Casting director Phyllis Huffman has worked in and around the entertainment industry for more than 35 years. But it wasn't until 2005 that her face graced the silver screen. In Kevin Jordan's autobiographical drama Brooklyn Lobster—about a family's legal struggles to retain its seafood business—Huffman plays a judge presiding at a property auction.
The phrase "labor of love" certainly applies in this case: Huffman's parents were friends of Jordan's grandparents in Rockville Centre, N.Y., and she has known the family for decades. She was even instrumental in helping the director get a foothold in the entertainment world. "When Kevin was 15, his mother called me and said, 'I don't know what I'm gonna do with him. He is just bound and determined to have a career in show business,' " says Huffman. "So I said, 'Bring him into the city, and we'll have lunch.' So we did. And I could just tell. At the end of the lunch, I said to his mother, 'I'm really sorry, but this is the real thing here. There's nothing you're going to do to dissuade this kid.' "
Jordan promised his mother—and Huffman—that he would go to college. He attended film school at NYU, receiving the inaugural Martin Scorsese Young Filmmaker Scholarship, and he apprenticed with Scorsese on the 1997 film Kundun.
While preparing to film Brooklyn Lobster, Jordan asked Huffman whether he could use her offices and include her name on the breakdowns. She agreed but stipulated that she was too busy to work on the project. She assisted in getting a copy of the script to actor Danny Aiello, however. When Aiello unexpectedly signed on to play the leading role of the father in the low-budget project, Huffman decided she needed to become more involved with casting. She was able to secure Jane Curtin to play the mother, in an 11th-hour maneuver. But when, at the last minute, the actor set for the role of the judge had to bow out, no suitable replacement could be found. At Jordan's urging, Huffman agreed—very reluctantly—to take on the part. "Kevin faxed me over the sides, and it was all that legal jargon. I was like, 'Oh, my God!' And I had to do it on a Sunday at the Brooklyn courthouse. I was a wreck. Because I hate it when [actors playing] doctors or lawyers don't sound like they know what they're talking about." Huffman was relieved to find that she only needed to act in short takes. She survived the ordeal. But she's vowed never again to step in front of a film camera. Luckily, she has something to fall back on.
Her career began in New York City in the late 1960s, answering phones in the office of agent Susan Smith. In 1975 she and her husband, actor David Huffman, moved to Los Angeles and started a family. There she assisted casting director Marion Dougherty at Paramount. When Dougherty moved to Warner Bros., Huffman followed. One of her first casting projects there was National Lampoon's Vacation in 1983; she also met and began working with actor-director Clint Eastwood, with whom she has enjoyed a long and satisfying professional alliance. Eventually she became the head of casting for Warner's television division.
Her husband, meanwhile, died tragically. In time, Huffman met a man who lived and worked in New York City. She and her sons headed back east to be with him, and Huffman has maintained a casting office in New York for 18 years. "I have space with Warner Bros.," she explains. "I have had a very long, emotional relationship with them. I don't specifically work for them, but it's a long relationship."
Among the features she has cast for Eastwood are Unforgiven, Space Cowboys, Mystic River, Million Dollar Baby, and the upcoming Flags of Our Fathers. Other credits include Breathing Lessons, The Piano Lesson, The Boys Next Door, Superstar, and The Blackwater Lightship.
How has the casting business changed over her years in it? Huffman confesses she is not thrilled with certain trends. "The teen movies are everyplace," she says. "And that's fine—that's its own genre. But when they start putting actors in movies just for the sake of their name…it's a shame. Because they can flop easily, with or without somebody with a big name. I've seen, many times, wonderful actors who've been dismissed—even in second-tier, third-tier parts—because they wanted some kind of name in it. And that's very distressing."
She notes that this tendency has long been present, but she believes it's gotten worse in recent years. Fortunately, she says, this is not the case when she works on an Eastwood project. Eastwood, she states, judges people solely on their talent. "He stands alone," she says. "He is extraordinary—as a man, as a person, as a filmmaker…. He's so inclusive of his team. He listens to everybody. He's involved in every single part of the movie, but you sort of never see it happening."
Technology is something else that's radically changed the casting process. Huffman recalls that when she started, not even FedEx was readily available for sending scripts or breakdowns; all mail was snail mail. And if Huffman wanted to show a director an actor's film work, she would order a copy of the film in question, then sit down with a projectionist who would mark the needed portions from the spool with slips of paper. Now the shipping and clipping happen instantaneously.
Five years ago the taping of auditions was seen as optional, Huffman notes; now it's a given. "It's a great tool, and it really works in the actor's favor, because the director can take the tape away with him," she says. "And he really doesn't have to count on his memory. He can just look at it one more time."
Huffman employs an assistant who scouts for New York talent at plays, showcases, and comedy clubs. And agents introduce her to plenty of other up-and-coming talent. Her office receives many submissions from unrepresented talent as well. Huffman believes that succeeding as an actor without an agent is not feasible: "You might get into some casting offices, but not on a consistent basis."
She lists three steps actors can take to help secure an agent and get into the business. The first is to get a first-rate headshot and résumé. Your picture, Huffman says, is the most important career investment you'll make. As for credits, they are what they are; you should never embellish them. The next step is to always be enrolled in a class. "It doesn't matter if you've just graduated from Juilliard the year before," she says. "You've got to be up on your feet every single week doing something." The class needn't be an intense scene study workshop, Huffman notes. You might "mix and match": Take a how-to-audition course for six weeks and follow it up with six weeks in a cold-reading workshop. And the final step: Audition, audition, audition. Huffman says to read Back Stage regularly and put yourself forward for projects small and large. "If that means 8 o'clock in the morning with 100 people standing in front of you, that's what this business is."
As far as auditions go, Huffman notes that sometimes actors will receive little information about a project when they show up for a call. Performers need to learn to cope with such limitations, but they should be as prepared as possible. "Don't think for a second that you can wing it, because you can't," she warns. "Your nerves will take over, and then you're dead. I always like actors to hold the sides in their hands, because rarely can they memorize something that quickly, in two or three days. Actors think they can, but once they get in there and their nerves take over, they're lost."
It's also vital that actors learn to pick up the vibe in an audition room. "Don't talk too much," she concludes. "If they're chatters, fine. If they're not, forget it."