International Law

Wired has a very interesting piece on how Hollywood is beginning to use social networking sites to find fresh talent, using Gus Van Sant's Paranoid Park as a case study:

He's worked with Matt Damon, Sean Penn, Nicole Kidman and Keanu Reeves, but director Gus Van Sant had no interest in casting movie stars for his skateboard drama Paranoid Park. He wanted real kids. So in July 2006, Van Sant created a MySpace page for Paranoid Park and posted a casting call for "skaters, honor roll [students], cheerleaders, punks, drama kids, musicians, artists, student council [members], athletes, award winners, class skippers, photographers, band members, leaders, followers, shy kids, class clowns."

"We were just trying to figure out the best way to get the word out to nonprofessional people to cast in the film," Van Sant says. "Now that MySpace is so prevalent, I think this is how all casting agencies should go about casting high schoolers."

It worked. A whopping 2,971 Portland-area teenagers turned up for cattle-call auditions. Among them: the film's star, Gabe Nevins.

Van Sant is one of an increasing number of movie makers to use the internet as a casting tool.

...

"I actually never thought about being an actor, but just thought it would be fun to go mess around downtown," says Nevins, now 16. "I was an average skateboarding teen before the movie and very innocent about the film industry, let alone acting. This made me relate to my character a lot because my character was an average skater like myself."

Has the movie influenced his ideas about a future career? "I don't have an agent yet but don't know if I want one," Nevins says. "I'm still an average kid in high school."

Net-casting fresh faces for Paranoid Park made sense because Van Sant, Oscar-nominated for Good Will Hunting puts a premium on authenticity. The film's casting director Lana Veenker explains, "Gus wanted to find a real skateboarder who hadn't been 'spoiled,' because a lot of times the only thing kids learn in high school or junior high drama departments is how to mug and it looks fake."

Trained actors with agents and head shots remain the rule rather than the exception in Hollywood, but when it comes to finding quirky unknowns, Casting Society of America board member Laura Adler says internet searches are fast becoming a go-to tool among her colleagues.

Read more here.  And here is the trailer for Paranoid Park: