My experience with casting children is that... the whole movie is going to rest on their shoulders, so you have to set aside time and wait for the perfect people to appear.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I've been really lucky when it comes to casting kids, and I don't particularly like child actors. Too often, they just show up, and they've had whatever real innocence that's in a child just beaten out of them. They start to perform for you, and you can just see it coming. It's no good.
Just as actors are afraid of child audiences because they're so honest, I would be scared stiff of going before the big folks.
As an actor you have to wait for someone to cast you, so you're relying on the business.
I usually set aside a lot of time in advance of a movie with important roles for kids to search, but when you have great ones, they can be a real ace in the hole.
A lot of the time with child actors, you get the feeling they're trying to have a kind of poise or presentation that's beyond their years that might be put on, but also might be because they've spent years just hanging out with adults and they don't even have a sense of what it's like to grow up with kids their own age.
As I've always said, preproduction is so important. When you cast the actors, you've done much of the work. Now, you may need to guide them a little, take it up or down, have them go faster or slower, but the casting process is crucial.
A lot of parents tell their children that if they want to be an actor, that's fine, but they should do something else first, so they've got something to fall back on. It doesn't work like that, as far as I'm concerned.
I think having children in general is always very helpful for acting.
Casting is everything. If you get the right people they make you look good.
There's a constant flow of child actors. It's kind of funny to watch the new crew come through. I think, You poor little things. You're going to have to struggle for a long time.