‘The Curse’ Casting Director Angelique Midthunder Discusses Her Casting Origins and Connecting With Actors

May 3, 2024 | Neil Turitz
Photo courtesy of Angelique Midthunder, CSA.

With such titles to her credit as Reservation Dogs, Captain Fantastic, How to Blow Up a Pipeline and the Lifetime biopic Georgia O’Keeffe, which earned her a 2009 Emmy nomination, Angelique Midthunder is more than a very good casting director. She’s also the mom of a rising star, Prey’s Amber Midthunder, so she understands how hard the job is in a way other casting directors might not. Driving her to “hundreds of auditions,” Midthunder has “seen her go through the process and supported her through it, so it’s very close to my heart.”

It’s partly this deep empathy for actors that makes her so good at her job, and partly that she has a keen eye for talent. Especially new talent, as evidenced by her above credits. She’s also not afraid to take chances, as with her latest project, Showtime’s very unique The Curse, starring Emma Stone and the show’s creators, Nathan Fielder and Benny Safdie. With Emmy season creeping up on us and The Curse getting a lot of critical love, her second nomination could be right around the corner. She was in South Africa, visiting Amber, when she spoke to us.

How did you get started in casting?

Back in the olden days, there were newspapers, and they would have wanted ads. I was just browsing them and saw an open casting call. I was young, early 20s. It was supposed to be my gap year in college, but I never went back. Anyway, I got the part, but I didn’t love it. Everybody was like, “You had your big break right out of the gate. You’ve got to get an agent. You have to go to auditions.”

I ended up making friends with the casting director. She kept bringing me in and we got to chatting and she asked me at one point, “Hey, I have a TV series coming up. I need an assistant, do you want some steady work?” I was like, “Yes, please.” The show was The Lazarus Man. The movie was in 1995, and by 1996, I was already working as a casting assistant.

What was it about casting that was so appealing to you?

It was kind of the best of both worlds. I’m both right-brained and left-brained, so I was pretty good at the logistics and admin and stuff like that, and also enjoyed the exciting creative stuff in the room.

You get a script, you pull the scenes, you do a character breakdown, it’s this weird combination of logistics with creative and it just spoke to me. Then, as I progressed in my career, working with directors, especially writer-directors, to find them the characters that they saw in their head when they were putting it on paper, to see actors coming in, performing the work and watching the directors light up as they see their vision come to life, and then putting the right actors together, it’s just the funnest puzzle ever.

One of the things I noticed is how often you work on projects that allow you to discover talent, like How to Blow Up a Pipeline and Reservation Dogs. What’s that process like, finding some spectacular young talent and giving them their first big shot?

I try to stay open-minded, and just let people do what they do best, especially with young people. I feel like, let’s us older people not tell the younger people how they should act, let’s let the young people just be themselves and kind of nurture them, especially when they’re newer. Just nurture that process and let them make the discovery of who they are, who the character is. I look for people who are just interesting, who I think will be interesting characters in certain roles. I know that they can bring whatever elements of themselves to that character.

Do you take an extra level of pride when you can connect like that with a young talent?

I feel like I’m always looking for that something special. When you see it, you can’t necessarily label it, especially when I know that they’ve been working so hard and that they’re good people and they really want it. [I also know and can see] that they have a lot to bring to the table and a lot to offer to any director, that they’re so generous with their spirit and with their talent, and they just want to be a team player and elevate the whole project.

I want to get behind those people. When I see that they finally have found the opportunity that they so deserve, I’m just really happy for them. I love people and I love to see them be happy.

What about something like The Curse, which is, on the surface, a high-profile project, but it’s odd, and there’s a lot more to it than meets the eye? With all the attention it’s getting, do you think at all about awards love? Maybe getting your second Emmy nomination?

You know, it was such a joy to work with [fellow The Curse casting director] Jen Venditti. I am a huge fan of her work. She and I started collaborating and coordinating the street casting process. That is the opposite process from what I usually do, where you’re championing someone who’s really been working to get somewhere. This is the opposite, where we literally had a street casting team.

We were talking people into being on camera, people who probably had never thought of it. Jen is a queen of that. It was just putting boots on the ground, working so hard and doing what we could to bring Nathan and Benny’s vision to life. When I watched the show, I thought, “Wow, I think people are going to notice that we really did something special here. I hope that people take notice.”

What piece of advice or wisdom would you give to an actor coming in to audition for you?

I feel like actors have heard this a million times, but you have to love acting, and you have to love the process because you’re obviously not going to book everything that you get.

What I personally would like actors that are coming in for me to know is that I am on their side. I am rooting for them. I try to tell actors when I have the opportunity to talk to large groups, “Look, if people came in and didn’t do a good job, we wouldn’t be good at our job. So, we are here for you. We’re here to do everything that we can for you to be successful.” I just want actors to know how much we are in their corner, and working for them to give them every opportunity to put their best foot forward. That’s really what we want for them.

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