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Netflix’s ‘Obliterated’ Casting Directors Alexis Frank Koczara, Christine Smith Shevchenko and Associate Gianna Butler Reflect on Their Casting Journeys


March 21, 2024

All you need to know about casting directors and partners Alexis Koczara and Christine Shevchenko is that, when they sat down to talk to us, they asked if their trusted associate Gianna Butler could take part. As Koczara explained, “We are very much a teaching and inclusive office, so we like to have her be on these things and contribute when and if she can.”

Butler did indeed join the conversation and contributed plenty in a chat filled with laughter and on more than one occasion, raised middle fingers (offered, it should be noted, with laughter). The casting team, partners for nearly two decades, is behind such smash hits as Black-ish, Cobra Kai, Fuller House, The Thundermans and Bones, among plenty of others. Their latest show is Netflix’s action comedy Obliterated. Koczara and Butler were in Los Angeles when they spoke to us, and Shevchenko in Atlanta.

How did you get into casting? Anyone can jump in.

Christine Shevchenko: I’ll go first. I actually went to school for directing. I took a lot of acting classes from the director’s perspective, and when I got to direct something, I really liked working with the actors, more so than the technical stuff. So when I moved to L.A., it was obviously very hard to just become a director.

I got little gigs here and there just to get my foot in the door, and I ended up getting a job with Junie Lowry Johnson, one of the biggest casting directors out there. I decided, “Wow, I really love this because I get to work with actors. I get to get performances out of people and then send them to set.” It’s funny how you major in one thing, then when you get here, you veer off and find your true calling.

Alexis Koczara: Exactly the same thing happened to me. (Laughs) No, I actually grew up in Michigan, so I never thought I would work in Hollywood. That was definitely not on my radar.

When I was in college, one of my cousins, Bill Prady, is a producer. He created The Big Bang Theory. He was writing Dharma & Greg and said, “Come out and do an internship and you can be a PA.” I did that and I hated it, but when they didn’t need me, they said, “Feel free to wander around.” I stumbled into the casting trailer one day and Nikki Valko and Ken Miller said to come in and help sort headshots and sit in on some pre-reads. I immediately fell in love with casting and thought, “This is exactly what I want to do.”

Gianna? How about you?

Gianna Butler: I was a theater major. I wanted to be an actor. In my junior year, I auditioned for the spring musical and didn’t get it. It was the third show that year that I didn’t get and I went to my advisor and said, “Alright, screw this. I don’t want to be an actor. What else can I do with my major?”

He was the one who suggested casting. I got an internship then moved through a couple of different offices and finally found Alexis and Christine. I’ve been with them, it will be nine years in June.

How did you two first hook up?

AK: We were teamed up to teach a workshop almost 20 years ago. We both showed up and didn’t know that we were co-teaching that night.

CS: We were not happy about it.

AK: We were annoyed because we each like to teach our own way. Then, by the end of that workshop, we were best friends and have been for 20 years. We just fell in love, as Christine likes to say. Then, completely randomly, three weeks later, we got set up to teach again together.

CS: And the crazy thing is, they’re usually not paired. Usually, in most workshops, you just taught your own workshop. But this was so random that these two different times we got paired up, it was like the universe was putting us together. We had to partner after that.

AK: We started spending time together outside of work. We were in different offices. I was with Vicki Rosenberg and she was with Junie, and then Vicki was getting ready to phase out and I said “We need another casting director.” She said, “Well, do you know of anyone?” And I said, “Actually, I do.” That was Christine. You can finish it if you want.

CS: I was at Junie’s for four years, but there wasn’t really any place for me to get promoted from associate, so I took the leap of faith. We worked together for a year, then Vicki decided to fully retire and we went out on our own. That was 2005.

Gianna, how did you come onto the team?

GB: I was an assistant with Margie Simkin for nine months. The project we were working on stopped and I interviewed with five different casting offices. They all said no. They were the sixth.

AK: Lucky us! I genuinely do not know why other people didn’t hire her. They are so dumb. We were sitting there in the interview, and Christine and I were looking at each other, like, “Where did you come from? You belong with us.”

She was such a perfect fit into the dynamic of our office. You could just tell immediately what a hard worker she was, how passionate she was about casting and that she shared the same philosophy as we did in terms of our approach.

Is there a division of labor between you? Like, one does certain things that the other doesn’t?

AK: As I mentioned before, we are a very collaborative office, we all work on everything together. But I do read with the actors because I’m better at being with them.

CS: Whereas when we used to be in-person, I love running the camera, just coming from the director’s background. I actually like to watch actors on a monitor. I don’t like to look up at them live. it’s so much easier for me to critique their performance by looking at them on screen.

AK: And Gianna does everything. But it’s amazing how we might have 16 things going on, and miraculously I’ll go do five things and then Christina will go do five things, and Gianna will say, “Oh, that’s great, because of the other six things I was about to start working on.” It feels a little bit like an accidental symphony.

CS: It’s Jedi mind stuff.

Or, a Jedi symphony, if you will.

(Everyone laughs)

AK: Yeah, it’s a Jedi symphony.

One of the things I find interesting about your filmography is how often you work with kids. Was that by design or did it just happen?

CS: I think it kind of happened, but we fell in love with it. It’s really neat to discover these kids with this raw talent and put them on their first show. And we’ve been fortunate enough to be on shows that have lasted many seasons. The kids on Black-ish, for instance, to watch them grow over those eight seasons was very gratifying for us.

AK: We actually started in drama, segued into comedy and then some of the kids’ stuff started to filter in. Both Christine and I had little children at the time, so that was also really nice to be able to work on things that our kids could watch or things that we could watch with them and share with them. Gianna has a slightly different experience because she’s younger than us…

Actually, I was going to ask. Gianna, you look younger and…

AK: (flipping the bird) I’m gonna ignore that, Neil. (More laughter)

GB: I think that was also one of the selling points, other than that the interview with you guys was so easy and natural. You started listing, oh, the Muppets, Fuller House and I was like, “This is exactly what I want to work on.” It’s just been a dream to work on things that I watched as a kid.

That’s the first time someone’s flipped me off in an interview.

CS: (flipping the double bird) I don’t like to be outdone. (Even more laughter)

AK: We are very professional, we really truly are, but our philosophy is that we want to have fun. You have to love the people you’re hanging with, and when you’re doing this, that’s kind of half the battle.

One of the things that keeps coming up in these conversations with casting directors is how underappreciated the craft is, in spite of the fact that it could be argued that, other than the director, a casting director has the biggest impact on a production, because it’s the actors who are drawing the attention. You can get away with bad cinematography or bad production design, but one miscast role can ruin a whole project.

CS: Thank you for saying that. Not many acknowledge that.

AK: It’s not even just one miscast person, but chemistry among a cast. We have seen shows that have an amazing script, production design, directing, all of these things and the cast just don’t work together. You don’t believe them, and it really takes you out of it. We’ve had two experiences in our career that stand out the most. The first was the pilot for Bones. When David Boreanaz and Emily Deschanel chemistry read together, you could hear a pin drop, everybody was so riveted by their chemistry together. The second was the pilot for Black-ish. Anthony Anderson and Tracee Ellis Ross, when they read together, that was like watching a masterclass in acting and chemistry. You saw the show right there.

What is it about TV that you prefer over film?

AK: Personally, I prefer the pace. The thing that’s cool about TV, especially when you’re in a series, every week, you get a new script. You get to add new characters, and that’s really fun. Whereas features move a little slower. You’re living with that same group for the entire time.

CS: Also, it’s fun to be a part of a crew that’s together, like our crew at Black-ish. A lot of us were there from the pilot, and it was so neat on the very last episode, to look back and see all the people that had been there for the pilot. You really do turn into a family, whereas I feel like features come and go and come and go. We were on Fuller House for five seasons, and Cobra Kai for six. You really do bond with all these people.

Gianna, what’s the best and most important lesson you’ve learned from working with these two?

AK: That’s a good question.

CS: That is a good question. I’d like to know.

Thanks. I’m a professional.

(Everyone laughs)

GB: The first thing that comes to mind is to be nice to everyone because you don’t know what project you’re going to work on with them in the future, or where those people are going to end up. It relates to actors, too. That’s how you get the best performance. And we are really rooting for the actor. We love actors, we love working with them and we want to see them get the job. We want to see them succeed.

It’s interesting you say that because my last question is always the same: What piece of advice or wisdom would you give to somebody coming in to audition for you? A lot of people say exactly that.

AK: I would say be yourself.

CS: I literally was just about to say that! Bring yourself into the character. Because while we enjoy watching actors, I don’t want to see you acting. I want the character to come through you. I think sometimes people push too hard because they’re trying to impress the casting director. They actually take it to another level when they really just trust their instincts and trust who they are.

AK: Trust your instincts is a good one. I would also say to ask questions and take risks. Casting is a collaboration between the casting director and the actor, so ask questions to help you prepare because that’s what we’re here for, to guide you through that and then take a risk here and there because it could pay off.

Gianna? Anything to add?

GB: Don’t take it too seriously. Enjoy it. I don’t know if that’s a good answer.

AK: I think enjoy it is a good answer, because acting is such a hard job. You have to have an ego of steel because you’re facing so much more rejection than acceptance. Sometimes you not getting a part has nothing to do with what you did in the room. There are a million reasons why you might not get a part despite giving an amazing read. You have to know that you’re coming in and giving your best work, so go out and have fun and enjoy it. Because when you come in and you don’t enjoy it, or your heart’s not in it, or you’re so stressed about it, we read that immediately.

GB: Thank you!

AK: I got you, girl! (Laughter)

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