Nonprofessional Actors Are the Heart of the Movies

"Some of the most accomplished actors in the business are among this year's Oscar nominees in the acting categories, but, in the films for which they've been nominated, many of them are partnered by actors who have little or no training and have never (or hardly ever) acted in movies."

"The prominence of movies featuring nonprofessionals, in this category and in the year's Oscar nominations over all (forty-two), is no surprise: directors may make movies what they are, but actors are what viewers see, and these movies, with their casting of nonprofessionals, offer flavors of performance that differ drastically from what can be achieved with a uniformly skilled cast of professionals."

"The casts of all of these movies are tangy—they offer documentary grafts, as if figures from life offscreen showed up to authenticate the drama as a found object rather than a fabricated one. The kind of authenticity they bring, however, varies from movie to movie and from performer to performer, not least because there are many kinds of nonprofessionals."

This year's leading Oscar contenders showcase accomplished actors paired with nonprofessional performers including reality-TV personalities, musicians, writers, and other non-actors. Films like "Marty Supreme," "One Battle After Another," "Sinners," and "The Secret Agent" exemplify this trend, with four of five nominees in the new Achievement in Casting category featuring such casting choices. Directors recognize that nonprofessional actors bring distinctive performance qualities and documentary authenticity that professional casts cannot replicate. These casting decisions create a "tangy" quality, offering viewers performances that feel like found objects rather than fabricated drama. The authenticity varies across films and performers, reflecting the diverse backgrounds of nonprofessional actors including entrepreneurs, musicians, writers, and craftspeople.

Read at The New Yorker