How To Become A Casting Director: What It Is and Career Path

What is a casting director and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

2 min read

There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a casting director. For example, did you know that they make an average of $21.0 an hour? That's $43,678 a year! Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 8% and produce 12,800 job opportunities across the U.S.

ScoreCasting DirectorUS Average

Salary

3.4

Avg. Salary $43,678

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

8.7

Growth rate 8%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

5.0

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.17%

Asian 6.41%

Black or African American 7.99%

Hispanic or Latino 14.67%

Unknown 5.60%

White 65.16%

Gender

female 58.85%

male 41.15%

Age - 39

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 39

Stress level

8.7

Stress level is very high

7.1 - high

Complexity level

9.5

Complexity level is advanced

7 - challenging

Work life balance

1.9

Work life balance is very poor

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a casting director

Explore casting director education requirements

Most common casting director degrees

Bachelor's

78.6 %

Associate

8.9 %

Master's

6.5 %

Start to develop specific casting director skills

Skills	Percentages
Contract Negotiations	24.59%
Music Videos	8.46%
RAN	5.88%
Feature Film	5.28%
Art Directors	5.11%

Complete relevant casting director training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 6-12 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. New casting directors learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a casting director based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real casting director resumes.

Research casting director duties and responsibilities

Oversee and manage model castings for fashion shows, advertising campaigns, editorials and special projects.
Work closely with top NYC agents and managers to bring in talent for projects.
Work with designers through the preliminary casting process through the completion of their runway shows for NYFW.
Interview candidates for major network reality TV competitions.

Get casting director experience

Generally, it takes 4-6 years to become a casting director. The most common roles before becoming a casting director include production assistant, internship team lead and casting assistant.

Prepare your casting director resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your casting director resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a casting director resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable casting director resume templates

Build a professional casting director resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your casting director resume.