How to Get Booked with Your Halloween Costume
When you work as a Background Actor with Central Casting, you can get booked with a variety of wardrobe, including with your Halloween costume.
Network TV shows typically film Halloween episodes in late summer, but depending on story needs (like flashbacks) Halloween scenes may be filmed any time during the season. Similarly, with streaming and cable series that film throughout the year, there are plenty of opportunities to get booked with your costume.
Non-trademarked Halloween costumes
In scenes that call for Halloween costumes, most roles will require non-trademarked wardrobe. What does that mean? Characters from your favorite movies and TV shows, attire from professional sports teams, and clothing with logos all have various forms of copyrights and trademarks that require clearance to be shown on screen. By booking Background Actors with non-trademarked costumes, a production can also ensure another franchise’s characters and logos don’t appear in the background of their scenes.
Non-trademarked wardrobe can include costumes like a witch, a vampire, a zombie, a pirate, etc. There are a ton of great and easy to put together non-trademarked options, if you’re unsure what to add to your wardrobe repertoire, keep an eye out this Halloween or go back through some of your favorite Halloween episodes for ideas.
Do you have trademarked costumes or cosplay you want to get booked with? Depending on the production and the needs of the scene, there may be roles where trademarked costumes are accepted or where specific costumes are needed. As always, read all communications from Central Casting, including availability inquiries and details messages, completely and carefully before responding to make sure you know exactly what the Casting Director is looking for.
Getting booked with costumes
When booking Halloween scenes or roles that require specific wardrobe, Casting Directors will either send a message to Background Actors who fit the description for the role or post to our Jobs page with information on the types of costumes they’re looking for.
A great way to let Casting Directors know the different costumes you have is to add your wardrobe to your online profile. You can do this by selecting the “Casting Information” section and scrolling to the “Wardrobe” option. If you don’t see an option in the dropdown that fits your costume, select “other” then enter the costume type. While you’re adding wardrobe, don’t forget to add any props you own to the “Props” field.
You can also upload photos of yourself in Halloween costumes to your online profile, just keep in mind that adding multiple photos in costumes will only clutter your profile and make it harder for Casting Directors to find the photos they need. We recommend uploading a casual, business, and formal photo, then adding 1-2 photos in unique costumes or wardrobe. Don’t worry if you have a variety of costumes you want to show off, when Casting Directors are looking for specific wardrobe, they will likely post to the Jobs page or send a message with instructions to send a recent selfie in that wardrobe. If you want to be prepared in these situations, we recommend keeping a collection of recent selfies in your best looks ready for when a Casting Director asks for one.
Be sure the check out our Ultimate Photo Guide for Your Online Profile before adding additional photos. You may have great photos in your costume from a Halloween party or out with your friends, but these types of photos cannot be used for casting purposes they may include other people and likely do not reflect your current look.
Putting looks together is a big part of working as a Background Actor. Read through the guides in our wardrobe article category for inspiration to help you get ready for set.
