From the archive: From Game of Thrones to The Crown: the woman who turns actors into stars
A profile of Nina Gold, the UK's most powerful casting director, whose work spans from Game of Thrones to The Crown to Star Wars. The piece follows her process of casting the HBO series Chernobyl, revealing the complex dynamics and hidden influence of casting in shaping major film and television productions.
Summary
Sophie Elmhirst's 2018 profile examines Nina Gold, whose name appears in the credits of 50-70% of major British productions, making her the UK's most influential casting director. Gold has shaped everything from Mike Leigh films to major Hollywood franchises like Star Wars, often discovering unknown actors who become stars. The article follows Gold's day-to-day work, particularly her challenging process of casting Chernobyl, where she needed to find over 100 actors to play Soviet officials and workers, including the pivotal role of Mikhail Gorbachev. Gold operates from her northwest London home office with assistant Martin Ware, juggling multiple high-profile projects simultaneously. The piece reveals casting as a delicate art of persuasion rather than decision-making - Gold must guide directors and producers toward better choices without appearing to boss them around. Her career began accidentally through music video casting while at Cambridge, leading to her breakthrough with Mike Leigh's Topsy Turvy. Gold's influence extends beyond individual projects to broader industry dynamics, as she navigates issues of class, diversity, and representation while working with what she describes as 'congenitally insecure narcissists' in creative leadership. The article explores the vulnerability of actors in the audition process and Gold's maternal protective instincts toward emerging talent. It highlights the contradiction of an industry where casting directors, mostly women, receive little recognition despite directing being '90% casting.' The piece concludes with Gold's successful casting of Swedish actor David Densick as Gorbachev and reflects on the psychological toll and transcendent highs of acting as a profession.
Key Insights
- Gold argues that casting directors must 'stop people casting the wrong people' and guide them toward better choices without appearing to boss them around, requiring delicate persuasion skills
- The author reveals that Gold has likely auditioned roughly 66,800 actors over three decades, calculating from her 167 credits with an average of 40 parts each, seeing about 10 actors per part
- Gold contends that the algorithm would be 'not quite as interesting as somebody who's a tiny bit off algorithm,' suggesting that surprising casting choices create more compelling performances than predictable ones
- Industry professionals describe Gold's casting approach as resembling 'the practice of an alchemist, a snake charmer, a card sharp,' indicating her work involves mysterious, intuitive skills beyond technical competence
- Gold observes that drama school graduates have become 'ever more homogenous, an endless supply of nice-looking middle-class kids' due to the rising cost of training, limiting working-class representation
- The author notes that casting is 'the sole creative department not to be given an award at the Oscars,' reflecting systemic undervaluing of a profession dominated by women
- Gold claims that 'acting outside your natural class is unbelievably hard' because actors lack automatic possession of class-specific gestures and expressions, making authentic cross-class performance nearly impossible
- The article reveals that for every successful actor trajectory Gold creates, 'there are a thousand actors waiting, hoping' and 'every time you choose somebody, you are not choosing someone else,' highlighting the brutal mathematics of the profession
Topics
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