Casting director Suzanne Smith has a remarkable talent for discovering fresh faces and building unforgettable ensembles. Her work on hit series like Outlander and Silo has introduced audiences to new talent while keeping each world feeling authentic and lived-in. Now, she’s back with Outlander: Blood of My Blood, the highly anticipated Starz prequel to Outlander, which traces the roots of the Fraser family and the sweeping love stories that began it all.
In this interview, Smith talked about her approach to casting new faces, the challenges of finding actors who not only resemble their Outlander counterparts but also carry the same essence, and how the industry’s shift to self-tapes has reshaped the audition process. She also shared stories from the casting room, from spotting immediate chemistry between leads to discovering future stars in unexpected self-tapes (even one involving an actor eating a pork chop). This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Watch the full conversation in the video above or on our YouTube channel.
One of the things that I really liked about this show and the original Outlander, is that I didn’t know most of the actors in it. They were mostly all new faces to me, so it was much easier for me to get into the world of the show. What was the reason for not casting any big time, recognizable faces for this and the original?
Suzanne Smith: Well, Starz always sort of said, we’ll make you a star, which is great. And also, you’ve got to have the reality of, we do have Scottish actors. We do have some actors who are not Scottish playing Scottish, but even the Scottish actors sometimes go, “I didn’t know they weren’t Scottish,” especially on Blood of My Blood. It’s quite funny.
I feel like UK actors, they can almost do any sort of accent immediately.
Suzanne Smith: Sometimes, sometimes not. If you’ve been to drama school, you probably have done all the accents because you’ve got three years of training and you do quite a lot of voice coaching there.
Who was the first person that was cast in this?
Suzanne Smith: It was Jamie Roy.
When you read the first script, did his name come to mind?
Suzanne Smith: We knew him, and we had put his name aside. We also had to bear in mind, we were casting people who should look like their parents, or they were in Outlander and we are casting the younger versions.
So, we got pictures of all the characters in Outlander and put them on a big board. And having worked on the show, I knew what their characteristics or their essence was.
For every role, we saw a lot of actors. Jamie Roy got the role, but we saw a lot of actors for Brian Fraser, and some of those actors that we saw for Brian Fraser, we said, “oh, you perhaps could be [someone else] along the way.” It’s a bit like a jigsaw puzzle, isn’t it?
I always think of casting like those crime shows where they have like pictures of people with the red lines going everywhere.
Suzanne Smith: You start with one and then you work out, but we knew the characters anyway. Sam Redford is Dougal, and when he came in, I was with Jamie Payne, the director, and we looked at each other and we went, cast him. It was just that feeling that he took over and he just had that Dougal essence that was right.
And Sadhbh [Malin], who plays Jocasta, I mean, she looks so much like our older Jocasta and they’re both Irish. It was wonderful to have that, because you look straight to her eyes and you just go, ‘oh my God.’
Speaking of Sam, I saw an interview where he said that he was thinking about quitting acting before you asked him to audition for Brian. He in the self-tape and then you called him back a couple of months later for Dougal.
Suzanne Smith: A lot of the boys were, we called them for Brian. The same with Murtagh, Rory [Alexander]. As soon as we saw them, you go, ‘well, you’re not a Brian, but we like you, you fit in.’ And so we earmark them for other roles.
Do you remember what it was about his self-tape that you liked? He said he was eating a pork chop in it.
Suzanne Smith: He just had that sort of Graham McTavish strong energy where you feel that he could do anything and is fierce, but he’s actually very gentle. But that’s actors for you, isn’t it? The people who play the baddies and sometimes the gentlest people.
Who was the hardest to cast?
Suzanne Smith: The girls, Ellen (Harriet Slater).
Why is that?
Suzanne Smith: Harriet, I’ve known for a long time, and I loved her, but also, you’ve got to have the chemistry with the guys. Jamie Roy has said that he screen tested with quite a lot of lovely actresses and we knew that in my office, he and Harriet had immediate chemistry. That’s something you can’t fake.
But we had to do it remotely because Harriet was not in London where I’m based and Jamie was in Scotland, and she happened to be in Scotland. So we did it and we were all looking on a screen and it was immediate.
After watching tons of self-tapes and auditions and you’re finally whittling down actors for one role to three or four people, do you have one person who you think is best for that particular role?
Suzanne Smith: Sometimes you do, sometimes you don’t. I was very lucky we had our director, Jamie Payne with us. He came into our studio and we worked with the actors and we saw them before we screen tested them, so you get to know them.
And sometimes you just knew, like when we saw Sam Retford do his Dougal audition. He came down from Manchester, he was on his motorbike and he came in and we, as I said, we just looked at each other and went, ‘cast him.’ He just had this manly energy that sort of took over our studio.
Sometimes it’s harder to coax people with their roles because they do get nervous.
And it’s changed so much now since COVID because we used to tape all the time and it’s now mostly self-tapes because we did look everywhere for our leads. We looked in Australia, we did look in Canada. We did have a wide net, because you always want to find the best actor for the role.
For example, Tony Curran, he’s sort of the most recognizable face that we have. He was chosen because he has the right attributes for Lord Lovett. Ned Gowan (Conor MacNeill), we had to have somebody who was short of stature, shall I say? So you are then looking at a different field, you have to have somebody who’s highly intelligent for that role and also has that sort of kindness and patience and voice which Connor has. And he’s done a lot of varied work as well.
Watching this, the original Outlander and a lot of the stuff you do, casting wise, everything is so spot on. It’s got to feel so satisfying when you get the perfect cast and close the book on the season.
Suzanne Smith: Very satisfying. Because in the end, as a casting director, you do have a say, but ultimately you’re not the one who makes the final decision. Because you’ve got producers, showrunners, you’ve got studio and network, so everybody does have a say on what. You really do have to believe in who is running the show and who is right for the role. And if necessary, argue your corner.
And it’s so nice, they all care about each other, which is fantastic. They’re all friends. When I was up recently, you know, they were all going, “oh, are you coming out tonight for dinner?” They’re all very, very close, which is lovely. And that makes it more satisfying to know that not only have you got great actors, they’re also lovely people.
Now that self-tapes are the way things are going, what are your top self-tape tips? What makes a great self-tape?
Suzanne Smith: I mean, you can do it nowadays on your phone. You don’t need fancy things. You don’t need fancy lighting, and you don’t even have to learn everything off by heart, as long as we can see your eyes.
I suppose one of my best tips is to look at the scene and think, ‘why have I been given the scene? What do they want to see from me as an actor?’
And it’s not that you can do anything and everything. It’s that you’re being given a scene and there must be a reason why you’ve been given that scene.
Try and do as much research as possible because sometimes it’s a genre thing. What’s the pace of it?
Different nationalities do different things, I’ve noticed, which is interesting. Say Germans, if it’s an outside scene, they’ll shoot outside. If there’s food, they will eat. Props are not necessary unless you feel that it helps you, like with a gun or a sword.
Just profile and make sure that we do see your face, that’s all.
It doesn’t matter to me, what the background is. And nowadays, you can use apps if you can’t find somebody to read with you. If you haven’t got a reader, we will Zoom with you, we will read with you because it’s not always that convenient.
Here in the UK, in the old days, it used to be, you’d get 15 pages to learn as an actor, which was ridiculous really. It was terrifying that you’ve got to learn that. Now it’s less, which is fantastic. We try and give actors as much time as possible, and we do watch every single tape.
As an actor, it’s always hard to think, “I’ve really done a great audition, but I didn’t get the role.” I think you just have to put the door on it and just go, “well, it’s a craft. If I’m asked back, they like me. They want me to do well.”
And in Blood of My Blood, that’s what we have done with quite a lot of the characters. Ellen’s sisters have come from actresses that auditioned for Ellen. We have utilized a lot of actors that we saw for other roles who eventually got a role.
