Today I sat down with James Bohnen, who will host Launch Pad Casting Workshop on April 11.
I was expecting to get a little insight into his process, talk turkey, and walk out with a clear direction as we get closer to the next LPCW. I knew I’d get something out of it, but I had no idea I’d have so much fun.
Really, all I did was meet him in a Lakeview tea shop, and ask him, “So what do you look for when you’re casting a show that you think distinguishes you from other directors?” The rest was just me taking notes.
He’s incredibly compassionate when it comes to actors and their work, but at the same time, he has very high expectations of the work as the process moves forward. He genuinely wants the actors he sees to succeed, and had several examples of actors sabotaging themselves by putting too much pressure on themselves in an audition.
His emphasis on speech, the music of the text, and the actor needing to be in a safe, comfortable environment is going to teach everyone a lot!
In the beginning, I mentioned the standard three pieces of information I need from any host:
- A text for the actors
- A rubric for feedback, and
- Some bits of wisdom to share with the actors at the end
Instead of getting these three in separate chunks, all we did was talk about theater, auditions, and actors, and I walked out of there with a few pages of notes (and the name of a play). I’ll take those and start refining how exactly James and I will work with the actors.
It was such a fun meeting: the Launch Pad Casting Workshop that James will host is going to be uniquely and organically his. It’s fun to see that as excited as I’ve gotten about LPCW, and excited as actors have gotten, there are directors like James who are having fun with it, too!
Tags: James Bohnen
This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 22nd, 2011 and is filed under Director Interview. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
