Production companies need to prioritize diversity and plan for it.
Local characters in Finnish TV and film are increasingly diverse in ethnicity, disabilities and gender roles, according to industry insiders who took on the issue in Helsinki on Friday at the Finnish Film Affair, but there is still a long way to go. “We know this is not just a Finnish challenge – this is a global challenge,” said Keely Cat-Wells, CEO and founder of C Talent and Zetta Studios, who has also advised organizations from UCLA to Virgin Media on disability inclusion. But concrete examples of success do lie along the path, said speakers at the panel, titled “Representation Now! 2.0 – Tools for Moving Forward.” Moderator Max Malka, a producer and head of scripted for Endemol Shine Finland, cited a frequent complaint from production companies looking to hire more diverse actors and struggling to find them: “We can’t find them – there aren’t any.” But even in a small, largely homogenous country like Finland, there are ways, said Katri Aksola, CEO of Helsinki Casting. “Productions really need to invest more in pre-production, make it longer and use a professional casting director,” said Aksola, whose company was founded in part to create a large, centralized database of diverse acting talent. Many production companies prefer to do their own casting, she acknowledged, but said, where diversity among actors is concerned, “I think a casting director is a must.” Over time, the availability of diverse, trained actors will improve, she said, but acting schools will need to start work on the problem. “We need to invest in education,” Aksola said. “We need to bring more students who are in different diversities so that there are possibilities for acting courses.” When asked for a recent teachable moment, Aksola cited a casting job done for a major Finnish project at which the director was clearly not happy “with some of the male suggestions not seeming to fit.
