‘It’s unbelievable how much information we hold about actors,” says Kelly Valentine Hendry. “We have our ears to the ground. We know about bad behaviour. We know about things that actors require in order to give a better performance …” Casting directors, she says, “monitor all that, all the time, from the shadows”.

Amid the A-list glitz of this weekend’s Oscars, casting directors will step from the shadows into the spotlight as the Academy Awards’ inaugural casting prize is presented. These quietly pivotal yet hitherto almost invisible figures are experts in spotting and allocating talent, and navigating actors’ and directors’ sometimes challenging temperaments.

Richard E Grant has long championed the profession, which his daughter, Olivia, moved into. “They are usually on board very early in the development process,” he tells me, “and use their script analysis skills and relationships with actors and agents to attach talent to get the project financed. They often work for years for minimal fees to help get projects off the ground. They are always looking ahead at who will be the next big thing a year or two down the line and have the ability to see the next generation of talent.”

It was the casting director Mary Selway, who died in 2004, who chose Grant for Withnail & I, insisting that director Bruce Robinson audition him for the 1987 film after spotting him in a BBC improvised film. “Her faith in me changed my career,” he says. Meanwhile, Celestia Fox “worked tirelessly on my autobiographical film Wah-Wah for a tiny fee for five years, never losing faith and ceaselessly encouraging and supportive.” It was she who cast the then-14-year-old Nicholas Hoult in the lead. “I am indebted to her,” adds Grant. So too, presumably, is Hoult.

Even as a seasoned star, Grant says, casting directors remain crucial to his continued success. A few years ago, when British casting legend Nina Gold (who is shortlisted for a 2026 Oscar for Hamnet) asked him to read “for an undisclosed project”, the role turned out to be a baddie in the 2019 Star Wars movie, The Rise of Skywalker.

Avy Kaufman, the veteran US casting director of films including Brokeback Mountain and Life of Pi, missed out on an Oscar nomination this year for Sentimental Value – yet four key cast members were nominated. “I feel like I did something right,” she says. But ask her what makes a good casting director and she struggles to define it. “You don’t train to be a casting director,” she says. “I’ve been around for a long time. I’ve climbed the ladder. I’ve seen different ways and different approaches to make films and television happen. It’s trust, it’s gut.”

Being political is key. Certain studios, she says, look first at an actor’s public profile and influence, while she is “coming from the creative level; I’m not looking at a list of who means what.” Oiling the communication channels is essential, “because I know I can fight for people that may not mean enough. I can be obnoxious, too, but you want the best for the show.”

Part of the struggle is that you can’t prove in advance what you feel in your waters. “I did a show for HBO last year, and there was an actor that I’ve just loved for years, but never got the break to be one of the leads,” she says. “I had to be careful how I was pushing him. A lot of the team didn’t see it.” (She won in the end.)

Hendry, whose credits include Slumdog Millionaire, Fleabag, Bridgerton and Jilly Cooper’s Rivals and who sits on the committee of the UK Casting Directors’ Guild, views the process as a puzzle. “It’s about managing a showrunner or director or producers or network or studio, and collective creative vision.” Once you’ve cast one person, then a tone is set. “What happens when you cast the next person? What does it do to that tone? How do those actors complement each other? Then you put your third, fourth, fifth, then you start creating a world that people can come into for two and a half hours.”

There are other considerations beyond acting talent. “Sometimes you’re putting a team of 50 people together,” she continues. “You have to make sure that the personalities match and there’s not someone being put in there that will cause a problem. We’re constantly on the lookout to protect the performer and the production.”

Diversity and inclusion are other key elements. Consider the backlash to last year’s Oscar contender Emilia Pérez, a Mexico-set drama starring almost exclusively non-Mexican actors (though that wasn’t the only issue). In order to “dig down into authenticity”, says Hendry, she scours foreign film festivals for talent. “We’re given material from shows from all over the world to consider. We go to one in particular in Kilkenny every year. We go to little pubs and back rooms and watch their really quite niche films from Finland or Sweden, Russia, France, Germany, anywhere but England. I’ve cast many people from that experience.”

Bafta introduced a casting director gong in 2020; the Academy is only now following suit. Grant points out that it’s a mostly female profession, “having to diplomatically navigate the predominance of male directors and producers, reluctant to acknowledge how crucial casting directors are”. Added to that is the relative invisibility of their impact. “I think everyone likes to think of themselves as a casting director and casting is a very easy thing for others to take credit for.”

Hendry agrees. “Everyone, including the man on the street, thinks that they know about it. I can’t jump on a plane and go and find a ravine in the middle of the Czech Republic, as location scouts do. Whereas anybody can go: ‘I like Josh O’Connor, he’s good.’ I don’t think people quite understand the nuances of casting, our importance and how good we have to be at our jobs.”

As for whether these intricacies will be appreciated by the Oscars voters, Hendry is sceptical: “Casting is very difficult to judge. I think a lot of people sometimes just vote for a movie that they really enjoyed.”

The worst part of the job, they all agree, is the financial negotiations. “There is a point when you’re casting anyone that becomes about the money,” says Hendry, “and that’s pretty gross, if I’m honest. The people at the top have never been paid as much. For the young ones just starting, I think the money is appropriate. It’s the middle people that are taking the hit. They work so hard.”

She likens the process to a tennis match. “I have the role [up for grabs], therefore I have the power. Then if I offer it to someone, they have the power. Then we get into the money deal, and obviously the agent will want more but the producer will not want to pay more, and I’m in the middle. And you’re discussing money that in any other profession would be a huge amount. It’s more than my office gets paid, and certainly I get paid. It just doesn’t feel real.”

The best part is the sense of a job well done. When the actor you found “made the film shine,” says Kaufman, “it just makes you feel good.”

Hendry is torn between fondness for a successful read-through, “looking at all these people that you’ve put together and watching them on the start of their journey – an incredible feeling,” and seeing a promising trailer for the first time. “I hate to say this,” she says, “but I do usually have a little cry.”