Put on your onesie pajamas. It’s story time.Above is Russell Boast, one of my favorite casting directors. After all the pain and suffering South Africa caused us with Dave Matthews, they totally made up for it with Russell.
A few years ago, Russell was a full-fledged slacker in Cape Town, organizing raves and committing victimless crimes. One Sunday afternoon, while sucking down beer in his back yard with his sketchy friends, Russell got a call from a friend who worked for a local production company.
The company was producing an American commercial for Polaroid, and needed a large group of pierced, tattooed extras. Russell’s friend, knowing he slummed around with these types, called him into her office immediately. When he showed up, her boss offered him half the payment up front to get this job done. Half was $5000– more than Russell had ever seen.
Russell went straight to a drug store, bought 40 disposable cameras, gave them to his friends and sent them out to find the dangerous types. Four days later, Russell had rounded up 5500 people.
Word spread back to the states about this guy that could cast in bunches, and Russell was hired to find a specific group of African tribal natives for Angelina Jolie’s film Beyond Borders. He went up into the hills of Namibia and found them, including the family from which Angelina adopted a baby.
Next thing he knew, Russell was asked to help cast Hotel Rwanda, then hired in America to cast the TV show “24”. Nowadays he casts films full time.
Before I’m accused of planting a huge one on Russell’s ass with this entry, I've earned some sort of immunity after he sent me a friend request on Facebook, the day after my first workshop with him.
If you ever bump into Russell, he’ll add you too, mainly for knowing he’s not from England or Australia. Which I suppose is proof that sometimes in this town it’s not who you know, but where his accent is from.
