From Kat: Leah Shapiro couldn’t be a more perfect start to introducing more casting folks in 2021. Leah always stands out in my mind as one of the kindest people to communicate with. Some parts of our job, like rescheduling appointments or having trouble uploading tapes, can feel monotonous, frustrating, or impersonal. Leah seemingly goes out of her way to do her job joyfully, beautifully, and personally. Communicating with her has always made my day a little bit brighter and a whole lot easier.

So it’s no surprise that her feature is thought provoking, wise, and joyful. Leah walks us through her journey into casting and the ideas of how to make our industry more accessible, what it’s like to go from casting theatre to watching your first TV project on a global streaming service, and the mantra that reminds her to not get bogged down in the unknowns of the future.

If you’re having trouble finding the good people in our industry, Leah is the perfect reminder that they’re out there. They’re out there doing good work and rooting for you.

Leah! One of my favorite names to pop up in my inbox. Would you introduce yourself to our readers with some “human facts”?

Hello readers! I’m Leah Shapiro (first name pronounced ‘lay-uh’). I was born and raised in Baltimore, MD. I was a bit of a shy and anxious child, so my parents put me in theatre classes to help get me out of my shell and let’s just say the rest is history! I’m currently the Casting Assistant on Inventing Anna, a new Shonda Rhimes’ television miniseries for Netflix at Estrin/Bergstein Casting in NYC. 

You double majored in Theatre/Human Development Connecticut College. Did you always know you wanted to get into casting? Were there certain skills you possessed that lent themselves to the casting world?

I was one of those people that truly had no idea what I wanted to do until senior year of college. I majored in Human Development because I’ve always loved people and interacting with them and also, sadly, felt I needed a more “practical” major besides Theatre. I majored in Theatre because I knew it was likely my last chance to perform unless I wanted to make it my career and I knew I didn’t. I’ve loved performing my whole life and while it always brought me great joy, I never considered pursuing it as a career. I respect actors the most, especially now as I get to witness daily the hard work and perseverance acting requires. Yet, even when entering college, I knew the hustle needed to pursue an acting career would take away the joy of performing for me.

Still, I loved the world of theater and I loved the people and community it provided. I desperately wanted to find a way to stay in this community in my professional life and so senior year I started brainstorming what that could look like – a career in the arts that didn’t require performing. 

I actually can pinpoint the moment that I had the ‘aha’ moment about casting. During my senior year at Conn, I was sitting in the library with a friend and we were discussing different ideas, and she said, “what about casting?” In that moment something just shifted. I was like, “hmm, that’s a really interesting idea;” as I thought back to the different creative processes I’d been involved in during college, I realized I had always loved facilitating the audition process. Ultimately, combining my acting experience with my degree in Human Development (which is essentially understanding why people are the way they are) felt like the perfect way to realize my passions. 

You attended the Tepper Semester, a program through Syracuse University, where students spend their spring semester of the senior year working and training in NYC. How did this program help your launch into the professional world? Any other advice would you give to someone looking to start a career in casting? 

I firmly believe I wouldn’t have the career I have today without the Tepper Semester. I worked at my sleepaway camp every summer of college and didn’t do any internships, much to many people’s shock and dare I even say, disapproval. I have zero regrets about that choice. Yet, I did graduate without that crucial ‘foot in the door’ that most people accomplish through internships. Through Tepper, I was able to be a student again for a semester, and I was able to apply and get an internship at Telsey + Company. Ultimately, I needed an introduction to this industry and world and the Tepper Semester provided that for me. I made great connections and learned so much from the internship, the classes and professors, and being able to see two shows a week. The program seamlessly launched my career. In fact, I got hired for my first assistant position a month before the program ended by Stephanie Klapper, who also happened to be one of the Casting Directors we met through our coursework. I’m so thankful to Stephanie for giving me my start in this career; I learned so much in that office and it was the best first job I could have ever asked for. 

I also do not want to miss the opportunity to recognize the immense privilege I have. Being able to afford and complete an additional semester of school through the Tepper Semester to help me further my casting career aspirations was a privilege. While I believe it was 100% worthwhile, and it truly did pay off for me, in that I’ve been employed (pandemic hiatus aside) ever since I finished the program, I realize this route is not possible for many. My experience highlights the need to make the casting profession and frankly, the entire entertainment industry, more accessible.

You’ve worked at some wonderful casting offices including Telsey, Stephanie Klapper, Shayna Markowitz and have now landed at Estrin/Bergstein. What has been the most rewarding project to work on and why?

This is such a hard question for me as I really do value everything I’ve worked on. I believe every new project has taught me something new that I can then take to my next project. But…if I had to pick just one, it probably would be “Dash & Lily” because it was my first exposure to the world of TV/film casting. Up until then, I’d solely been working in the theatre world, and while I learnt so much in my first year and a half as a Casting Assistant for theatre, that’s always been a familiar universe for me. 

Getting hired on “Dash & Lily” threw me into an entirely different world, with a new schedule, pace and lingo. The Casting Director, Shayna Markowitz, and Associate, Betsy Fippinger were so wonderful to me. They gave me the space to learn and grow, while also pushing me to be better and learn every day on the job. In the end, through working on “Dash & Lily,” I discovered I really enjoyed casting for television and wanted to continue pursuing those types of jobs and projects. I’m so grateful to Shayna for taking a chance on me with no previous television casting experience, as I believe that job changed the trajectory of my career. Also, “Dash & Lily” is the first television show I’ve worked on to come out on a global streaming service, so that in itself was a very exciting, rewarding, and full-circle experience. 

What’s the change in our business you hope to see coming out of this time of a racial reckoning and a global pandemic?

I touched on this a bit above when discussing my own entrance into this industry, but I really hope to see more accessibility and representation in all aspects of the business. Naturally, those go hand-in-hand. We will see more representation when there is more accessibility and in order to see these changes, we need to act. It’s important to not just wait for the changes to happen but to hold ourselves accountable and be a part of those changes. In our office, we started having conversations this summer about how to make the possibility of a career in casting more visible to BIPOC youth. Further, we discussed creating a path to working in casting offices for high school and college students, and even young adults for whom it’s not feasible to take unpaid internships and/or opportunities. We’ve explored and discussed the possibility of free informational interviews, free mentorship, and paid training programs. I’m looking forward to seeing how these types of ideas and programs will be implemented across our industry. 

We’ve used the metaphor of a mountain to be analogous to our career accomplishments, dreams, and changes. We feel a lot of our reader’s “climb” is on pause. Has your mountain ever changed? Is it changing now? What’s keeping you moving?

I tend to get extremely overwhelmed by the big picture and the future. Questions like: “where do you see yourself in 5 or 10 years?” have always really stressed me out. I heard the saying recently, ‘trust the timeline of your life’ and it really spoke to me. It’s helped me focus more on short term goals, which ultimately, I know will be the stepping stones to my more long-term goals, and prevented me from getting too bogged down by the unknowns of the distant future. 

In my opinion, this pandemic has been a perfect example of why we shouldn’t spend too much time focusing on the future – I don’t think any of us saw this pandemic coming and it shows we really cannot predict what’s going to happen in life whether it be on the personal or global level. That’s not to say we shouldn’t have goals and aspirations; we absolutely should as that’s what keeps so many of us driven. But if we’re talking in terms of a mountain metaphor, I now try to have goals of one summit at a time as opposed to looking towards the very top of the mountain. For me, this shift in mindset is leaving me more space and openness for pauses, changes, and shifts without ever feeling like I’ve failed to reach the ultimate goal. 

RAPID FIRE:

Favorite Quaran-TV: “Normal People” & “The Great” 

Quaran-reads: The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett, Hidden Valley Road by Robert Kolker, and The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid

Favorite Dash and Lily scene?: Ugh so hard to choose! I actually have several, but for the sake of conciseness, I’m actually obsessed with the montage in the last episode to Gracie Abrams’ ‘Stay’

Exercise routine (if you are into that): My quarantine fitness routine has been entirely Jabs by Gina!!! (www.jabsbygina.com). Obsessed. 

Favorite food: Ice Cream

Advice to someone walking into your audition room or, for a while, self-taping for you?: We want actors to succeed and do well. Actors succeeding helps us accomplish our job!! Also, to know that a “good” audition is so much more than booking the job. A good audition leads to us remembering actors and calling them back in. 

Thing you have missed most since March?: Live theater and eating out

Religious, Spiritual, or Nah: Yes, I would say 100% culturally Jewish! I’m not extremely observant in terms of the religious aspects, but I do connect to a lot of those aspects and celebrate all the holidays.   

Favorite spot in, your hometown, Baltimore: Harbor East in downtown Baltimore

I feel most at peace when _________: I’m in Maine on a lake in the summer. 

Social Media Feelings: Can’t live with it, can’t live without it! My sister actually said to me recently, “Comparison is the thief of joy.” That’s helped shift my relationship towards social media recently. I now strive to think of my social media as a place to hold my memories and experiences, for me, and no one else. It’s mostly been working!!

Casting for theatre or casting for TV?: I like both for different reasons but I think TV and (hopefully some film) for the foreseeable future ☺ 

Social Media Handles: IG @leahameliashapiro & Twitter @leahashapiro

Anything you’d like to promote?: It’s not for me, but my younger sister started a podcast during Quarantine and it’s really good. It’s called Listening for Love. In her words, it’s “A podcast where I set up my friends on virtual blind dates and we follow along as they listen - cameras off - for love.”

Photos:

#3: Leah and family

#4: Leah and sisters