Six California acting workshops under the aegis of the Los Angeles Actor Workshop Coalition have agreed with the state Labor Commissioner on new operating guidelines for casting-director workshops.
Jean St. James, a spokesperson for the coalition, said last week, "The guidelines will ensure that actors can practice their cold reading skills and learn about current industry issues that affect auditions. These guidelines will protect actors and prescribe procedures for workshop owners to ensure that workshops are not confused with the process of applying for employment."
The labor commissioner proposed the new guidelines in August, an attempt to settle the touchy issue of actors who feel they're forced to "pay to audition" when attending the teaching sessions.
The guidelines include forbidding a casting director to conduct auditions—including prohibiting use of material from roles a casting director is currently casting—or job interviews during the workshop; demanding that workshops be of an educational nature; and allowing an actor to audit one workshop without paying.
The rules also oppose workshops consisting solely of cold readings. If the workshop does include a cold reading, the instructor must provide critiques and allow other feedback.
The Screen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists were both involved, along with the Casting Society of America, in working with the labor commissioner's office in designing the regulations.
Both unions indicated in September they were pleased with the new guidelines, as was the CSA's president, Gary Zuckerbrod.
"We've reviewed the guidelines, and are very encouraged by them and see them as a positive step in addressing the protections for our members," Ilyanne Kichaven, SAG's national communications director, said at the time.
But a consistent critic of the rules, casting director Billy DaMota, remains opposed to them. After the LA coalition announced its approval of the guidelines, DaMota told Variety, "What the state has come up with are guidelines which allow one-night, two-hour events where as many as 24 actors pay to read for a casting assistant, whose only qualification must be that they are casting. You can dress these events up as 'classes' and 'education'-but you don't have to be a rocket scientist to understand why actors pay to attend 'workshops' and read scenes and monologues for a casting assistant on a hot network TV show." -Roger Armbrust