Bernard Telsey & Adam Caldwell for ‘Being Heumann’ | The Business | SAG-AFTRA Foundation

This is an absolutely giant ensemble piece. Obviously, it's a period piece, and it's a cast of unknown and largely, dare I say, disabled actors. So it feels like uncharted territory. Can you give us a snapshot of your conversations with Sean Hader at the beginning of this process? She said, are you ready? And we said, yes. We had worked with Sean on a couple of things and most recently on a series called Little America. That was on Apple that was based on immigrant stories. And so each of those episodes required a number of searches. So I think that's one of the reasons that she came to us. I mean, we love working with her, but she knows that we enjoy the searching, the going out, the finding, meeting new people, meeting people who had never thought that they should be auditioning for something before and giving them a shot and a chance to show us what they can do. It's like the sort of original definition, at least when I started casting, of like, normally when you cast something, you pride yourself on the knowledge of knowing all the people that you should be suggesting to the director. But to have a project that you actually don't know who those people are, or I haven't been educated enough myself, it was such a great challenge to like, I'm going to go find it. That I know how to do, right? We know how to do the searches and so does most casting directors. But to get to go on that ride and do something that you've never done before, it was thrilling and exciting. And this was a worldwide search. And so, I mean, can you just give us an idea because, you know, Sean was looking for such specificity and so many actors that you found had very little experience or no experience, actually. So how was this different or unusual? How did you? Yeah, you know, you start with, I mean, the greatest thing about the whole thing was that Apple gave us the time. You know, everybody here knows as actors, it's always so immediate, everything is so fast. You have to go, go, go, go, go. And here, they really allowed us just at first to do a search for Judy, you know, and can you see the women that you know that exist? And obviously, we knew who Ruth was, and I'm sure you're going to talk about that in a minute. But then, once the movie then got greenlit, and we had Ruth, then we had so much more time than we normally do to go and search. And, you know, you do the agent thing, you do the internet, you do the open call searches. We called every organization that was associated with disability, whether it was cultural or not, to see who they might know. You know, everybody knows an actor, right? Like how many friends call and say, will you meet my friend, that actor? Like, you know, I mean, right, our whole lives, you know, I mean, I have to just keep changing my dentist every time. But no, just joking. But, you know, so we would call all those organizations that were not even the cultural ones. And the greatest thing was they all knew who Judy was. You know what I mean? Like everybody knew who she was. So when they heard that there was a movie being made about her life, they were willing to put the word out to there. And you know, we were willing to see anyone. This is not a case where we had to, you know, be strict about how many people we could see, because we did not know so many of these roles and what we were looking for. We went pretty wide with the search for just actors with disabilities, like anyone can submit. And then from there, we started to narrow down specifically to do outreach that was maybe geared toward blind actors or actors with cerebral palsy or, you know, deaf actors. Like it kind of one at a time had to do each individual search as well. So we needed the time. You couldn't do it all at once. You had to do it one step at a time and try to figure out the talent pool for that role. They were all based on real people, too. So that was part of the challenge that was exciting, that we were matching their essence, their sense of humor, what made them idiosyncratic. And their disability. We found it really interesting. And maybe this is like, you know, they're nerding out about casting, but we found it interesting to add that to the equation of we often talk about diversity of some kind and posing those questions and what we're looking for with ethnicity and gender and body diversity. But this was an interesting way to look at a tapestry of disability as well that was baked into the conceit of this movie, that people of all different disabilities were having to come together to fight and to create this movement together. You know, we had all over our office, the pictures of the real people, you know, and there were times as a casting director, you're like, nobody knows who that person is. Can't we just use the actor that we found that is great? And, you know, you know, what I love about Shawn was, you know, she spent two years working with Judy on the screenplay. So, so much research was thrown our way. And they wanted to honor all of those people who were truly in that, you know, the people you saw in that movie, those characters were the real people who were there. And, you know, some of them are alive today, their families are alive. So, you know, she wanted to stick to the, the ethnicity or the gender that those characters were, and made it more difficult, but it was great. It was great. So let's start with finding Judy, you said, you know, Shawn had spent years working on the project with her. And so I'm sure she was very particular about her character and finding the right actress. So what did you understand to be the qualities that were most important that you needed to find in the actor who would play Judy? Well, Bernie has the best Adam has like six words, I have one word. So we'll do his six first. We needed like ferocity, we needed the strength, we needed a sense of vulnerability underneath it, because there's a big question of like, how you how you lead, that was a part of it and how your leading style might be in question. That was a big part of it, a sense of humor, because like, we wanted to make sure that even in Judy, who was so single minded, that there was a permission to, to, to laugh with her at like, the ridiculousness of the situations that she's in with these people. So that was all part of it, which basically, for me means chutzpah, you know, like, being a nice Jewish boy, right? Like and Judy, that was very needed for Judy. I mean, if you research her, and you know her, like, she was just fearless, but with so much joy and with so much dignity. And Ruth was someone who we knew, right? That's one of the, you know, the, the kinds of people we did know. Not well enough. Yeah, not well enough. We had seen her in her... Years and years. Years and years. And we had auditioned her for Vanessa Rose in the Wicked movie the year before, which wasn't the right, you know, thing, but yet we knew who she was. And then we just started auditioning her. And she had that, like, you see it, you know, you all know as actors, like, when you see it, you see it. And there was a sense of like, this is somebody we want to play with. This is someone, you know, again, what I love about this movie, and you will relate, let's use the audition process to find out more about her to see if she could play the role. As opposed to which many of us are in those situations of if they don't do it in the first, you know, few minutes, it's not it. You know what I mean? Like, there just never is enough time for an actor, or an actor is not given enough time for most things for various reasons. But here it was, Sean was going to spend as much time it took for all of those roles. Because so much of this movie is about the essence of these people. You know, I mean, Judy, yes, has to really, really, really act. But a lot of the other characters, if we can pull out their essence on a film, that's almost more important than whether or not they can do their dialogue. I want to get to that further down the line. But first of all, yeah, Ruth, I'm just interested, because you say it was a long process, if you could just sort of describe in a bit more detail each stage, because I'm sure to begin with, there were there were many actresses that you were looking at each stage that Ruth sort of worked with you to accomplish, you know, the audition process? Sure, the I think it was, I think it was probably four or five steps of look at this scene, do it. I think it I think it may have started with a self tape. And the first very first step that she sent in, and we were very excited. And Sean was excited to get it. And that was the first taste. I believe that then there was a we set up a meeting then with Sean. Okay, so this is her first take on it. Can you talk with her? I think they spent a couple hours on zoom talking. Before then, we then got back on zoom with her to work through additional material. And again, this is not like it wasn't. It wasn't. As Bernie said, it was an exploration of like, oh, and this got better. And this was more interesting. Oh, look at the way she approached that. It was kind of like, growing the the the process of like, proving that she's right, that she's doing really good work, and that they're good collaborators together. Because that was important. That's, yes, that's very important for Sean. And that's where I think so much of the zooming was that, you know, if I get to know her after an hour, then I could give her the notes for her to go do the scene with you guys. And then I'll look at it, you know, that kind of a thing. And then I think, then there was the step of, okay, now, the accent was before that, though, I think we were like, now let's, you know, help her with a coach or dialogue coach. She was on her way. Yeah, she was great. But it was just to do a little bit more since you know, she's British, right? You all know that. And then we brought her to New York to do like a day of work session with Sean. And then it was another day of mixing and matching with kitties. So she, she really did a number of steps. And she'll say it, you know, like, as you know, as actors, sometimes that can feel like grueling. But it really wasn't. And I been in a situation when it is that, but it really was like I was saying earlier, it was a process. And I think once an actor can give over to that, and realize that's what this is. So we're working together, right? Acting is working. Sometimes it turns out you don't get the job, but like, they got to do that together. And it allowed everyone in that situation to do their best work. And then getting the part or not getting the part is, you know, secondary for a second, you know, and it was great. It seems like that part would be very important to for Sean, to have those conversations with Ruth. Because so much of this film that sort of the making of it, as well as the actual film must have been about her leadership, and and building that community around her in order to work on set, as well as to perform, you know, both sides of that coin for the actors. Yeah. So absolutely. I mean, Ruth is able to speak better than we can about the way in which Apple set up this project with Sean, to make it as accessible as possible, and to make sure that all of the folks here could focus on their work, and not about the obstacles that they might usually encounter being on a film set about not being able to drink water because there's no bathroom that they can go to, like Apple built 12 new trailers that were accessible, they could use on this, because apparently, there's only maybe one in North America, that the more people we met and auditions would say, have they told you that there's one trailer because we each sign our name on it? And, you know, which is so funny, because as a cast member, when you would suggest somebody with in a wheelchair for a job, whether or not it was a role about that, you know, I would then remember, like production saying, well, we don't have trailers, we can't hire. And I, okay, you believe it at that moment, you're not going to push back for that moment. But then, you know, years later, we'll work on this movie and to hear like, oh, there really was only one trailer that floated all over America. And and the actors Ruth knew that Michael knew that some of the the actors knew that and yet, now there's 12 that anybody can rent, you know what I mean? Plus a makeup trailer to Michael Patrick Thornton, who played Ed Roberts, who's been in the industry for more than 20 years, was the first time he'd ever gotten to go in on a makeup trailer, because he'd never been able to get into one before ever in his whole career. Which is just like, I mean, he's a pretty chill guy. But we heard that was a pretty emotional moment for him, which this is to Apple's credit to Sean's credit, like that they were going to make this movie. Yeah, and it still wasn't millions of dollars. You know what I mean? This was not a huge budget film, but that's where they put the money. You know, even this one little thing, even like the crew, you know, they had to make every you've all been on movie sets, of course, all of these pieces that were over the cords, right? There's wires all over the place in court ramps everywhere, you know, you know, and the crews were all like, can we always have ramps? You know, it actually makes everything a little easier that they we trip over these cords to you know, I mean, it was just like, fascinating to me. And, you know, it'll take a while, but just, you know, diversity, inclusion, all of these things that have happened in the last five or six years, hopefully, things like this will also be in that same realm. I think that's one of the messages that's also very clear in the film, the way these accessibility rules actually made things better for everyone. Right. Absolutely. Right. Like, don't you want someone like that in your movie? You know, I mean, it's no different than when you find an actor from a country that you never saw before. And then everyone's like, Oh, let's put her in our movie. It's like, I want these people in other movies and other projects. So you you do this huge open call for the ensemble. And I think one of the scenes that's perhaps I mean, it's hard to choose, but an incredibly touching scene in the movie is where we see all of the testimonials for George Miller. Right? Yeah. Yeah. And it struck me that, you know, when you when you said that you were working with Sean on people's sort of stories, you know, that when we're asked to do a slate, and sometimes we're asked, you know, if we have a personal connection, if it's a 9-11 story or something, but that you also were asking people for those kinds of personal stories with with their audition tapes. So can you just explain to us, you know, what it was that you were looking for with those, not the performances of the script, but the but the personal story in the audition process? From doing these searches, we have found that if we don't at least acknowledge or allow someone like, please give us a slate, a standard slate. And if there's anything else you would like us to know, please feel free to share. You don't have to, but if you would like to, especially if it's a self tape, or it's part of an open call that we're not actually meeting you to talk to you. So we would, that would happen. And we would get pretty extraordinary stories sometimes, or in their callback, they might share something with us about their connection to Judy, or an experience. But we did have, Sean had written a lot of testimonials that were always possibly being used that were based on the real event, but then also open to the idea that like, depending on who was there, she did spend that entire day letting anyone on that set give their testimonial, the thing that they would like to say if they were given the platform to do in a room like this for the government hearing. And, but so she would offer that in auditions. We usually didn't do it at the beginning, but yeah, we didn't do like the actual testimonials in the auditions, but we had written ones that people would do. But then in a callback, she would say, if you would like to do your own testimonial, like you are more than welcome to do that. Sometimes people would want to, sometimes they wouldn't, but it was, it was incredible for people to, to, to share with us. And I think because of what you were asking, I think because we knew so much of the supporting roles were not about necessarily lots of lines and dialogue, but yet we knew the movie could be about them and they're going to be there the whole three months. And this is why you might just see somebody whiz by, but you feel like now, you know them because they were so part of the group. We wanted to get the essence of the actor, whether it was a real person, never acted before or an actor who we just didn't know. So we, you know, one of the easy things was tell us what you know about Judy Heumann and every one of them, whether they were 17 or 70, they all knew about her because to her, it was like the way we all learned about Joan of Arc. You know what I mean? Like, so that was a way for people to talk and for us to get a sense of who they were and their essence. Cause you know, that's so much about the acting, right? It's the essence of the actor that's auditioning, not just what they're saying. And that was very telling. So then was there a part of the process? I'm sure you still had so many people to narrow down where you got to a point where you were coaching some of these actors who've had very little experience. And can you give us some examples of what that sort of coaching looks like from your end? Sure. We were inviting people who didn't know how to do an audition or hadn't had the experience with it. So that was our job to provide grace in a way that's like, if we see something that there's talent there, we really like you, you, you feel really special, but you just, you don't know how to imagine that there's a bathroom stall here. And like, we might have to help you set the stage, like be in the room with you. Like this is where let's, let's pretend this is the door. This is where the person you're talking to is. And again, that's not about, certainly people train and seasoned actors learn how to know how to do all that, but it, but not knowing how to do that wasn't a reason that we weren't going to continue learning about you. Especially when we saw moments between that made sense of why you're so right for the story. Storytelling that they were doing, you were like, oh my God, how do we put that into the. Yeah. So it was, it was giving people multiple chances and coming back and not making a decision on someone necessarily from the first or second time, or we'd bring them in with Sean. She would work with them. She'd say, okay, well, these, this is the things that I don't know if they're doing yet. Can you guys work with them again? And then show me what you're able to do, which is cause she's also in prep for the whole movie. So like that was happening a lot as well. And then sometimes she would then be like, yes, that's it. We got it after we had worked with them the second time, like without her having to see them again. And sometimes like, you know, doing improvs with them because, you know, that you could see on some of the newer actors, they were so worried about learning the line and doing the line and not remembering the line. It would be like, screw the lines. Like, you know, and Sean was fine with that. Just let's just do the scene as if it's you talking, you know what I mean? And that helped actually a lot. But we also had incredibly seasoned actors like Ruth, like Michael Patrick Thornton, like Russell, Russell Harvard. We had like Matthew Jeffers. We had plenty of people who have disabilities that do work and, and certainly know what they're doing. And we were excited to champion them with Sean when we started to say like, we know and love these people already. You have to meet them. Like they're, they'd be an incredible asset to you as part of our ensemble. Same with the, the non-disabled actors, you know what I mean? Finding the ones that were also willing to be there for three months, knowing that most of them have all had much bigger parts than this. So, and knowing that they're going to sit around a lot and actually be an ally to this situation. And that was fun because you didn't know everyone's personal story and then to find, you know, that those four guys, you know, Mark and Dylan and Will Brill. I mean, they all were just so personally connected to the story. Yeah. It's wonderful. It's such a diverse tapestry and to that point. So, okay. So I, I'm assuming that Mark was in from the get go that Sean maybe sent him the script. He read it. He was in. Not that easy. You know, you got to go through the agents and what's the size of the part. You have no money, you know, all that stuff. Yeah. We started talking about Califano after we had a sense of Judy and the film Greenland. And then, you know, we discussed a bunch of ideas with her, but like we had the image of Califano. I mean, he looks just like him. You saw the end of the movie. Similarities between them. So it wasn't exactly like, you know, that, that much of a surprise, but what got us excited about him is that he's an activist, which very, very, how do we know him from New York and about things. And it was interesting to, to think of him being the opposition. Cause he's got such a heart and he's got such a belief. And he was like, one thing that you said correctly was he did sign on pretty early on, like probably the first of one of those roles. Once he read it and met with Sean and understood what the purpose of this role was going to be and the purpose of the whole movie, he was like all gung ho. And I think he does bring that color to it where he's not just the villain. You understand he's been told to cut the budget and now he's got to, you know, you understand the conundrum that he's in. Yeah. I mean, he doesn't think of himself as a villain. He thinks, you know, I mean, he's progressive. He thinks of himself as like part of the civil rights movement. Yeah. So, yes, you mentioned, you know, some of these seasoned actors, able-bodied seasoned actors, and I loved seeing people like Roberta Calindres. And I was wondering, you know, you guys, I imagine you see everything. So you saw her in Oscar Isaac's Hamlet, or you already knew her because you've auditioned her a million times. I mean, you see everything in New York. Yeah. Quite a lot. And she had just done Cult of Love on Broadway and was fantastic in it. So she was maybe the first person that we pitched to Sean for that, for that part. Right. All right. So let's, I want to go through some of the cast members and maybe you can tell us if there are particularly, you know, extraordinary stories or something. Dylan O'Brien, I thought was fabulous as the cameraman. He's so good, right? Because he's, he's, I feel like the audience's journey, right? Like we all start like him. You know, I mean, like, I'm afraid of someone with a disability. I don't know. And then to become such an ally as his character. And then that was, Adam was saying this yesterday, which we know that, that scene in the courtroom in the elevator really is what happened. You know, he was that last person to sort of talk to Califano. There's video of it. It's actually like a news, a news segment. And so we had that when we were, we had, there was a lot of footage that we, that Sean was able to share with us and her team was able to share with us about these people. But that was a very specific video that she was recreating. That's wonderful. And I think Jim Beavers is always good. It was quite fun to see him as the love interest. John Beavers, yes. Who played Jim. Yes. Yes. Oh, sorry. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You got it. He played Jim. Yeah. We've been big fans of him forever. And You all know which one he was, right? Oh my God. Jim, the really, really tall guy who was sleeping with Judy. The love interest. Yeah. He was on our office, our LA office at Castamon Paradise. We've known him for a while and he, and we needed someone who could sign. So we were auditioning like interpreters and people who could sign. And he had started to learn because of a family member and only knew it a little bit, but there was a question about whether he could do enough for what they needed. And then actually the whole accessibility team were really impressed with the ability of how quickly he was able to pick up what was needed to play the part. I mean, there was such fun thing that sort of textures in the movie to understanding what it would have been like for them in those 28 days, you know, the sex tent and all of those different things. Right. It's all real, all real. That was the best thing about Sean's research that she would say that's real. That, that, that happened. Or like Lynette told me that Judy was sleeping with Jim, but Judy didn't tell me that. So I had to go confront Judy and say, why didn't you tell me that? And she'd be like, Oh, was I sleeping with Jim? I guess I was sleeping with Jim. Like it was so long ago. Okay. So then, you know, you've got actors like, um, is it Antoine Tolliver who played, you know, this black disability rights activist who actually was a victim of gun violence is how he is comes to be in real life. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Not the character. Right. Yes. Yes. We, we met Antoine through his modeling agent because he does a lot of modeling campaigns, which is interesting. I mean, he had been trying to do some auditions and things, but he was, when I was explaining, um, the whole bathroom stall, like this is the bathroom stall. That was his scene that I remember we were in the room with him, like doing that scene where he get where, uh, he's being bathed. And it was actually an extended scene that got cut down from the movie, but it was, you know, putting up chairs. Okay. So imagine this is the, this is the stall. This is what we're like working through here. Um, but he was in New York, so we were able to work with him a couple of times in person. That's wonderful. Yeah. I love watching him in the movie too. He's so expressive. I mean, everybody is, it's really extraordinary. I'm trying to think of the chap who, um, has the pointer. The character is Hale Zukas and that's Andrew Pilkington. How great is he? Right. That was a really fascinating process trying to figure that out. Again, when you're matching, trying to match someone's disability and at Cerebral Palsy, we were auditioning many actors with Cerebral Palsy, but it doesn't always manifest the same. And so we were having what I found to be really thoughtful and consider conversations with actors who might not have a speech disability. Like I would say I have Cerebral Palsy, but I don't know how I feel about like pretending like I have a speech disability. I don't, it's making me feel uncomfortable. So we talk with them about it. They might try it. Um, it wasn't until later in the process when we were really struggling to understand, to try to make sense of the way that Hale communicated. Like we knew he had the pointer. We knew which no one today uses, obviously they all have computers, even that, that physical act that we needed this person to do requires a certain, um, motor skill that someone with this disability might not be able to do. So it was a part of the process of like doing that and then just figuring out like what his verbal communication was. And Andrew, we had met, I think it might've been through one of the disability coordinators brought him up cause he's a filmmaker and we found a video of him in college editing videos. He uses his nose to type and to edit videos like, and he's very fast at texting, which using his nose, which is incredible. And he was like, he said, I am not an actor. I don't know what you guys are talking about. Like, and we talked to him a few times, encouraged him, but we worked with him a number of times. No. And the funny, you know, I remember one of the challenges too, or the opposites, right? Like, so we're trying to cast someone who doesn't communicate verbally. Well, you know, and you're meeting a lot of real people. I'm not making a judgment, but if you're already someone who doesn't communicate verbally through sound, and if it's all this way, you're pretty closed off in general. And yet we have to have a role that delivers like that of someone who's so expressive, even if they're not speaking, like how to do that and how to describe that. So can you act that at the next scene? Like, no. So it's like finding these videos and finding these essences of him. That's like Adam said, you see the video of him going with the movies and you're like, oh, okay, bring that to the scene. Yeah. Yeah. Finding Hale's like mischief and his wit and how Andrew was able to, we just, we literally just ran into him in the lobby of the hotel. It was real exciting to see Andrew. He just got married. It's all a big year for Andrew. No, I know. And it's like a year later, right after the Toronto opening and like half the cast like flew to, where is he in the South? I forget again, like to the wedding, you know? And I'm like, God bless, you know, Connecticut. But like, you know, now we bump into him in the lobby and it's like, I understand what he's saying. You know what I mean? Like you learn, right? We all are not afraid of the differences and you start to, it's great. It seems to me that there are so many challenges, which you must have faced that are just not sort of forefront of our minds when we see what you created here, even though there's so much that we do understand must have been very difficult for you to manifest. So when you look back now and you've seen the film, what is it that strikes you as that you're, I don't want to say pride, but that you know was a struggle, that you know was a challenge, that you are really pleased about the outcome where we might not recognize the difficulty of the achievement? You know, that's a great question for Sean, because every time I see the movie, I mean, she made that happen, right? Like we've found, we just found the actors, she brought each and every one of them the way that we were all watching and did it for three months, you know what I mean? But I segwayed from answering the question, I'm sorry. Can you say it again, though? I mean, because I was just thinking like, Sean did all that. I just think, what was a real challenge that maybe you even didn't know whether or not you would surmount that now you look at it and you're really happy? Yeah, you didn't know. I mean, you loved and there comes a time you're like, you're just happy that they got chosen and like, okay, that one's done. You know what I mean? Like, is it going to be that way? But you don't, you still have fear, because you have no background. And that back, you know, you have no backup to say, but I saw them in this play two months ago, they're going to be great. You know what I mean? So there was a fear. And you know, God bless them all, Sean and our producers and Apple were like, we want you guys at the table read, you know, and we're like, you know, we'd been done for months. And like, you know, usually they forget who we are, you know, and they're like, you want us to come up to Toronto to the table read? And I remember like being so scared. You know what I mean? Because now we're going to be in the room for the first time with all 30, 40 of them. And they're going to be for the first time because only maybe, you know, two of the roles were in person three. And it was like, what happens if it doesn't work? What happens if like it doesn't, you know, okay, well, they have two weeks of rehearsal. So we'll just slip out the back door and like, get on the next plane quickly. But they were so I mean, that's what the fear was. I don't know about you. But I remember going like, it went over like gangbusters. They were all in the room at the same time. The feeling was pretty incredible. And our producer, Kevin Walsh, David Permit, they literally had everyone then give us a standing ovation afterward, which was crazy. Very sweet. It was like, it was one of the better moments, I think, of my career. You know, and then we watched from a distance, like, I mean, we were in the room watching them rehearse, just the transfer. You know what I mean? Just Dennis, you know, the blind guy transferring. You know what I mean? Like, that's where Sean is really a great leader. I don't know if we're answering your question. But like, we do have a lot of fear. Yeah, but we answered it, right? You did. You did. And there really is, you mentioned joy before, there really is so much joy in this film that you brought to life. That was a big part of what we were going for with the humor that everyone needed to bring with the permission, like I think I said, to be able to laugh at all of it that that it's Hale's line that disability is not a tragedy. It's just a tremendous hassle. That's what the movie needed to feel like. It needed to feel like these people, once they got into that building, they then had a pretty amazing time with the drugs and the music and the sex and all that, like we needed to make sure that there's joy in disability and that it's not a sob story. Absolutely did that. I love that line too, when the Black Panthers arrive, and it's what's in those trays, revolution. Thank you both so much for joining us. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you all.