I watch an Australian series on Netflix called “Offspring”. The main character is an obstetrician so there are a lot of births shown with newborns taking center stage. In the episode I watched last night, the other area hospital had some issue where they ended up having to send all of their maternity patients to the hospital that the show is centered on causing much chaos. They then showed numerous births all with different newborn babies. I started wondering who in the heck signs up their newborn baby to be in a TV show or movie? These babies are very newborn looking not even a month old. It used to be that movies would try to pass off an 8-month-old as a newborn.
I started wondering who in the heck signs up their newborn baby to be in a TV show or movie? Are women going from the hospital after giving birth directly to casting calls? It just strikes me as odd. But then I’m talking Hollywood here…:rolleyes:
There’s a UK series, Call the Midwife, which necessarily needs newborns to be portrayed. According to this article from The Telegraph they get volunteers from women who are still expecting.
Not directly. The cite says 15 days. And why not? Get some money for the babies college fund.
When my first daughter was born, my wife’s roommate was a commercial actress, and suggested that my daughter would be good in commercials (at 8 months, not right away.) I turns out that the big thing they are looking for is a child who does not cry when separated from his or her mother, a test my daughter did not pass. But it is hardly traumatic for the child.
A warning. There are scammers who get parents of babies to “audition” for them. The goal is to sell expensive photo packages as head shots. Babies don’t need headshots - all babies are cute, pretty much, and as I said the casting director is looking for a cooperative baby, not an especially cute one. Plus, since babies change so quickly, a head shot would be out of date in a week.
The scammers do send photos of babies to casting directors - where they get thrown in the trash.
I doubt they have glommed onto newborns, but you never know.
One inaccuracy there. SAG requires that you work before joining, and so you get a first job without being a member. You have to sign up before the second job, but since babies are unlikely to have a second job, that won’t matter.
You still get union rate and are protected by union rules.
When I watched Ghostbusters II on TV a few years back I thought the names of the twins that played baby Oscar sounded familiar - William and Henry Deutschendorf; sure enough, they were John Denver’s nephews (Deutchendorf was the name Denver was born with). Sadly one of the twins died at 29.