WHAT WENT WRONG - Below The Line - Casting Director (Abbott Elementary, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia)

Episode Date: March 10, 2025

Chris and Lizzie speak with the incredible, Emmy-winning Casting Director, Wendy O'Brien (Abbott Elementary, Dave, It's Always Sunny, Wyrm). Enjoy a conversation about how this role is different from what you might think, how it has changed in a post-Covid world, what it's like to work with Chris, and much more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello, dear listeners, in honor of our forthcoming coverage of the Hymbo Ensemble Spectacle that is Predator, we've decided to unvault a casting conversation from behind our Patreon paywall. We hope that this chat with award-winning casting director Wendy O'Brien proves as informative to you guys as it did to us. One important note, this conversation was recorded during the 2023 Writers' Strike, which will be discussed. Without further ado, here is our interview with Wendy O'Brien. Hello and welcome back to another episode of Below the Line with What Went Wrong. It's me, one of your hosts, Chris Winterbauer, here as always with my co-host, Lizzie Bassett. But not only am I here with Lizzie Bassett, we are joined by the truly incredible Wendy O'Brien.

Before I let her speak, I need to let her credits speak for her. Wendy O'Brien is an Emmy Award-winning casting director, perhaps most recently known, for her work casting Abbott Elementary and a favorite of mine, Weird, the Al Yankovic story. Her list of credits reads like a who's who of your favorite shows, including, but obviously not limited to. It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Dave, Sons of Anarchy, and Mions MC. I have to mention those last two, particularly for my mother-in-law, who is a ride-or-die-dye fan, along with my first feature film, Worm, which is where I met, Wendy.

Wendy, thank you so much for being here. It is a real honor to get to talk to you about what a casting director does. Yay, it's my pleasure. So I'm going to kick it over to Lizzie, and she's going to get us started into figuring out what the hell you do to fix people's movies. Because you saved a lot of these, including my own, a lot of these projects with your amazing casting input. Well, I mean, no surprise that you saved Chris's project. That seems to go without saying. Okay, well, where we usually like to start,

is in the simplest possible terms, as though you are explaining it to a three-year-old, or perhaps someone not in the business like my father, what is the primary function of a casting director? We fill the roles. So any rule that's written that speaks, so there's also extras casting directors who do the extras, the non-speaking. me specifically, I do the speaking or a featured, a specifically featured role that you would need a little bit more skill or specifics. But anything that's been written, a character that's been written, that's my job to match the description or not match the description with the actors.

Yeah. And this is a very specific, incredibly important function on any film set, but it's not something that I think a lot of people think of people who aren't in the, I can speak for myself. When I was not in the film business, I assumed the director or the producer just picked all the people that were going in the movie. Obviously, it's not that simple. What drew you to this career? Was this an intentional move? Did you first get into the industry in a different capacity and find your way to this more organically. What brought you from University of Washington all the way down to L.A.? Shout out, Udub. I'm from Seattle, so calling it out. I, you know, I was a student athlete, so at some point there was a reconciliation with that that is not

going to be my future career. And once I came up for air to, you know, start thinking ahead, I was actually talking with my dad. And my dad, you know, so I don't know what I'm going to do. I don't know. I'm an English major with creative writing emphasis. And he said, well, what about casting? And this is, you know, he wasn't broadcasting for a while, but more recently a horse farm, you know, not somebody who would I think would know anything

about casting per se. And I asked me, I was like, what is casting? He's like, you know, we see the credits and it says casting by. And he said, and I did really like acting when I was young, but everything was musicals and I can't sing. So it wasn't something I pursued, but I was always interested in it. And he, I don't remember this, but he says that I always used to critique whatever film or TV show we were watching and say why people were wrong and miscast. Oh, my gosh. So he said, if you take English.

and the material and you take your intuition, which, you know, he felt that I was very good at that. And empathy and understanding actors and drama and you kind of put it together that would be casting. And I was like, okay. So I did an internship my senior year for study, like for credit. And I loved it. It was a northern exposure was the show that I interned on. Wow. And yeah, and I loved it.

I was like, this is my fit. I feel like it's, I mean, no knock against parents. We love them. But I feel like it's kind of unusual to have your parent just like nail what you're going to be. My dad is, he's amazing. I mean, the amount he reads and the amount he, he's just, he's incredibly intelligent, but he also is just very insightful. So, but the fact that he, he, he, he's.

He matched it so well. It was pretty amazing. I mean, really was amazing. Yeah, I don't, no one in my family was like, have you considered a career in the film industry? Yeah, I mean. You know. Kyle McLaughlin, we covered Dune recently,

had come out of Seattle kind of unexpectedly, like out of U-Dub. Like, I feel like there was a little bit of momentum out of Seattle at a certain point. There was certainly the music scene coming out of Seattle. So there were creative people around, And, you know, at, like, U-W, I'm sure, while you were there. Yeah, and if my memory serves me, the graduate drama program was ranked, like, top in the nation. Really, really highly ranked. And I did want a double major in drama as a freshman, but because we were traveling in the spring,

and that's when a lot of the shows mounted, they said that I couldn't do both. And you were a rower, just for our audience can, like, like, the hardest sport just so everybody understands. I think my hands are still awful. Oh my gosh. Our producer was a rower and he made me erg once in high school.

I played tennis. Oh, yeah. Didn't go very well. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, he's made me erg before also did not go very well. Two strokes in, I was like, and I'm dumb.

Yeah. And just really quick shout out for the UW drama program. Also, Joel McHale went there. That's right. He obviously has had a very successful career. That's right. Gene Smart, I believe. Oh, wow. I love her. A lot of good Seattleites. So casting, obviously, is like an incredibly, incredibly crucial part of filmmaking. That to Chris's point, not everybody, like, I think a lot of people outside of the industry do take for granted.

Isn't it, Lizzie, like, Scorsese says casting is 90%. Wendy, I'm sure you know that. I mean, 90% of any movie, and he's probably underselling it. Yeah. Well, but it's also like, you know, I briefly studied acting and the audition process obviously can be painful, especially for the people that are not going to get the part. So how do you create an environment that's comfortable for everyone involved and how do you draw out the best performances in a very stressful environment? Well, I think that's exactly it. You try and I think a huge part of my job is to try and alleviate as much stress, as much sort of peripheral noise as you possibly can, which I think, you know, directors like Chris, I mean, that was definitely, I think we were both in sync on that.

Chris was always disarming, you know, the actors that were coming in and putting people at ease. And I think, you know, going traditionally pre-Zoom, it was a huge part of going out into the waiting room talking to people. Like, I'm a big hugger. Oh. So I hug everybody that comes in, but there's so much information that's transferred in that hug. You can tell if somebody's too stiff, if somebody's shaking, if somebody is just, you can tell if they're, if they're having a bad day, sometimes people just melt in your arms and you can tell they're just not ready. There's so much information before you walk in that room. And then you can either decide, do I take a minute? Do I figure out what's going on? Do we have a conversation? Do I let somebody go ahead? Or do I just give

them like a let's do this, you know, a little psych up like I'm with you. And it's just to connect so you know we're together. We're here. We're in step. We're going in and facing this, the two of us together. Because not every room is like Chris's room. You know, Some rooms aren't the warmest, and it doesn't mean that they're bad. It's just different dynamics, you know. There's a lot of writers that aren't necessarily as comfortable with people, some more than others, you know. So I think it's our job to try and absorb as much of that tension if it is a tense room,

try and take it in. Sometimes I'm just a ding-dong and I'm like distracting, so they don't even pay attention to the grumpy person on the couch or, you know, each session is different, but it's our job to be the sponge and suck up anything that doesn't help, if that makes sense. That's so, yes, it does. And I, like, I don't know why it never occurred to me before how much empathy is involved in your job, but, like, so much, you truly have to be so caring in, in order to get what you need out of these people.

Well, I think it, yeah, I think it helps. And it's self-serving, right? the more people are relaxed and the more they feel supported and prepared, the better they can do. And, you know, sometimes, I mean, we've cast the first person who's walked in a room before. And it's been, they've nailed it and that's that. And sometimes we'll see more people, but we knew that was the person out of the gate. And so, you know, the goal isn't to be casting the same role for 12 weeks. Like, the goal is to home.

own in on what the producer, director, writer, what they're looking for. So, again, the more that we can let the unimportant parts of it, so the work can be done, the more we can let that happen, and the quicker we can let that happen, the faster we can sort of really cast as well. And we're going to get into the Zoom, how that's changed things, sort of a specific anecdote I want to ask you about that involves an actor we both know. But before we do that, could you actually just walk us through, let's say, for a television show or it could be an indie film like the work we did together, can you walk us through just so people know, what's the process? You know, you take the script, break it down, get submissions, because it's an incredible amount of work.

And you have screened so many people before the director even enters the process. Correct. So if you wouldn't mind just the high-level breakdown of those steps of your job, I think it's fascinating. Sure. So we get the script. Generally, especially if it's a film, you have time with the director to really, because in film it's more the director who we're working with closely and the producers, but the director more so than television. and we break down the roles, get input on, you know, is the role as written? Is it really this age? Does it have to be a 40-year-old white guy?

Can it be, you know, something else? So we work with that, get that breakdown out. It gets released. So it can get released to actors, like actors' access, generally gets released. to all the agencies and managers in the city, in Toronto, New York, sometimes Australia, England. It depends how broad you can look. Some films don't have a budget to bring people in,

but generally now it's a pretty far search. And then we get submissions, and sometimes we could have up to 6,000, 7,000 submissions for a role. sometimes a co-star role has 5,000 submissions. So you put a breakdown of 20 rolls and, you know, 20 times 5,000. And it's a lot of submissions. How do you do that? Like, how do you begin to sift through that many?

And when you say submissions, you're talking about self-tapes, right? No, no, no, just basically the picture and resume being submitted. So in the olden days, you would get these, you know, those mail bins. Yeah. And the post office just dropped these mail bins. And it would just be full, probably 20 of those. And we would open every envelope and then we'd sort, put all the pictures in a rolls, and then we'd just be flipping through the picture.

So now is the same concept, but it's, you know, digital. So you, you end breakdown services and casting networks. There's a few different places that you can use, basically have the picture and resume and often the demo all digitally, you can log in and click, which is great because as you're going to submissions, you can actually, you like somebody's look, you can click and watch a one minute reel. So you can do a lot of digging before you even get into the room, which is fantastic. So you get 100,000 up to, you know, submissions easily.

And then, but you can't just hand 100,000 submissions over to directors and producers. No. So, yes, correct. So it's our job to whittle down, you know, however many people were going to bring into a session. So I had one show that the producer and supervising director said would only let us bring four in four actors per role because they didn't want to sit through auditions. They had a lot to do. So I had to narrow. That's very few.

Yeah. Yeah. And that was frustrating because there's no wild card then. You know, it's like, here's what I know, when I'm pretty sure I want from the little bit of communication you've given me from your scout. But it doesn't give me room to try something that they didn't think of, you know, which is the joy of the job. Which is how we got Dan back at all in Worm. Right. Was Wendy brought Dan in against type because I had only known him playing like a hard-ass character in Veep, a potty mouth. And there was like the sensitive. father, and she's like, you should watch this other show that he's done, and he's great. And then, sure enough, like, that became... And he's wonderful.

And I didn't dance great, and I continue to have a relationship with him today. Oh, he's wonderful. So you narrow it down, depending on the bandwidth of the director. Correct. You're going to bring in a certain number of folks. Correct. And then how much input do you either get or like to stake out in your ideal relationship when you're, you know, how do you like this process to go with, you know, how much input?

the director or with the showrunner, you know, or whoever you're working with in an ideal world in terms of, you know, how much input you're getting in this process. It's an interesting, yeah, it's a very good question. I, I fluctuate because I actually kind of like not knowing anything because I like to come at it and to see if I nailed it in my own mind and to not get too tainted in sort of of what I'm looking for, but it only works if we're in the room together, you know, or like with self-tapes, it does not work because that's part of the big problems with self-tapes is there's no feedback. And so, you know, whereas when you're in the room, it's meaning an actor can't adjust. Well, they can't adjust or I don't, I just

get an email going saying, you know, I didn't respond to anybody. Or I kind of like so-and-so, but I don't know. Let's see more. Well, I don't know what or why or I, or I'm not picking up the ingredients as we go. So every time somebody walks out of the room, you know, like you, Chris, you would say, well, I love this, but it's not quite this and that age doesn't quite work because if they're too mature or, you know, if we're doing kids, there's, there's that automatic feedback where you're like, got it, got it. And so you keep adjusting to hone in on what your vision is. Because, you know, at the end of the day, it's, it's, you know, you hope you're working with somebody with great taste. But sometimes you have to adjust your taste to their vision, right? And it may not be my taste.

To the bad taste. But it's my job to figure out your taste and to find the actors that I think fit that. And whether it's mine or not, it's my job to solve it and figure out what yours is because it's all subjective. So it doesn't mean that you're right or I'm right. We're just solving it. So yeah, without the feedback and just the self-tapes with, things seem to me to take a lot longer to cast now. Yeah, I bet. And like in a situation where you're not getting a ton of input or like you say you you like that to certain degree when you're starting because you kind of just start with the script. How does that work? Like, what cues do you look for in the script to help you know, which of those 5,000 headshots are going to be right? Do you sort of, do people pop into your head as you're reading? Or is it more like, are there sort of signals you look for? Again, I think it's the role ingredients. Like, sometimes it's the

dialogue, you know? I just read this fantastic, you know, funny script and write a word. way, I could just start the voice and the type of humor. There's a few people that just jump out right away that would get it and that almost sort of have that intonation and the way that they deliver lines or the sarcasm. So I think there's a bunch of different sort of cues to look for. Also, when you're looking at leads, you know, it's different than a co-star, whereas you don't want to just bringing the same people all the time. So you're always trying to add new people. But then you have also some people that you know can just nail it or are going to be great on set. And so you, you know, you include that pool and then you're always trying to add to it and get it to be a deeper

and richer pool all the time. But for leads, I think there's a lot of people that just pop in right away that you love or that you're like, I think they can do it. Maybe they can do it. I'd like to try. You know, you've had them come in doing a lot of drama, but they're super funny. Going in and going out of the room, you're like, I've got to try this. Like, you don't know. Oh, that's so cool. So you kind of get to, you have the opportunity to sort of open actors up to maybe things even they don't know that they can do. Yeah. There's an actor that that is now mostly just as comedy, but I remember he used to come in for like a lot of drama and like heavy, heavy stuff. Oh, come on. Can you share a name? Is there any? Well, I'm,

This is my memory, but David Walton, he would come in and, you know, and he was kind of a newbie to L.A. And I say this with love because I just adore him, but he would come in and, and he would do these funny things. Like, he leaves his mouth open or he would just do odd things and he was so funny and charming. He is so funny. He was like the handsome, you know. He's super handsome. That's the thing. Exactly.

Distractingly handsome. Yeah. But then I was sitting, he's leaving. I'm like, he has such a weirdo, you know, in the best way, in the way that I love. And he's so quirky, but we're Hollywood. We're trying to make him the leading man, his agents wanted him to be the leading man, which he can do. But then I was like, oh, he's just got to come in for comedy.

Like, that's what I, so it's fun when you do, it's part of why I love doing comedy and drama, because you really, the pool just gets so much wider. Can we jump into the Zoom thing really? quickly because it's so frustrating. There's an actor you cast in my first movie, Lucas Gage, who obviously has gone on to do wonderful things. He's a writer in his own right. He went viral during the pandemic for an audition.

The director was basically caught in the hot mic. The hot mic, somewhat disparaging his apartment. Isn't it so sad this guy lives in this apartment? Lucas obviously has a very good sense of humor. I don't think he took it too. Too much to heart. But it's, it shows how impersonal and distancing the process is, not being in the same. And I've done Zoom auditions. They're night and day. How have you managed that? Like, have you been able to get back to in-person auditions now? Have you really like, I would imagine you probably push for that as much as possible? Like, what have the last couple of years been like? It's, yeah, I really, I don't enjoy Zoom for, for the reasons that we've talked to. about, but also, you know, you miss so much of the nuance. You, even going past a two-hour in-person

session, you see attention spans start to wane. And, you know, then I'm not there to, the camera's off generally. So, you know, I can't, I don't, I can't police them who's watching or focusing and there's distractions. And you miss your hug. You miss your trademarked Wendy Hug at the top. Yeah. But there's just so much information you're not getting. And the feedback's not quite the same on Zoom, you know. I mean, I think you can adjust. We've had some really successful outcomes for sure.

I mean, we did Abbott Elementary on Zoom and Chem reads on Zoom. And, you know, it worked. People really were all in to make it as familiar and personal and intimate. is it could have been, but it's hard. It's hard. I just find it, you know, and we've done, we've done some comrades. We've had like a handful of in-person. We've done callback. So I've probably had 10 in-person sessions. But it's interesting before the pandemic, in television, very rarely would anyone come to a session. They just never came. So we were for years, We pretty much did everything, just ourselves, put it on tape and sent it off digitally for them to watch.

Interesting. Why is that? Because sometimes the directors aren't brought on early enough, so we're casting slightly ahead of the episode because the pace is so fast. And then once they're in production and, you know, and that train is going, it's harder and harder for them to leave prep or especially if they're an alternating director. like it's or producers it's it gets timewise very tough have you ever had to recast a role on a project and how do you handle that yes so one was it was somebody that the network jammed against you know everybody oh meaning they push this person through against very hard and after the table read it was very apparent and so that was sort of their job to correct um

But it did happen recently. And yeah, it's heartbreaking. You know, it is heartbreaking because sometimes it's, well, in this instance, it was certainly not the actor's fault. It just, for one reason and other, didn't quite work, you know. It was also after a table read. So do you usually stay through a table read then to kind of make sure that? Yeah.

Because things, you know, sometimes the chemistry or the, that people are, missing the beats or, yeah, a lot of things can happen. At least on the feature side, it feels like for the lead roles in a lot of these, especially streaming projects, no on auditions. Like, at least in the movies that I'm possibly circling. It's like just, oh, we think we can get this person or this person's interested or a script I'll get handed. This guy's already attached.

Like, that happens to me constantly. How frustrating is that. I find it very frustrating. How frustrating is that on your end of things, too, where it's like, well, now I have to build around something that might or might not even be the right initial foundation, you know, for the house that I'm building. Do you run into that very often?

Yeah, a lot for, you know, of, yeah, with sort of premium cable or when you're trying to get packages or films, it's true. And it's interesting because I've even, you know, working with actors that direct. And they're like, people don't want to audition. I'm not interested. You know, I don't want, I'm not going to, I'm, and we've done it.

But I also think, but you're offer only all the time. You don't audition. So it's, you know, it's interesting. But it's hard. It's a leap of faith. Can you explain that offer only really quickly for anyone that doesn't know? Yeah, they won't audition. They generally won't read the material, whether it's actually the actor's choice

or the agents protecting, you know, that's a big part of it too, is, you know, the ego of that. That means the actor is literally not getting the script unless there is an offer coming in with attached to the script. Correct. And they will not audition. You won't be able to hear them with the material. You won't be able to hear their interpretation of the role. You don't know if they are going to be in agreement with how it's written or if they are going to have their own version. or their own adjustments. My gosh. I don't, how do you do that?

I mean, I had my own very limited experience with this recently on a podcast where we were trying to find a host. And we did run into some offer only. And it was so hard because I found myself being like, well, I need to hear it. Like I don't, I guess we, you know, we'll go to some people who are willing to do a mic test. How do you do that? Do you find yourself gravitating towards people?

who are willing to go on tape? Or is it more like you just know sometimes that someone is right and you go for it? Yeah, I think it's a bit of both. Sometimes we have been actually, and it seems like a little bit more recently where we will, the producers or directors won't make that jump.

That they have to hear it. Or they at least have to meet and talk about it and get like a temperature on the material and on the vision. and their interpretation of the role. So I think that's also very important. It's like an offer subject to a meeting. That's at least a little bit more helpful.

Yeah, I think it's super hard to not hear it. It kind of feels like an arms race. You know what I mean? Like all of the agents want to be able to say that their actor is offer only. Like it just feels like this nuclear proliferation. I don't know if it started with probably started before streamers and now it's getting worse.

You know what I mean? With like the streaming money that's coming in and whatnot. But anyway, I'm sorry I interrupted you. It just feels like more and more actors are now offer only. At least that's my perception. Yeah, listen, if I was getting offer only for the podcast. I'm like, I can't imagine what you're dealing with. Well, but also it's then are you, if you haven't seen the actor do it before,

you know, you're just going to kind of regurgitate a variation of. a role because maybe you're not going to make this huge leap of faith. You're like, well, I don't know if it's in the wheelhouse. It very well may be, but I'm not going to risk my entire film on a maybe, you know? Right. And you don't get the David Walton situation where you're able to try him on something totally different than what he's been getting cast in. Right.

Or, I mean, there's just so many performances, you know, that over history where you would never have imagined that actor. in that completely different pair of shoes, you know, like Dustin Hoffman, literally. But you, but you, you know, so, so do you just keep casting them in the same sort of role? Because you have, you know, do you take a leap of face? And sometimes you do, and it tanks,

and we've seen those films where you're like, that couldn't have been more poorly cast, or just an ill fit. I understand why they were probably the biggest name that they could get for the distributor, to get your money, to get, you know. That's the thing. It's like, do you want to get your movie made?

Or do you want to stay true to whatever artistic integrity you may consider yourself in possession of at any given moment? Enough about some of those downer aspects of it, of the casting process. How do you navigate? This is going to get more toxic. How do you navigate? This is the part of the process that everyone has an opinion on. It's like there are so many parts of the process. where it's like production design

and the producers don't look up from their laptop and they give you a thumbs up or something like that. Casting, everybody is... No, listen, my mom has an opinion. Yeah, exactly. As you mentioned. Yeah.

You did when you were a child. Yeah, with, oh, my daughter doesn't like that actor. It's happened. Yeah. They don't, they didn't like that show. And you're like, what does it have to do with? I've had that conversation before. Is she paying for this movie?

Yeah. Yeah. So how do you navigate the often competing desires of the. the studio producers, various producers, because the producers also represent different interests in many instances, and the director or writer, director, or showrunner, you know, whoever the kind of the lead creative is. How do you, you know, it's such a political job, too, I would imagine.

It is. Yeah, I feel like that's the part that I struggle with the most because, you know, because I also have my opinion. And it's hard to sometimes be quiet. you know, with the producers' directors, you generally hope that for that project to have moved forward to that stage, they're already on the same page. And usually that relationship is bonded before I stepped in. Not always. Sometimes, you know, I'm ahead of the director on television. Quite often, like, even on a pilot, I'll be ahead of the director coming on.

But, you know, so generally speaking, you hope that they're in step. the producer and directors. And then the studio, yeah, I mean, it's tough. I've watched shows, you know, just get noted and noted and noted. And the show has changed so drastically from the show that was purchased to the show that's about to go to camera. And then the table rate happens. And then all these notes come back in and it's going back to the show that they purchased on paper. And it's, you know, I don't.

You know, why, how, who's justifying a job? I don't know. But some of these notes are just crazy. And then you're listening to the writer and the director, and they're debriefing you on the torture that they're going through and the creative neutering that they're experiencing. And it's hard. And it's hard to support because you also, you know,

there's certain actors or certain, there's certain, I'll probably get in trouble for saying that certain actors that, you know, and a certain network won't hire again for whatever reason, you know. That's not surprising, yeah. Yeah, if they've had a bad, a bad experience or,

you know, then you have to kind of know who's not on that list or who not to suggest. That's so much to keep in your head at one time. You totally don't have to answer this. if you don't want to, but we have a couple more questions for you. What is the most challenging role that you've cast? The most challenging was a show called Carnival. Yeah.

And we needed to cast a triple amputee. Oh, wow. So both legs and one arm was the story. and we found a couple people. And then the young man that we ended up, who was wonderful, and we got sort of down to the line with him, and we were getting close to shooting,

and then they realized, oh, no, you know what, we need the other arm. What? It has to be, it has to match a previous dream, so it has to be, could you just get somebody with the different arm? And I was like, no. Switch the arms.

What? Yeah. They're like, it should be the right arm up the left arm. I can't remember which arm it was, but it was, yeah. I would have lost my mind. Yeah. Yeah. The fact that we even had options, you know.

Seriously. Oh, my God. That's insane. Yeah. That's actually one of the craziest things. That is nuts. Also, the way the studio phrased it, I'm sure, they're like, well, you don't have to fire him, but could it be the other arm?

Because, you know, that's how, like, the studio would. You know, it can't. Yeah. Wow. Oh my gosh. Any of my expectations. Of course. Great.

In terms of what would be challenging. Not dissimilar, I guess, from that. So any just broad level, major differences between film and television casting. You've mentioned the director being on, obviously much earlier in film than in television. Are there any other broad differences that our audience should understand? Generally, time. Um, usually with the movie you'll have, you know, you could have months and months to cast. I mean, it could be, you know, six months. It could be two months.

Television, you know, if it's a pilot, you, you are generally have 10 weeks is what they'll bring you on for the studios. If you're now in, um, in production on episodic, uh, comedy is every week is a brand new script. So you're casting, flip. You start all over from scratch the next week, and the turnover is very, very, very fast. And if it's one hour, you would generally, that would be an eight-day cycle. So weekends will fit in. So it might extend to a week and a half, maybe two weeks. But the turnaround is a little slower, but you generally have more roles as well with an hour.

You have more time to tell the story. And, you know, and again, now with cable, television has become such incredible storytelling now. So they really, the overlap is becoming more similar. And especially with, you know, a high-level pilot, you could have months and months and months to work on it in advance. If you could give aspiring casting directors one piece of advice, what would you say? I would say not to get discouraged by the remote and the Zoom. I think it's, it feels to me like it's a pretty tough time to be jumping into casting because so much of, so much of the work that I get is based on relationships that I've had,

you know, from being in person and, you know, spending time with different actors. And so to not, to not be able to be able to be. in the room, I think to not give up. If it's something that you really love and you're really interested in, it's going to take a little bit longer, and it's going to be a little bit not as, I don't think you're going to get the, feel the rewards or those immediate validations,

but just to keep grinding and stick with it. And how about for actors out there and their agents, if they happen to be listening, What piece of advice would you give them? Actors, I would just say bringing you to every role. Don't try and overthink what we're looking for. Don't try and think about how you imagine we see the role. Bring how you feel the role.

Bring your essence into it. Bring your version because no one else will have that version. And if you try and just simulate what you think we're looking for, there'll be 20 versions of that. I love that. I'm reading Carrie Elvis's book about making the Princess Bride right now. And that's something that it sounds like Rob Reiner said to his actors quite frequently when they were kind of freaking out was like, you don't need to worry about it. Like it's you. It's like I wanted you. It's you. So you don't have to do anything. Just like go in and you're already, you're already the character. And I think that's so like what a lovely sort of release to give to your actors. It's true. It's really true though. You're going to be right or you're not going to be right. But you're. So much of that is out of your control. So don't try and control it. Oh, that's such good advice.

I think that's a great note to end it on, Wendy. Thank you so much for being a part of our little show. Everybody out there, watch Abbott Elementary. Check it out. Check out weird. It's weird. It's super fun. Great unexpected casting in that film from the lead role on down. Wendy, anything else you would like to plug before we let you go?

Unemployment. California. Give unemployment to the writers and casting directors and everybody. We need it because of the strike. And hopefully we will all be back to work soon. Wendy, hopefully I'll have a script I can be sending you soon. So we'll see.

And you can fix what's wrong with it by finding people who can say the words in a way that makes me sound smart. You are smart. Yay! And with that, guys, check out again, Wendy's list of credits. They're incredible.

And check out Abbott Elementary. And Wendy, thanks again for taking the time to chat with us tonight. Thanks, Chris. Thanks, Lizzie.