EXCLUSIVE: In the first of three roundtables featuring this year’s Emmy nominees for Outstanding Casting, Deadline gathered Jeanie Bacharach (The Bear), Linda Lowy (Hacks), Destiny Lilly (Only Murders in the Building), Brett Benner (Shrinking) and Melissa Kostenbauder (The Studio) to talk about self tapes, landing the joke, and the challenges that come with preparing the next generation of casting directors.
The nominees, who each had to submit a 30-minute composition reel from the season to showcase their work, also explained how they judge their peers and what they were most proud of accomplishing on their respective shows.
DEADLINE: This casting category encompasses the best comedies on television right now. How do you decide which show is more awards worthy than the other?
DESTINY LILLY: Fun fact: we actually can’t vote for ourselves. We are not allowed to vote in the category we’re nominated in. People just kind of go with their gut with what they feel most excited about in that moment. It’s subjective, it’s art, so there really is no best. The actors are the ones who really make us look good.
JEANIE BACHARACH: It is so personal. It’s what you are connecting to at any given point in your life, the stories that touch you, the performances that touch you. So much of what we do is subjective.
LINDA LOWY: For me in voting, I am looking for a show to use an actor in a way that I have not seen them used before, to turn something on its head. Let’s take Severance. Just to see John Turturro and Christopher Walken play lovers is so unexpected, so unusual and so well done. I applaud that.
MELISSA KOSTENBAUDER: I look at how much work must have gone into assembling a certain type of cast or getting certain roles cast. Was it extra challenging to get those sorts of actors?
DEADLINE: When you’re voting in this category, can you still consider the regular cast when deciding who will win?
BRETT BENNER: If it’s a pilot or the first season, you can technically consider the series regular, but subsequent seasons, you’re supposed to judge the guest cast for that season only.
DEADLINE: What are you most proud of accomplishing this year?
BRETT BENNER: For season 2 of Shrinking, it was about a lot of those smaller players who came in. We had Courtney Taylor [Courtney] and Vernee Watson [Phyllis], who were fantastic. With our show and working generally with Bill Lawrence, something could start very small and continue into something that becomes much larger. Trey Santiago-Hudson came on for the small role as Jorge and just continued to evolve. He’s all through season three now. To me, one of the most exciting things is finding people who have worked and done other things but for whatever reason, the general public does not recognize them. They’re all looking for that one opportunity that might give them the notice to propel them into the next phase of their career.
DEADLINE: Linda, is that what happened with Julianna Nicholson’s Dance Mom? Her role got bigger once you noticed how fun she really was?
LINDA LOWY: She was always going to be in multiple episodes. What’s amazing about Julianne is I don’t think people have ever seen her do that kind of thing, be that comedic. I had some friends in from Chicago who were visiting me and they were talking about Dance Mom and Julianne, and they’d never seen her before. Isn’t that crazy? I just think, my God, we’re all so blinded here living in Los Angeles and New York. We just don’t realize that people between the coasts may not have seen so many of these people, especially on Hacks. For me, comedy is kind of new. I’ve done it before, but not for a very, very long time. I’ll never forget auditioning Robby Hoffman [who played Randi] because it was one of those cases where you knew it was there. She was so funny. She was in her New York apartment and I was sitting right here [in L.A.] and I was like, ‘okay, I’ve got to kind of reign this in.’ I’ve got to ground this somehow because that’s what I do. So I spent over an hour with her. It was like a masterclass in acting, not that I teach acting. But we’re all pretty good at helping actors audition. We ended up with not only a great audition, but I felt so confident that the flow of it could carry itself into the rest of what she might have to do during the season.
DESTINY LILLY: Season four of Only Murders was built around our main trio and then the trio of people who were playing that trio in a film. That was Eugene Levy, Zach Galifianakis and Eva Longoria. It was so fun casting the three of them. The one person I’m very excited about from season four, though, is Daphne Rubin-Vega [Inez], who is a theater legend. She was in the original cast of Rent. We actually had some in-person auditions at the beginning of that season for some of the longer arcs. It was so magical. We also got to cast a lot of quirky New York characters like Richard Kind, but then we also had Melissa McCarthy for one episode. It was an eclectic season for us.
MELISSA KOSTENBAUDER: We had three paths on The Studio. We had the series regulars, and the very obvious celebrity guest stars. But then there was a whole lot of the other roles that were co-stars and like Arthur Keng [Steve Chan] and Thomas Barbusca [PA Doug] who are so interesting and did nothing but add texture and great acting to these supporting roles.
DEADLINE Were you surprised at how many celebrities were willing to make fun of themselves?
MELISSA KOSTENBAUDER: No, because Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg did such a great job. They would talk to them first. We’d check availabilities, get a general interest check, and then we would set up a meeting. There were a lot of people we called on who were not interested. I feel like the ones who wanted to make fun of themselves were looking for that experience.
JEANIE BACHARACH: I’m in a little bit of a unique position than the other fabulous people on this panel because we didn’t have as many guest roles in season three. We’re also in this odd place because season four just aired. We had a lot of really wonderful, local Chicago people who got opportunities with smaller roles, which is always so fun. I just am so proud of our series regulars and how their work continues to grow … especially Liza Colón-Zayas [Tina]. Season three was her big episode with the episode “Napkins”.
L-R: Jeanie Bacharach, Brett Benner, Destiny Lilly, Linda Lowy and Melissa Kostenbauder.
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DEADLINE: Linda, you said comedy was so new for you after years of casting dramas like Grey’s Anatomy and Scandal. Did you have any fears about doing comedy?
LINDA LOWY: I didn’t really have a fear about it. It’s more about knowing that group of actors really well who are out there. It’s more about the submissions that are coming to you, and going to all the comedy shows and watching comedies. I just didn’t have my secret stash of people. You’re looking for a different skillset. I found that to be a little bit more difficult in comedy casting. We had eight recurring roles that were part of Deborah Vance’s writing staff that followed her around. These were small recurring roles that were very important. We got 34,000 submissions for those eight parts. This is what is happening right now in the industry. So that was difficult because it was a learning curve for me in terms of actors and also in terms of being back after four years of not getting submissions.
BRETT BENNER: Even having a stable of people that you can call on initially, you’re always looking for new people. Our job is to bring in people that we are not only excited about, but who might be people that no one else has seen before.
DESTINY LILLY: A lot of the time it’s as simple as, can this person actually land the joke? Are they putting the emphasis on the wrong syllable or the right syllable? Are they giving too much? People also will give too much. They’ll be like, “look, I landed the joke,” and you’re like, no. So you move on.
BRETT BENNER: The one-liners are the hardest because of exactly what you are saying. You don’t have context with before or after. You don’t have a scene for someone to warm up with or even say two scenes. You have one line to come in and hit it and be out and also be authentic to what the scene is and not create a bit that says, “I have to stand out because I say, here’s your coffee.” It’s incredible how many people are just missing this for whatever reason. If you’re lucky enough, if it’s a live Zoom or even back in the olden days being in the room, to be able to give somebody that adjustment is so great. But it doesn’t always happen. We don’t always have the opportunity.
LINDA LOWY: I also think on the producer end, with the writers and the director, it’s harder for them to fully describe what they want. They have to totally see it, and maybe when they see it, it’s just not funny enough or it’s not exactly as they pictured it in their head. So they change it. You have to go back to the drawing board. There’s a little bit more going back to the drawing board, I think, in comedy. Do you agree with that?
MELISSA KOSTENBAUDER: I do agree with that. Comedy acting is really complicated for so many reasons. You have to figure out the tone much more in comedy than I think you do in drama, even though it’s important across the board. It’s a skillset that’s tough to manage. With comedic timing, when you’ve got it and it hits, it evokes laughter from us. When it doesn’t, you’re like, okay. When you are sending it to your creatives, if they are not just immediately laughing, or seeing where that humor is coming from, maybe that’s on them to either switch the writing or us to find different actors to really deliver.
JEANIE BACHARACH: We have to keep trying different things out to help them find their vision because they can’t always articulate it themselves.
DEADLINE: I’d love to talk to you about the tightrope you walk, Jeanie, on The Bear. Obviously the show is in the cross hairs of purists because it’s not a traditional comedy.
JEANIE BACHARACH [Deadpans] I haven’t heard anything about that.
DEADLINE: Are the rules different for you compared to what the others have been saying about what they’re looking for in comedic timing?
JEANIE BACHARACH: Maybe it’s less about hitting the joke and more about the circumstances, letting the comedy come out of the situation. Or it’s character driven. But I think that’s true in everything that you guys are working on. I think we all share the common ground of how to make these characters relatable. Comedy is what touches you in any particular moment on any particular day of an actor’s performance.
DEADLINE: What’s more challenging about your jobs now versus five years ago?
BRETT BENNER: I do feel a big loss of not being with actors the way that we have been in the past. We’ve been remote and now we’re doing the Scrubs reboot and we’re not even being offered offices. That’s a strange thing. There are conveniences to not having to get into a car to drive to the valley and sit in traffic. So I understand that other side of it, but I do miss the opportunity to be in the room, especially with newcomers. I think there’s a whole breed of actors who are coming out of training programs right now who will never get the opportunity to be in the rooms with us, to build a rapport that we used to have.
MELISSA KOSTENBAUDER: There’s so little work out there, still. People are calling and pitching people who have been series regulars multiple times for a guest star or even a co-starring role, just because they want to work. They don’t care about the hierarchy, whereas five years ago if you asked someone who has a lot of extensive series regular work if they want to be a guest star, they’d kind of laugh at you.
DESTINY LILLY: We can see more people over Zoom or over self-tape than we really had time to before. The way we use the internet now in this post-Covid age has opened us up to so much new talent, and we can consider people from all over the world in a way that was less available previously. I also like having the hybrid ability of working on something while I’m in New York or LA or I can go on vacation and watch these self-tapes for a little bit. I can watch self tapes at two o’clock in the morning if I need to, whereas I couldn’t have actors come in to audition in person at two o’clock in the morning. But it’s also a little bit of a trap, too, because then you’re watching self-tapes at two o’clock in the morning, which isn’t necessarily the balanced life that you promised yourself. I know it’s really a struggle for so many actors who have been doing this for a long time, but there are also the new actors who, honestly, have never been in a room to audition before. They don’t know how to conduct themselves in that space.
JEANIE BACHARACH: There’s a whole generation of casting directors who aren’t in the room with actors, either, and how do we grow those casting directors to be compassionate and understanding of the actor’s process? How do they learn to build a safe environment for them to work over a screen and not in the room? You connect with actors on a human level by being in a room with them. I do worry about casting as a career for people newer to it.
LINDA LOWY: I’ve been trying so hard to make my peace with Zoom because I was in the room, then four years went by, and then I was on Zoom all of a sudden. I don’t know how you all feel about this, but I know that there’s this first-come, first-serve Zoom thing where you have to offer a Zoom session for each role. We don’t go by that. We offer Zoom sessions constantly. Anybody that wants one can have one at any time. Our office is open. What I’m finding is there are a lot of actors who are very vocal about wanting to be back in the room and how great it is to just be on Zoom. But there are a lot of actors who choose not to have a Zoom audition. They choose not to be in the room. They want to self tape. They’re getting used to self taping. I don’t know if they just have their own setup at home and they would rather work on it themselves and do it a dozen times until they hit it and then send it in, or they would rather not be directed by one of us. But it’s really interesting because once I opened it up to anybody to have a Zoom, I don’t have that many takers.
BRETT BENNER: I would say 80 to to 85% would rather self tape. We were shocked. I don’t know if the others have seen this, but the people who are choosing those Zooms are usually the people who lived in the world with us when they were only coming in. We found that a lot more of the younger talent are sometimes choosing to go right to Zoom. But yeah, we were shocked the first time we offered Zoom auditions and only got five.
LINDA LOWY: It’s a new world, and I’m so old school that I’m trying to not be set in my ways. I want to open up and be this part of the new world, but I so agree with what Jeanie said. How are we going to teach our associates and assistants the finesse and the nuance of casting? Associates and assistants can be on Zooms with us, and that does help. But if we’re not on a lot of Zooms directing actors, or being on the phone with directors, saving people for other roles, talking about performance .. there are a myriad of things that happen in a room or on a Zoom that you will not get by watching a self tape. You will not learn by watching a self tape.
MELISSA KOSTENBAUDER: If someone does a great self tape, a lot of times that translates into being able to do a great in person. But there are times when you don’t know if that person did that 25 times to get there and they are not as quick or they’re not as able to take direction as you’d hoped.
DEADLINE: One one of his first days in office, Trump issued a DEI moratorium which has affected a wide array of businesses and institutions. What kind of effect do you see that having on the industry and your jobs in particular?
MELISSA KOSTENBAUDER: I don’t think any of us have a crystal ball to figure that out. I think it changes moment to moment. All you can do is try to pivot and evolve and work within the circumstances you’re given.
JEANIE BACHARACH: I think we have to keep fighting the fight to reflect the world the way it really exists, not the way some people might want it to be.
DESTINY LILLY: It’s actually very important to me. I got into casting because I wanted, like Jeanie said, to really reflect the world that I saw in my life and in the lives of people I knew on screen. That was something that I hadn’t seen growing up. As I’ve gotten further along in my career, it’s become the core value of my work to make sure that I am working from a place of authenticity, a place of compassion, while continuing to grow and learn new things. Like Linda said, we have to be evolving. That’s not going to change. And it’s very important to me to continue to push for people to be portrayed authentically and push for people to be able to play roles who are real people. I don’t think that the people’s desire to see themselves reflected is going to change, either. So our job remains very important because we get to be part of the process that decides what kind of people the whole world gets to see playing certain characters and how that little bit makes a difference in the way people see the world.
DEADLINE: How are you feeling about the state of the industry?
BRETT BENNER: I feel so fortunate to be working. I feel so blessed to have a job. Sure, I can complain, but it’s not worth it because of whatever little thing or because producers aren’t responding to somebody that we think is amazing. That’s the process. That’s the job. I think what’s hard right now with the industry as a whole, all these people who aren’t working despite the fact that there’s so much programming. The numbers are so reduced. When you’re having orders that are suddenly eight to ten episodes, when you used to be guaranteed 22, sometimes 24 episodes. People always say, well, there’s so much work, why aren’t you working more? There are more shows, but there are less numbers in those shows.
LINDA LOWY: I agree with every single thing that Brett said. I am very fortunate to be working. I know there are so many people that not only are not working, but have moved out of Los Angeles. There are a lot of veteran casting directors that haven’t worked in years. There’s no pilot season anymore. That was the meat and potatoes for so many people to spring from, to learn from, where their next job came from. So I have an overwhelming sense of sadness for the industry. It feels sparse. And I don’t know if that’s going to change. I don’t know how people who enter the industry in whatever profession are going to be able to sustain and live and be able to support themselves and a family. I can’t visualize that right now.
MELISSA KOSTENBAUDER: I don’t think the entertainment industry is ever going away, but it’s cyclical. I’m just hoping this next cycle brings more work for people and more opportunities.
JEANIE BACHARACH: I echo everything that they said, starting with feeling incredibly grateful but sad and concerned and unsure.
DESTINY LILLY: I don’t know what’s going to happen, either. I can’t worry about something when I don’t even know what it is. I tell people this every day. It’s really important to focus on the things that are within our control because there’s so many things outside of our control with whatever’s happening in the industry. It’s the same for actors. They’re like, what do I do? And I’m like, just do the best you can with every opportunity you get, and that’s what you can control.
