A firsthand view of casting process
Tim Urban describes his first "Apprentice" casting call in this excerpt from his blog, Under the Turban (timurban.blogspot.com):
. . . So I ventured to Universal Studios yesterday morning. For some reason, in my head I was picturing a room with a small line of 50 or so people, going in for an interview one by one. I figured I'd be in and out in no time. It didn't cross my mind that there would be a thousand people standing in a massive zigzag line, outside in the cold. This was a hideous scene.
A woman stepped over the zigzag ropes and came up to me and said, "go to the front of the line." As inexplicable as this was, she didn't have to tell me twice. Amid shock and disgust from my nearest compadres, I left the zigzag and moved to the front. There I found seven other people who had also been pulled out of the line, all equally confused.
We stood there while group of eight after group of eight was led inside to sit at one of the tables (there appeared to be about 20 tables in a huge room). None of us knew what the hell was going on. I looked at the people standing with me, though, and saw a young, diverse, fairly attractive-looking group, and figured that the separation was a positive thing.
Finally, they motioned for my group to come in. We were brought to a table in the back, and suddenly, things made sense.
The moderator: Donald Trump.
The eight of us, all stunned, sat around the table, and Trump asked how we were doing. "Long wait, huh?" he joked. People mumbled and laughed nervously and no one really said anything. He said he wanted us to go around the table and say our name, age, and job. It got to me, and I said that I owned a tutoring company. Upon hearing this, Trump asked, "How's it doing?" I said it was doing well, and he moved on. I was the only one he conversed with. We were basically brothers.
And then, his phone rang. He got up for a few minutes, and finally motioned for one of the other casting directors to take over. And just like that, we were just another table. We had lost him.
