A recap of all the top content pieces and highlights from 2024 that you won’t want to have missed.
The curtain is falling on 2024, but our highlights of the year deserve a final standing ovation before 2025 arrives.
We’re sure (and hope) that you were absolutely inundated with auditions and acting opportunities, so had no way of keeping up with absolutely everything we’ve been up to. Never fear, for we’ve put together this compilation of our top news and advice pieces from the year, as well as some of our more notable events and new product features that were added to Spotlight.
New Spotlight Features
We’re always listening to feedback and thinking up new ways to improve Spotlight and the service we offer to performers. This year we added the following features – all aimed at improving your chances of being found by casting professionals and making it easier to take care of your small business (you!):
- Announcing Spotlight’s New MAC Complexion Shade Profile Feature
- Talent Scout
- Spotlight Pilots New Studio Access Pack
- Extra Cover Pack
- Spotlight Launches Video On Demand Library
We’ve also been busy sourcing new partners in the industry to provide you with useful discounts and services:
Top 10 Advice and Tips Articles of 2024
From accessing voice work to audition tips and monologue advice, our articles have covered a variety of topics over the last year, and here some of our most popular reads:
- Getting Started as a Voice Actor
- What’s Your Vocal Range and Voice Type
- How Do I Set Up a Voice Over Studio at Home?
- Finding and Signing with an Agent
- How to Self-Tape Auditions
- Acting Showreel Tips From Casting Directors
- What Casting Director Amy Hubbard Wants to See in the Audition Room
- Tips for Performing Your Best Monologue
- How to Edit Your Self-Tapes and Showreels
- 7 Headshot Tips from Casting Directors
Interviews with Casting Directors
We were thrilled to talk to many talented casting directors this year about the wonderful films and TV shows that they cast. How many of these did you manage to watch?
- Aisha Bywaters on Casting Queenie
- Rachel Sheridan on Casting One Day
- Susan Shopmaker on Casting The Holdovers
- Sophie Holland on Casting Beetlejuice Beetlejuice
- Catherine Willis on Casting A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder
- Peter Hunt on Casting Hollyoaks
- Nina Gold and Martin Ware on Casting ‘Conclave’
Casting Stories
We were excited to see so many Spotlight members on our screens and stages in 2024 and share their success stories. Next year, it could be you!
Ones to read:
- Marta Svetek in Five Nights at Freddy’s: Security Breach
- Evie Templeton in Return to Silent Hill
- Ella Purnell in Fallout
- Lee Mead in Sister Act on the West End
- Laura Dawkes in Frozen on the West End
- Noah Matthews Matofsky in Disney’s Peter Pan and Wendy
- Karl Queensborough in Hamilton on the West End
Ones to watch:
Interviews with Industry Professionals
This year we spoke with some fascinating people working behind-the-scenes in the industry as directors, producers and other professions. Here are some of the highlights:
- In the Director’s Chair with Paulette Randall MBE
- Producer Robert Chandler on Voicing Animated Characters
- An Intimacy Coordinator’s Insight with Joshua Okpala
- Behind the Scenes of ‘Saw X’ with Cinematographer Nicholas Matthews
Spotlight Prize Winners
Back in July, we were delighted to host another Spotlight Prize where 22 amazing drama students showcased their talents in front of an audience of actors, agents and casting directors. Alyssa Thabisile Sibanda of Bristol Old Vic Theatre School won the prize for Best Actor (Stage) with her performance of Many Moons by Alice Birch, and Senam Akpokavi of Arts Educational Schools won the prize for Best Actor (Screen) for his performance of For Black Boys Who Have Considered Suicide When the Hue Gets Too Heavy by Ryan Calais Cameron. We can’t wait to see where their career takes them next!
And that’s a wrap! We wish all of our members and casting professional friends the very best for what the new year will bring.
