Film Extras Wanted: Keep Your Calendar Current

Your Calendar is how casting knows which days you can take a role. A current Calendar means the requests you receive are for days you are free. A stale one fills your Replies with requests you have to turn down, or worse, ones you accept and cannot keep.

What the Calendar is for

Casting directors build a scene around a day. They need a certain number of people on that day, so being free on the right date matters as much as having the right look. When you mark a date available and you are in the area, casting sees a small calendar icon on your profile for that date. That makes it easier for them to check your availability, since they do not have to guess or ask first.

Think of it as telling a neighbor which days you can help move a couch. If you said Saturday was fine and then forgot about a wedding, they planned around the wrong day.

Tap once for available, twice for unavailable

The Calendar is simple. To mark a day as available, tap it once. To mark it unavailable, tap it twice. That is the whole system.

It is worth practicing on a few days so the taps feel natural. If you tap a day and it is not what you meant, tap again until the day shows the right status. On a phone, a slow, deliberate tap is better than a quick double flick that may be read as one tap.

It saves by itself

There is no save button, and nothing to submit. Each time you tap a day, the Calendar saves your choice automatically. You can close the page and come back later and your days will be as you left them.

Still, look at the Calendar once after you finish marking days. Scan the month and make sure the days you meant to mark are the ones that show up.

Marking a day is not the same as replying

The Calendar makes you easier to find, but it does not replace a reply. Marking a date is not enough on its own. Also reply to the roles you want, with one tap of "Yes, I'm available" on each Open Call. Casting may send many availability requests to narrow down a pool, so a clear Calendar helps you answer them well, but the reply is what puts you in the pool.

Roles are often booked for the next day or two. If a role you want falls on a date you marked, reply the same day the Open Call comes out.

Update it when plans change

Most Calendars go out of date for one reason: life changes and nobody goes back to the page. A new job schedule, a doctor's appointment, a trip to see family, or a week when the car is in the shop can all change which days you can do.

A few habits help:

• Open the Calendar whenever you add a plan to your own calendar or planner.
• Look at it once a week, perhaps when you check Open Calls.
• Mark days unavailable as soon as you know, not the day before.
• Add new available days when your schedule opens up, since casting may be looking for people on those very dates.

If you are already booked and a date falls through, the Calendar will not cancel the booking. You cannot cancel through the website. Email or call the casting company that booked you, or use the "email casting" link in your Calendar. Only the casting company can remove the booking.

How the Calendar helps with many requests

Casting may send many availability requests at once. A casting office might send 400 requests to book 100 people, or 2 requests for 1 role. When your Calendar is current, you can answer each request in a few seconds, because you already know your days. If a request arrives for a date you marked unavailable, you can say no right away and spare casting a wait.

A Calendar full of days you cannot really do causes the opposite problem. You say yes to something, then turn it down, and casting loses time. Each casting company decides how to treat that. Mark only the days you can truly take, and answer emails, texts, and calls from casting promptly.

Check it before replying

Before you tap "Yes, I'm available" on a role, check the dates in the Open Call against your Calendar. If the days do not match what you have marked, fix the Calendar first. Casting sees both your reply and your Calendar, and mismatched information looks careless.

It also keeps you honest with yourself. Days on set are usually about 12 hours and often start early. If a role needs a full day and your Calendar says you have an obligation that afternoon, skip the role.

Your next step

Open your Calendar right now and look at the next four weeks. Fix anything that is wrong. Then read how to land movie extra roles by replying fast and once. To see how the two request types work, read availability request or booking request. If you are building your profile from the start, the guide to becoming a film extra covers the full setup.