👀 What Casting Director Rori Bergman wants to see from you 🫵🏻

🎬 Welcome to The Reelarc Rundown 🎬

🔸 Casting Director Rori Bergman really doesn’t want you to lose sight of one thing
🔸 Matrix 5 is coming
🔸 Who you need to know from We Were the Lucky Ones

All that and more on this week’s Rundown ⤵️

Industry News

Casting Directors Want to See *YOU* in the Room

Casting directors Rori Bergman (I’m Thinking of Ending Things, The Americans) and Karlee Fomalong (No Hard Feelings, Rabbit Hole) spoke to Casting Networks about a variety of industry topics. They had these excellent words of advice for actors auditioning for them:

RB: “I think educating yourself on the projects that either that director works on or that writer has written or the kind of projects the casting director tends to work on and get a sense of the tone of the world helps you make decisions.” (Psst…this is what our newsletter section “Behind the Screens” is all about!)

KF: “At the Oscars, Da’Vine Joy Randolph made me cry because it was all about her just always being herself and having a strong point of view. That’s all we’re asking. We want you to come in fully as yourself doing your version of something.”

RB: “Don’t spend so much time trying to fit yourself into the box that you think we want you in. You lose sight of everything that makes you you, and that’s ultimately what elevates something from a character on the page into something three-dimensional.”

The Biggest TV Event of the Month

Deadline’s annual Contenders Television event is April 13-14 in LA at the Directors Guild of America (with a virtual livestream you can RSVP to). Contenders TV dives into the hits of the past year, as well as upcoming projects that should be on your radar. Most major studios and streamers are scheduled to participate, as well as showrunners like David Benioff, D.B. Weiss, Lulu Wang, Sarah Schechter, and Lee Eisenberg.

Another New Neo?

It’s official: a 5th movie will be added to the Matrix universe and this is the first time a Wachowski won’t be sitting in the director’s chair(s). Drew Goddard has an interesting assortment of directing credits- The Cabin in the Woods, Bad Times at the El Royale, and four episodes of Mike Schur’s ensemble comedy The Good Place. Goddard got his start as a staff writer on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. He wrote the screenplays for Cloverfield, World War Z, and The Martian as well as created Netflix’s Daredevil series.

WB president of production Jesse Ehrman stated- “Drew came to Warner Bros. with an new idea that we all believe would be an incredible way to continue the Matrix world, by both honoring what Lana and Lilly began over 25 years ago and offering a unique perspective based on his own love of the series and characters.”

Box Office Numbers

1. Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire - 80 mil - Warner Bros.

2. Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire - 15.6 mil (73.3 total) - Sony

3. Dune: Part Two - 11.4 mil (252.6 total) - Warner Bros.

4. Kung Fu Panda 4 - 10.3 mil (151.8 total) - Universal

5. Immaculate - 3.3 mil (11.1 total) - Neon

Behind the Screens

Let’s take a look at the individuals at the helm of Hulu’s new miniseries We Were the Lucky Ones.

WWtLO is adapted from the 2017 book of the same name by Georgia Hunter which was inspired by the story of her own family. It follows the Kurcs, a Polish Jewish family, throughout the Holocaust. The series stars Joey King, Logan Lerman, Henry Lloyd-Hughes, and Amit Rahav.

Adapted by Erica Lipez, Lucky Ones is produced by 20th Television. Along with Thomas Kail, Lipez also served as showrunner and executive producer. Lipez’ other producing credits include The Morning Show, Bates Motel, and Julia. Thomas Kail has produced Fosse/Verdon, Grease Live!, and Hamilton. He is the upcoming director of the live-adaptation of Moana. Watch Erica & Thomas discuss the challenges and rewards of adapting WWtLO-

We Were the Lucky Ones was cast by Fiona Weir (Damsel, La Chimera, Fantastic Beasts) & Florina Fernandes (Wednesday, The Romanoffs).

Weir won an Artios Award in 2016 for her casting work on Room. Here she discusses why she was drawn to casting as a storyteller.

The limited series has had three directors so far- Amit Gupta (His Dark Materials) Nease Hardiman (Jessica Jones) and Thomas Kail himself.

Reelarc Casting Board

NYC
male, 25-35, any ethnicity
female, 28-33, any ethnicity
female, 20-25, any ethnicity

LA
male, 40-55, any ethnicity
female, 11-13, any ethnicity
female, 40-50, any ethnicity

Quiz Time

First-responders procedural 9-1-1 recently reached a milestone all actors hope for their shows- 100 episodes. In honor of their achievement, can you put the following series in order from least to most episodes aired? (Check the answers at the bottom to see official episode tallies.)

• Grey’s Anatomy

• Guiding Light

• It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia

• Law & Order: SVU

• Shameless

• The Simpsons

Trends on your FYP

While Letterboxd is its own social media platform, they have a presence on others too. Our favorite video series we see from them on YouTube and Tiktok is “Four Favorites” where they ask actors, directors, and writers to name four of their favorite films. You can watch the full playlist here, but these are a few of our faves-

• William Shatner loves Martin Scorsese’s view of Americana in Goodfellas

• Emily Blunt’s seen Romancing the Stone at least 50 times

• Will Gluck is always trying to recreate the feeling he had after first watching Dead Poets Society

• Dirty Dancing is the seminal movie of Natalie Portman’s youth

• The Matrix made Keegan-Michael Key ask “What is this? And can I have some more of it now?”

What We’re Watching This Weekend

🎥 For an action-packed revenge adventure, Dev Patel’s Monkey Man now in theaters

🎥 He didn’t just do Star Wars, you know- George Lucas’ classic American Graffiti is now streaming on Netflix

🎥 For a good mystery - Colin Farrell’s new series Sugar for Apple TV+

🎥 For your ensemble comedy fix - all six seasons of Community are now on Peacock

🎥 For the Andrew Scott fans - limited series Ripley (yes, based on that “incredibly talented” movie) on Netflix tomorrow

🎥 Finally! Starting today you can screen this year’s Best International Feature Oscar winner Zone of Interest on Max

Quiz Answers: Shameless - 134, It’s Always Sunny - 162, Grey’s - 420, SVU - 544, Simpsons - 762, Guiding Light - 15,762
(P.S.- Have a story or industry info you think should be featured on the Rundown? Let us know - [email protected]!)