):
here. So it's this need this
detachment from a result or needing the
job, wanting the job and
just being present in the
audition. And then that allowed him to
come up with the choice
of, hey, you know, honestly,
(20:37):
it's probably more interesting if I just
do the crossword. Is that
kind of like, are those two
things linking together? Yeah, pretty
much. I mean, he just he
just he took himself out of the
conversation of, oh, I need this job or I
need to get this job and
just it freed him up to just
try things in the scene. And I think
instead of being an actor
acting or this is my idea of the
(20:58):
scene, an actor going in gone, please, I
need this job. Or, you know, how can I
try to give somebody
what they want, which is a dangerous
place to be as we discussed before. But
he, one of the things
he said was, you're the doctor, they're
the patient, go in and
take care of them. It's like,
it's up to you to go in and make them
feel like it's okay, I got
(21:18):
this. I love that. I love that
metaphor. I love that. I love that.
Another phrase he used was I hear you
have a I hear you have a
casting problem. Maybe I can solve it for
you, you know, like they're like,
everybody's looking for
the same thing. Everybody wants, you
know, they want to find the perfect
person. They want you to
be great when you're walking the room.
And that's something to help
(21:39):
me because I, you know, I made
a mistake of thinking a lot of times that
like, oh, my God, they
hate me or like that they were
weren't on my side. But they absolutely
of course they want, of
course they want you to be the best
version of that character that they've
ever seen. I can see a lot of actors
saying to themselves, you're not going to
(21:59):
get the fucking job.
That negative connotation
without the opinion that actually might,
without the opinion that
actually might discourage some
people that actually might make some
people anxious. But it's
just funny, he's East coaster,
and I could easily I can easily see that
that's kind of like, you
(22:19):
know, you know, we talked about
good thoughts and bad thoughts. Good good
actor thoughts, bad actor
thoughts in Leslie's. But it's
just funny how that's kind of important
is to be able to use that
mantra as something that's
uplifting instead of discouraging. Yeah.
And like I say, it doesn't work for
everybody. It didn't
right. It didn't necessarily land for me
(22:40):
in exactly that way. But it just I'd
never heard anything
like that before. And I was like, Oh,
that's interesting. It's
whatever gets you to that point,
whatever helps you let go. I mean, as he
talks about it, in terms of,
you know, she'll ask people
about what what makes you nervous, what,
what, what starts? Why are
(23:01):
you nervous? What's happening
in your body? And they'll talk about
what's happening in the
body. And she goes, Okay,
but what's happening? What else is
happening? And it's thoughts. It's like,
they're gonna hate me,
or I'm gonna forget my lines or all
these, you know, what we
call bad actor thoughts,
she calls bad actor thoughts. And that's
all it is. So whatever gets
(23:21):
you there, if it's you're not
getting the fucking job, really use that,
you know, if you're
something else. But I think I had to
find a way to because I was a terrible
audition. There was
something that someone sent to me.
It was an Instagram post from a casting
director, I should note, a former, a
former casting director
(23:44):
giving out her do's and don'ts for self
tapes, self tape, truths.
Exactly. Thank you. There was
a kind of back and forth with another
former casting director.
So let's talk about these
self tape truths. Because it's one thing
to have opinions of this is
what I think works in self
tapes. Oh, that's kind of risky. Oh, I
(24:04):
want to do that. This is what a lot of
casting directors say.
Okay, yeah. There's another thing to just
have black and white, hard
lines. And then for you and I,
as you know, I would say fairly
knowledgeable actors, we've been dealing
with self tapes, we've
booked off of self tapes, we're pretty in
(24:25):
the game. I'm reading some
of these hard fest truths. And
I'm like, I don't even understand what
that's about. I don't even
like, it's like, I have to
wrap my head around it. You can look this
up. I'm probably not going
to put the link there because
I don't want people to get confused that
we're vouching for this,
for these, as we believe in
(24:46):
it. But this is for the purpose of
discussion. Let's go through some of
these hard fest truths,
because I feel like a lot of actors who
are seeing this blow up
online are going to get dissuaded
are going to get misled. And we're going
to talk about it. Because
a lot of this conversation
does not exist on social media. And also
the point of this is, be careful where
(25:08):
you get your advice.
Because guess what? A lot of the people
who are self taped gurus on
Instagram and online that all
of us are watching, guess what? They're
not on a show. They're not
working as a casting director.
And they don't have a job. Just like you
and me. There's nothing wrong
with that. But just like you
(25:29):
and me, they are out of work. And they're
also selling something
online. Speak for yourself.
Just be very careful where you're getting
your advice. Okay, so
let's jump into this.
So right off the bat, she says, don't use
a ring light. No, no,
(25:49):
no, no, no, no context.
Just don't use a ring light, which is
already pretty, you know, polarizing.
If you don't have, I mean, you're lit.
Well, I'm thinking
about that, though. I mean,
I don't understand why. Is it is it
distracting? Is that the maybe I want to
(26:12):
say sometimes there's
a ring light and you could see it in your
pupils that you could see
a little ring in the eyes,
you could see the ring in the eyes, which
is such a specific issue.
And I was like, of all the
things that you're going to talk about
that that's that's where
you that's where you go.
I would seriously doubt if that's a deal
breaker for most
productions. I agree. I agree. Seems
all right, but whatever. Okay, so this is
(26:33):
what she said. It's just a conversation.
Okay, first of all, I would love I think
Leslie would be screaming
for about hour and a half
on this point of it's just a
conversation. I don't even understand
what that's referring to. She means an
(26:55):
audition is just a
conversation. So that means that
you're I'm going to guess your self tape
is so natural that it's
like you're actually with
someone in real life and you're just
having a conversation,
which is so bonkers because you
have no idea what the scene is. You have
no idea what the TV show is.
(27:16):
I'm going to guess that and
I'm just speculating here that what she
may mean from that I don't know is that a
scene is essentially
between two people a conversation and to
not make it a performance. I
don't know if that's what she
means. Even if that's what she means. I
don't personally find that
particularly helpful because
of course it's a conversation that's
anything where two people
(27:37):
are talking is a conversation.
And I will add she also has defended
herself because she's gotten some fire.
She's defending herself and say hey, some
people are saying this is
the opposite of some casting
directors advice that I've heard and she
(27:57):
would respond to the
effect of well, are they Emmy
winning casting directors? Okay, this is
where we are online and to iron this out
if you look on her IMDb and here's the
thing we're not attacking anyone. Okay,
but these are just going through the nuts
and bolts of the facts.
She worked on a show that did win Emmys
(28:21):
that was many years ago
and she was an assistant
and an associate. So diving into the
weeds here, those are
levels of casting directors.
There's a head casting director under
that is the associate
under that is assistant and
(28:44):
that is kind of what she is using to
build up her reputation
making these posts and then also
selling her classes for a successful
former casting director.
So we just need to preface
this that she's not some random who's not
in the industry but. Yeah, a
(29:05):
few thoughts on this but one
and we've talked about different casting
directors and what
they've said on this podcast and
talked about it with each other in a
moment in the industry. No
one person has the answers.
No one casting director. It's like
Kirsten said the other day,
you get 20 actors, you got 20
(29:26):
different methods. Everybody does their
thing slightly differently
and that's fine. You know
what I mean? I'm not going to worry too
much about what one casting director.
Well, to clarify that
because to clarify that though, this is
actually less about the craft
and more about what possible
self-taped standards would be though. No,
(29:47):
that's the question. Yeah,
she has her opinions on how
she does her job. Look, she's got
experience in the industry. She's done it
for a long time. Whatever,
whether or not she's good or bad. I don't
know. I don't know if she's a good
casting director or not.
But I think my issue with this is if
you're a younger actor or
someone new to the business,
you could take this as gospel and you
(30:09):
know, it could affect what
you do and how you approach
auditions. Oh, damaging. Yes. Guess how
many people are
following this casting director?
21,000. How many people like this post?
500. That's actors
around the world saying, "Yes,
thank you for sending the record
straight. We love it." And that's why
(30:30):
we're talking about this
because this is the type of
misinformation that is swirling around
online. But I think that's a
good lesson in, you know, nobody don't
take anything as gospel,
particularly online and
particularly where somebody is selling
something because I'm
looking through these things now.
One of the first, the top one I didn't
realize was it's just a
(30:50):
conversation. Okay, that's not
very helpful to me personally. You are
listening and being affected.
Yeah, of course. Don't use a
virtual reader. It kills the scene. Okay,
that's fine to say. And
obviously it's not ideal, but
sometimes you have to. You know what I
mean? Sometimes there's
no other option. So just
going through these things, I think
anything that's fear-based
advice to me, really just I
(31:14):
have a reaction to anything, which is
like the second page of this
post is what not to do on a
self-tape. Don't walk into the frame.
Okay, well, maybe in some
instances that the scene requires,
or you know, it would make it more
interesting. Don't make in quotation
marks bold choices. I
don't know what that means. Don't make
bold choices. Good God. I
know exactly. Let's talk
(31:34):
about that one a little bit. How do
people use the words when they
say a bold choice as an actor?
What does that even mean? I don't even
know what that means. And
I don't think we have to
talk about that. I'm just saying that be
careful how you use your words and
context is everything.
So I completely agree. Don't make bold
(31:55):
choices, even though it's in
the script, it's written in
the script, it's written in the scene. I
don't even know what she's getting at.
And there's no context.
I think bold is a misleading word,
because I think accurate
choices would be way more helpful.
Make accurate choices. Don't make bold
choices. And my problem with
this, with a lot of this advice,
and again, it's not personal to this
particular casting director. I
don't know anything about it.
(32:16):
But I think the problem with the advice
here is twofold. One,
it's fear-based. And two,
it's not actionable. Like, it's not
helpful because it's not
actionable. I don't know what
don't make bold choices means. I can only
assume that she means maybe
don't make crazy choices that
are not accurate or for the sake of them.
(32:38):
I think the least
helpful note in here is don't,
in quotation marks, act, just be you. I
think that is one,
ridiculous and not helpful. Because
just be you. Are you a mechanic from
Pittsburgh? If not, then
being you is not going to help you
be this character. So I think what the
(32:59):
issue with a lot of this
is it's an overcorrection to
some actors' performances that were bold,
that were them acting and
not being themselves. And
then that's why they put out these
hard-fessed rules in which
obviously can be misleading. And
here we are. I think bold is a... Again,
(33:22):
I think it's very
misleading because I think
like a strong choice, if it's accurate,
is great. I mean, a strong
choice is what you want. You don't
want to be middle of the road. I fucked
around for a lot of years
just trying to be myself in
auditions and being very natural and
believable. It wasn't
especially helpful for me because it
wasn't character-based. You know, I was
(33:44):
bringing me to the role,
which again is very vague and not
actionable, but also very unhelpful for
me personally. You're
playing a character,
so play that character. And also the
character that was written, a lot of
actors are portraying
or acting their idea of their character
(34:04):
or what they would do. And
the irony is, is sometimes
the bold, crazy choice is the one that
the writer wrote for
you. The one that the writer
wrote for you and just doing what they're
asking is actually going to
set yourself apart from all
the other actors. And that's the irony.
Right. Well, I'll tell you, I was talking
(34:25):
about this with some
friends I don't know. Arguably the
greatest character actor of all time,
Philip Seymour Hoffman,
made some incredible choices in some of
the relatives playing,
some of the characters
who played just some brilliant choices.
There was a guy who made
bold choices all the time,
but they were accurate for the character
that he was playing. And I
(34:46):
don't know. I don't know.
It's a really great point. Done it
better. You know. So the
fear-based advice of like,
don't make bold choices, don't walk into
a scene. Do. If it's
accurate to the character, do it.
Exactly. Don't be
fearful. I think a huge,
fear is such a killer in this industry.
Because if you go in with
fear loaded in your mind,
(35:07):
you're trying to give somebody a version
of the thing, you know, a version of this
character that you think they like and
you're afraid to make mistakes.
Go online and go on YouTube and look up
actors audition tapes like famous actors,
(35:28):
audition tapes from different roles and
see some of them are not well lit.
Some of them are not, you know, they're
in distracting background.
Some of them break all the rules that
people talk about, like this
casting director has has mentioned here,
and they still got the role because
they were they were
playing the character.
They were playing an interesting, you
know, lived version of that.
(35:49):
I love I love that.
And just on that note, some
ones that famously stick out,
Aaron Paul is reading for Breaking Bad,
drops his line and stays in it
and obviously got the
role and he's a great actor.
So we're going to put
that link in the description.
Also, Amy Adams.
Oh, yeah. Amy Adams.
Oh, Amy Adams. That's it.
Amy Adams and June Bug.
(36:11):
She, you know, hilariously
drops it, but stays in it.
And she's a she's a great
actor and also booked that role.
So we're going to put those those are
famous auditions to look at.
And I think Emma Stone in.
Oh, I didn't realize
that she fumbled something.
No, no, not fumble.
But when you see her audition tape, it's
like not a not a classic.
(36:32):
Yeah, her easy audition.
Yeah, that's what that's
the one I'm thinking of.
Like she's just in a bedroom.
The lighting's not great.
Sitting on a bed.
Yeah. Yeah. I agree.
I don't think there's a direct camera.
It's a brilliant audition.
Yeah. Yeah. I agree.
I don't think there's
anything wrong with that.
It's a brilliant audition, though.
So that was great.
(36:53):
Let's do hidden gems real quick.
Oh, God. Hidden gems.
Yeah. So I mean, I
hidden gems, my hidden gem.
I actually just got a
chance to go to this museum.
It's in Astoria, which is a
small little area in Queens,
the Museum of Moving Image.
If you haven't been there, it's a little
out of the way from
(37:13):
from actual Manhattan.
But it's great.
It is a museum
specifically for film buffs, movies.
They have a standing
exhibition for Jim Henson.
Blow your mind.
He does the Muppets that
you could spend all day there.
Oh, by the way, it's free
every Thursday, starting at 2 p.m..
(37:34):
So this museum is amazing.
Jim Henson, Jim Henson, the Muppets,
Fraggle Rock goes
through his whole history.
But they have a special exhibit right now
for Mission Impossible.
They have a whole set up for all of Tom
Cruise's stunts through
every Mission Impossible.
I will hopefully be putting together a
(37:54):
video and throwing it on my YouTube soon.
But we had way too much
fun over there anyway.
So you see it's just a huge exhibit for
Mission Impossible,
which is out right now.
So anyway, that's a great museum.
If you get a chance to go
out to Astoria, check it out.
And that's my hidden gem.
Can I do a hidden gem?
A bit of book I haven't read.
(38:16):
Well, OK. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well, tell us why you
why you want to read it.
Well, one, I was talking to a friend of
mine this morning and he
recommended this book to me.
It's called Nexus by Yuval Noah Harari.
And he talked about it
extensively and in depth.
It's about, you know, how information
networks have shaped human history,
particularly with a
(38:37):
sort of reference to A.I.
or a focus on A.I. and
how A.I. is developing.
But the way my friend described it in so
much detail, I was like,
that sounds fascinating.
OK, cool. I didn't know that.
But about that book, that sounds cool.
Yeah. At the end of the conversation, I
could not wait to read it.
And I understand that, you know, the
difficulty in recommending
something I haven't read yet.
(38:57):
But I was like, wow,
that sounds incredible.
Hey, well, there you go.
I think that's a worthy
hidden gem. I love that.
There's yeah, there's a hypothetical
hidden gem that we will
revisit in a few weeks
when I've read the book.
I can tell you if that was good or not.
All right. All right.
He's putting it out there.
We got to hold him to it.
And in all honesty, I didn't even know
that he wrote this book
and I never heard of it.
So that's great. It's the news to me.
(39:17):
Just as we talk about a lot, I thought,
OK, I'm going to I'm
going to get stuck on.
Love it. OK, guys, that's our show.
Hope you enjoyed it.
Leave us a review. Leave us a like if you
get a chance and see you next week.
See you next week, guys.
Popular Podcasts
United States of Kennedy
United States of Kennedy is a podcast about our cultural fascination with the Kennedy dynasty. Every week, hosts Lyra Smith and George Civeris go into one aspect of the Kennedy story.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com