“Casting is too easy for others to take credit for”: Richard E. Grant on the invisible moguls of cinema | Oscars 2026

‘I“It’s unbelievable how much information we keep about actors,” says Kelly Valentine-Hendry. “We have our ears to the ground. We know about bad behavior. We know the things actors need in order to give a better performance…” She says directors are “watching all of it, all the time, from the shadows.”

Amid the star-studded brilliance at the Academy Awards this weekend, casting directors will step out of the shadows and into the spotlight with the presentation of the inaugural Oscars’ Choice Cast Award. These quietly pivotal yet almost invisible figures are experts at spotting and distributing talent, and handling the sometimes difficult moods of actors and directors.

Richard E. Grant has long championed the profession into which his daughter, Olivia, moved on. “They typically join a project very early in the development process, and use their script analysis skills and relationships with actors and agents to connect talent to get project financing. They often work for years for a small fee to help get projects off the ground. They are always looking ahead to see who the next big thing will be in a year or two and have the ability to see the next generation of talent,” he told me.

It was director Mary Selway, who died in 2004, who cast Grant for Withnail & I, insisting that director Bruce Robinson audition him for the 1987 film after seeing him in an impromptu film for the BBC. “Her belief in me changed my career,” he says. Meanwhile, Celestia Fox “worked tirelessly on the biographical film Wah-Wah for a small fee for five years, never losing faith and being a non-stop encourager and supporter.” It was she who threw 14-year-old Nicholas Hoult into the lead. “I owe it to her,” Grant adds. And Holt is supposed to be too.

Even as a seasoned star, casting directors remain crucial to his continued success, Grant says. A few years ago, when British acting legend Nina Gould (who was shortlisted for the 2026 Oscar for Hamnet ) asked him to read “for an undisclosed project,” the role turned out to be a villain in the 2019 Star Wars film, The Rise of Skywalker.

Avi Kaufman, the veteran American director of films including Brokeback Mountain and Life of Pi, missed out on an Oscar nomination this year for Sentimental Value – yet four key cast members were nominated. “I feel like I did something right,” she says. But ask her what makes a good director, and she struggles to define it. “You’re not training to be a director,” she says. “I’ve been here a long time. I’ve climbed the ladder. I’ve seen different approaches and different approaches to film and TV production. It’s confidence, it’s intuition.”

Being political is key. Some studios first look at an actor’s overall profile and influence, she says, whereas “it comes from the creative level; I don’t look at a list of who means what.” Strengthening channels of communication is essential, “because I know I can fight for people who may not make sense enough for me. I may be obnoxious too, but you want what’s best for the show.”

Part of the struggle is that you can’t pinpoint in advance what your water feels like. “I did a show for HBO last year, and there was an actor I had loved for years, but never got the opportunity to be one of the leads,” she says. “I had to be careful how I pushed him. A lot of the team didn’t see that.” (She won in the end.)

Hendry, whose credits include Slumdog Millionaire, Fleabag, Bridgerton and Jilly Cooper’s Rivals and who is on the UK Casting Directors Guild panel, sees the process as a mystery. “It’s about managing the showrunner, director, producers, network or studio, and the collective creative vision.” Once you choose one person, the tone is set. “What happens when you cast the next person? What do they do with that tone? How do these actors complement each other? Then you put in a third, a fourth, a fifth, and then you start creating a world that people can enter for two and a half hours.”

There are other considerations beyond acting talent. “Sometimes, you put a team of 50 people together,” she continues. “You have to make sure that the personalities match and that there is no one who might cause trouble. We are constantly looking to protect the performer and production.”

Diversity and inclusion are other key elements. Consider the backlash suffered by last year’s Oscar nominee Emilia Perez, a drama set in Mexico that stars almost exclusively non-Mexican actors (although that was not the only issue). To “dive deeper into authenticity,” Hendry says, she searches foreign film festivals for talent. “We’re given material from shows from all over the world to consider. We go to one in particular in Kilkenny every year. We go into small bars and back rooms and watch their really niche films from Finland or Sweden or Russia or France or Germany, or anywhere but England. I’ve picked a lot of people from that experience.”

BAFTA gave the director a gong in 2020; The Academy is only now following suit. Grant points out that the profession is overwhelmingly female, “they have to deal diplomatically with the dominance of male directors and producers, and are reluctant to acknowledge how important casting directors are.” Added to this is the relative obscurity of its influence. “I think everyone likes to think of themselves as directors, and casting is a very easy thing for others to take credit for.”

Hendry agrees. “Everyone, including the man in the street, thinks they know about it. I can’t jump on a plane and go find a valley in the middle of the Czech Republic, like location scouts do. Whereas anyone can say: ‘I like Josh O’Connor, he’s good.’ I don’t think people fully understand the nuances of casting, our importance, and how good we are at our jobs.”

As for whether these complexities will be appreciated by Oscar voters, Hendry is skeptical: “It’s very difficult to judge casting. I think a lot of people sometimes just vote for a movie they really enjoyed.”

They all agree that the worst part of the job is the financial negotiations. “There’s a certain point where you pick on anyone who becomes interested in money, and that’s pretty disgusting, if I’m honest,” says Hendry. “The people at the top have never been paid like that before. For young people just starting out, I think the money is right. It’s the middlemen who take the hit. They work hard.”

She likens the process to a tennis match. “I have the role [up for grabs]So I have the power. Then if you show it to someone, it has power. Then we get into the money deal, and obviously the agent will want more but the producer won’t want to pay more, and I’m in the middle. And you’re discussing money, which would be a huge amount in any other profession. It’s more than my office gets, and I certainly get paid. It doesn’t look real.

The best part is the feeling of a job well done. When the actor you’ve found “makes the movie shine, it makes you feel good,” Kaufman says.

Hendry feels torn between the passion of a successful read, “looking at all these people you’ve brought together and watching them at the beginning of their journey – which is an incredible feeling,” and seeing a promising trailer for the first time. “I hate to say this, but I usually cry a little,” she says.