Casting Under Pressure: When Opportunity Calls. Talent scouting for the first African American spokeswoman for well know product.

Casting Under Pressure: When Opportunity Calls

What do you do when you receive a late-night call on a Thursday asking your Atlanta-based casting company to recruit talent for a national advertising campaign—and the client is looking for the first African American woman to represent its product?

You say, “Absolutely! We’ll take the project!”

Of course, my first thought was, Surely, we’ll have at least a week to pull everything together. We can handle that!

Well…not exactly.

What we didn’t know was that the advertising agency was conducting a national casting search in several U.S. cities—and Atlanta’s audition was scheduled for Friday. Yes, the very next day.

As the Casting Director and Talent Recruiter, my immediate response was, “OMG! How are we going to pull this off?”

My production crew, however, didn’t hesitate.

“No problem, CJ. We’ve got this.”

And just like that, we went into full casting mode.

Within hours, we secured the studio and prepared the cameras, microphones, and equipment. Then came an endless evening of contacting talent agents, posting casting notices, emailing performers from our talent database, and reviewing more than 200 submissions.

Once we narrowed down our selections, we began sending scripts and confirming audition appointments. There was no sleep, barely time to eat, and certainly no slowing down.

After hearing the commercial copy over and over again, I thought I might scream if I heard one more person say, “Ask your doctor if the power of Viagra is right for you.”

But that’s casting!

After the auditions, we reviewed tapes and headshots, prepared the video files, and uploaded our final selections directly to the producers through our client’s private online viewing platform.

Thank goodness for technology!

We also had the privilege of auditioning some of Atlanta’s most talented and recognizable women. Even more exciting, one of our selections made the A-list, and we couldn’t have been prouder. We wished her nothing but success as she moved forward in the process.

There is also an important lesson here for actors and talent: Casting Directors want you to succeed.

We appreciate your talent, your preparation, and the gift you bring into the audition room. When you arrive prepared, look professional, understand the material, and deliver a blockbuster audition, you don’t just make yourself look good—you make the Casting Director look good, too.

Every audition is an opportunity to show us why we should remember you, recommend you, and bring you back for the next project.

So, after the late-night phone calls, hundreds of submissions, countless emails, back-to-back auditions, no sleep, and one very memorable commercial script, would we do it all over again?

YES! Most definitely.

We would do it again…and again…and again.

Because when that phone rings and someone says, “We need you to cast this project,” we already know what time it is.

It’s CASTING time!

— Carolyn Jenkins Casting Director | Talent Recruiter Carolyn Jenkins Agency LLC