Screenwriter Aims to Change HK Film Casting From Inside

HONG KONG — The screenwriter of last year’s unconventional Cantonese flick “All About Love” doesn’t have a lot of love for Hong Kong’s movie casting process.

Yeeshan Yang, a veteran industry insider, says film productions here are hidden inside a “black box” when it comes to selecting their leading actors, actresses, crew members and even extras. She is in the first stages of launching an online database, CastDifferent, that she says would make film casting more transparent. But there are two challenges: She first has to raise capital, then she must defeat widespread opposition in the movie business, she said.

“In the industry here, we don’t have this position of casting director,” Yang said.

CastDifferent is based on a business model that’s working well in the U.K., Yang says. Overseas, online services such as Casting Call Pro compile profiles of actors and other industry workers onto a database that is accessed by production companies and casting agents. The websites are like a JobsDB.com for film professionals, although in this case the job seekers pay. The membership fee is HK$100 a year, which Yang calls low compared with what some scouting agents charge. At this stage, film companies don’t have to pay to access the database and view member profiles, but Yang plans on charging them eventually.

The purpose of CastDifferent is to level the playing field; talent and portfolios would count more than money, according to Yang. Currently, big celebrities drive the industry in Hong Kong because they have the connections and clout, she says. “The movie stars are very spoiled, and they create barriers for new actors, new talent to enter the business.”

Bey Logan, a film producer and screenwriter who worked on “The Medallion” and “The Twins Effect,” says: “We need young blood.”

“The major problem in Hong Kong is the absence of young talent who can take over the industry from actors like Jet Li, Jackie Chan, Tony Leung – who are all around 50,” he adds.

In casting his film projects, Logan says he has never encountered what Yang calls the “black box.” Before founding B&E Productions in 2009, Logan worked for Emperor Motion Picture Group and was the vice president of Asia for the Weinstein Co.

Yang hopes CastDifferent will succeed not only because she says it has the potential of changing an industry, but also because she has a lot riding on it.

So far, Yang has poured HK$500,000 of her savings into her business idea since she launched it in August. She says she needs more capital – about HK$4 million –to keep it going.

She has approached several government departments and investors for funding and has received favorable responses. “The government also thinks this is a good idea. It’s good for the industry; it’s good for the society,” Yang says.

“In the film business, we have 500,000 people looking for jobs,” she says. “The current number [of members] is not enough to change the industry.”

CastDifferent is already online, but there are only 70 member profiles, many of them directors and actors in Hong Kong or Beijing. Yang’s target number is 50,000 members.

Her biggest opposition remains the film industry. Her adversaries aren’t just people at the top, such as directors and producers; they are at every level. Those who stand to earn the biggest profits will lose the most if CastDifferent were to succeed, she says.

Patrick Frater, chief executive of Film Business Asia and a former Variety journalist, says an online database for casting may work in Hong Kong. But, he adds, “what works in the U.K. can’t necessarily be applied in Hong Kong because there is a different system here.”

Plus, he says, a talent database already exists online. It’s called Alivenotdead.com.

That site invites artists to create profiles and connect with one another and fans; actor Daniel Wu is one of its most prominent and active members.

Logan used the Alivenotdead.com network to cast his leading lady in his current project, “Snowblade.”

“The site is great, but it needs more direct connections with the industry,” he says. Alivenotdead.com acts more as a community of artists than as an industry tool.

“I use Alivenotdead, Facebook and three or four online platforms… but there is definitely room for improvement,” Logan says. “It would be good to have a site that acts as a casting director to sift through the oddballs – with the Internet, you never know what you’ll get.”

Yang, who is in her late 40s and whose film credits are also under the name Elsa Chan, has been a screenwriter for 12 years. She entered Hong Kong’s film industry when she was asked to adapt her book “From the Queen to the Chief Executive.”

“Before that, I did business, so I understand that world,” she says. “To become a scriptwriter, you have to have business sense.”

The job is “20% writing and 80% selling,” as Yang puts it.

When “All About Love” was written many years ago, it couldn’t sell, Yang said. The script – partly set on the Mid-Levels escalators of Soho – is about two lesbian lovers who meet again after both get pregnant on short flings with men. She sold it years later after director Ann Hui approached her.

“Usually you have the script written 10, 20 years ago, and you can never sell it – but maybe when the time comes, when the market is ripe, when the investor comes, you can sell it,” Yang says.

Perhaps that’s a lesson Yang can apply to her CastDifferent venture. Changing Hong Kong’s film casting process from the inside may be her biggest sales pitch yet.