Over the course of almost 100 years, Central Casting has come to dominate the TV and movie trade as a significant supply of employment for hundreds of actors throughout networks, studios, and streaming platforms. But present and former workers say that energy has gone unchecked internally, creating what they are saying is a poisonous office the place complaints of racism, typecasting, and mistreatment are ignored and managers use intimidation and bullying to run the operation.
BuzzFeed News spoke to at least one present and 11 former workers about their experiences at Central Casting, all of whom needed to stay nameless for worry of retribution within the trade. Six workers mentioned they despatched a gaggle e mail to firm executives in June about how the corporate can enhance the poisonous work atmosphere, took half in a subsequent inside HR investigation, and have been then laid off in July and August.
The workers mentioned they have been advised their jobs have been being eradicated on account of cuts due to the coronavirus’s influence on the corporate’s backside line. But a few of them have been confused; previous to their e mail to executives, they mentioned, they have been in good standing and even praised for his or her efficiency. The layoffs felt focused, six former workers mentioned, which left folks scared of talking up.
“Laying off those employees fuels the toxic work environment because it looks like a threat,” the present worker mentioned.
Former workers mentioned it was widespread for staffers to be yelled at and cry overtly within the workplace at their desk. They additionally mentioned the corporate buries complaints it receives from actors about work situations on set, together with sexually inappropriate habits, in addition to getting typecast into sure roles based mostly on their race.
“Central Casting is responsible for the treatment, employment, and facilitation of careers for thousands of people, both in their own company and the people they represent,” one former worker mentioned. “There are people who rely on them, and Central Casting couldn’t care less about what goes on there as long as they are getting their money.”
In an announcement, Central Casting’s mum or dad firm, Entertainment Partners, mentioned “we are already aware of some of these issues and are taking them seriously.”
“Our company maintains a workplace free of discrimination, harassment and retaliation and follows all applicable equal employment opportunity laws,” the company mentioned. “We investigate all employee complaints thoroughly, including those issues raised here, and review, evaluate and implement changes as appropriate to ensure a safe, diverse and inclusive workplace that is welcoming to all employees.”
With workplaces in Los Angeles, New York, Georgia, and Louisiana, the company is the primary hub for background actors to e book gigs. Its web site and Instagram account boast credit on a whole lot of hit exhibits, together with Grace and Frankie, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Law & Order, Dead to Me, You, American Horror Story, Dear White People, The Morning Show, and This Is Us. The company additionally lists Brad Pitt, Kristen Wiig, Eva Longoria, and Tiffany Haddish as a few of its famed alumni on its web site. As one former worker put it, “If you’re working background in LA, you’re working with Central Casting.”
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Background actors choose to be part of Central Casting’s database, the place they’re then chosen to fill roles on the units of movies and TV exhibits. Casting administrators are then accountable for being the go-between for movie and TV productions and the background actors.
But the staff mentioned the identical tradition of toxicity and indifference they confronted each day within the workplace affected how Central Casting dealt with complaints filed by actors about how they have been handled on set.
Former workers mentioned it was widespread for background actors to complain about how they have been being typecast into stereotypical roles based mostly on their race. According to the staff, there’s a coded language that’s used to debate casting actors as “perpetrators, crackheads, and terrorists” and when casting “a main character who goes to school in a ‘rough’ area but lives in ‘a good area.’”
“A lot of Middle Eastern background actors who’ve worked on shows like Homeland and S.W.A.T. would call in [to Central Casting] and be like, ‘I’d love to do other roles; I don’t only want to be a terrorist,’” a former worker mentioned.
One former worker mentioned once they tried to solid interracial {couples} and Asian Americans for a community TV sitcom, they have been advised by the manufacturing to solely rent {couples} of the identical racial background and that they “only want real Asians.” The former worker additionally mentioned they have been advised by a white lighting director to not solid “darker-skinned Black actors because they’re harder to light.”
“If your lighting team isn’t good enough to light the whole spectrum of human color, your lighting team needs to be better,” the worker mentioned.
One former worker mentioned they obtained various complaints from actors who labored on outstanding showrunner Ryan Murphy’s Hollywood, which began streaming on Netflix in May. After working sooner or later on set, they mentioned, background actors known as to cancel for the following day’s shoot as a result of they skilled warmth exhaustion and weren’t given sufficient water or allowed to sit down down on set for your entire day.
A Netflix spokesperson mentioned this isn’t true and that the manufacturing adopted all security tips on set.
Another former worker mentioned they bought a criticism about how a foremost actor on the set of ABC’s Black-ish touched a girl background actor inappropriately and made her uncomfortable.
“There’s a massive power dynamic between background actors and everyone else on set, and these productions shouldn’t be able to get away with this when the productions are names like Ryan Murphy and Black-ish and all these huge shows that have huge followings,” a former worker of Central Casting mentioned.
ABC didn’t reply to a request for remark.
But when it got here to protocols for dealing with the complaints, former workers mentioned, they have been instructed to ahead the actors to a voicemail quantity for a expertise relations consultant — however the identical actors would then name again and say they have been pissed off that they by no means bought a response. Former workers mentioned they’d additionally obtained telephone calls about incidents of sexual harassment on set; typically, background actors would name Central Casting with complaints as a result of they’d by no means obtained a response from expertise relations.
“I noticed that a lot of people would call back constantly who were scared to death about whatever was happening to them on set, and no one was there to help them,” a former worker mentioned. “It was really hard to get a hold of someone who would do something about these problems.”
According to some former workers, actors have been hesitant to report incidents that occurred on set as a result of they have been afraid they wouldn’t be employed for future jobs. They have been additionally cautious of a rumored “blacklist” for background actors, which former workers mentioned shouldn’t be actual. However, they did say Central Casting is aware of it’s the principle company on the town and makes use of its place to its benefit.
Typecasting and feeding into racial stereotypes is a bigger concern that isn’t unique to Central Casting — however because the main company for background actors in Hollywood, one former worker mentioned, it nonetheless perpetuates typecasting in an enormous method.
“That’s basically what casting is: playing into these clichés that we all have in our brains about certain situations and how we picture certain types of people. It’s not necessarily Central’s fault, because productions ask for casting breakdowns, and a lot of these issues are because of systemic racism,” one former worker mentioned. “It’s about what everybody’s perception of these things are, and it’s hard to pinpoint where that starts — but in casting it was like, ‘Fill in the cliché as much as you can.’”
