Casting Director Rich Delia Talks ‘Ninja Turtles’, Finding Chemistry in Your Cast

Did you have a good summer? It almost certainly didn’t compare to Rich Delia’s. The casting director had five different features released since June, starting with DC’s The Flash and culminating with Amazon’s Red, White & Royal Blue. In between, there was No Hard Feelings, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem and Joy Ride, which combined to earn well over half a billion dollars worldwide (and that factors in the Amazon film, which didn’t even get a theatrical release).

It’s rare that anyone has so many films in so little time, but with Delia, it shouldn’t be a surprise. One of the most in-demand casting directors in the business, he is impossible to pigeonhole. He doesn’t just work on the biggest blockbusters, he’s also pretty skilled with smaller, more intimate fare as well. He even dabbles in horror, as he has cast the rebooted Scream series and yet another 2023 film, the Nicolas Cage-Nicholas Hoult horror-comedy mashup Renfield. Put it all together and it’s as impressive a run as you’ll find these days. He spoke to us from his home in Los Angeles.

How did you get into casting in the first place?

I was living in Los Angeles as an actor. I really love stage acting, but the work I was booking, I wasn’t as creatively fulfilled as theater, where it’s kind of a two-hour emotional journey with an audience.

I was having a conversation one day with someone and said I wasn’t sure what I was doing, and a casting director who I knew reached out and asked if I wanted to maybe try casting. I said, ‘Absolutely,’ because I’m a person who’s open to new experiences. I loved it immediately.

I view a script as a puzzle, and all of the actors are pieces. I love the idea of working on an ensemble and helping put actors together. It was very creatively fulfilling, so I just threw myself into it and started from there.

I find a lot of casting directors start out as actors.

I think that actors all speak a similar language, whether you’re Meisner or Method or whatever training people have. I think having a facility with how to speak to actors, and how to pull things out of them, really can be beneficial in casting. I know wonderful casting directors who were not actors, but for me, personally, I use the training I had as an actor in my job every single day.

I work in a lot of different genres, but I love character. That’s what got me excited as an actor as well. Why are characters doing the things they’re doing? Why are they saying the things they’re saying? What is the intention behind it? And I think when you’re fleshing out an ensemble, as opposed to just looking at one character’s motivations, you’re really looking at the ripple effects of how those characters affect the other characters, and vice versa.

Speaking of working through lots of genres, this summer you had a pretty remarkable array of projects, in terms of size, scope and style.

I feel that I approach every project the same way regardless of what genre it is. A film I’m really proud of that I did this summer was Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Even that one, which is animated, the actors we wound up casting as the turtles, it was really about finding the chemistry between them, because ultimately, even though it’s an animated version, you want to feel like these characters are brothers, friends, relatives, whatever the situation may be.

Regardless of what genre it is, I approach it from a place of character. Will the audience care about this character? When I start to think of it like that, it kind of transcends the genre, because that character can exist in many genres, just like we in life go through many different periods. We might be unemployed, traveling on vacation or might have just won the lotto. Those are all very different experiences, but we’re the same person experiencing them. So I really try to focus on the specificity of character, and the genre is a bit secondary to that.

You mentioned chemistry. Each of the movies you cast this summer really depends on that working. Is there a secret to really nailing it?

I don’t know that there’s any formula to it. I think it’s a lot of instinct, and I think that you have to do the work. For Joy Ride, for instance, while we were doing it, the whole process was over Zoom because we cast it during the thick of COVID. We did many rounds of casting, reading two people together, some people reading for multiple roles. We also did a lot of improvising.

I find improv can be a really great thing in the audition process for discovering chemistry because a lot of the gold can come out of what these two people are bringing to the table that’s not on the page. Let’s release them from having to worry about the lines and just actually get a sense of their energy together and who they are.

When we got Jennifer Lawrence and Andrew Barth Feldman together for No Hard Feelings, we were lucky enough to be able to do that in person because it was a bit further along in the pandemic, it was instantaneous. We read several guys opposite Jen, but the minute they started, before they even got into the scene when they were just together, you could feel it. It doesn’t always happen that way, but when it does, it’s a really, really special thing.

That segues perfectly into the question that I end all of my interviews with, which is what piece of advice or wisdom would you give to somebody who’s coming into your room?

First of all, I think the number one thing is to be on time because it’s a profession. If you’re not on time, then you’re immediately starting on your back foot. Do all of your work beforehand, know all of your lines and then forget it. Be present in the room.

Robert De Niro used to say, ‘It’s like you do all of your research, you do all of your homework and then before you go in, you unplug the computer and you trust that it’s there within you. But you have to be alive and vibrant and present in the room.’

If you’re thinking about the lines, or if you’re thinking about something outside of that. It’s going to get in the way of that chemistry, of those moments of connection. With the five minutes you have with that character, do everything you want to do, show us your version, make unique choices and then forget about if those choices resonate and someone wants to see more, then that’s great. And if not, you can know that for the five minutes you were the character, you did exactly what you wanted to do with it.

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This interview has been edited for clarity.

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