Head of the week: The character seeker

 
For Patrizia Kettenbach, perfect casting plays the main role in every film and photo production. 
Spending a week at cattle markets and in farmhouse parlors looking for "waschöchten" Appenzeller character heads. Searching countless school classes for talented people who can play baseball as well as kids in Brooklyn. Looking out for originals in the scene who you can tell want to win a karaoke competition. - This is the world of Patrizia Kettenbach. The trained actress and former film production assistant has been running her own agency, Kettenbach Casting, for just over a year.
She found her Appenzeller for the Contexta cheese advertisement and the commercial by Michael Steiner. The kids played basketball in a trailer for Swiss television. The "character faces" could be seen shortly before Christmas in Beck&Bondi's karaoke campaign for Swisscom Mobile's broadband.
Their casting agency does not work by managing a card index, Kettenbach offers a constantly new search as casting director. Kettenbach Casting is therefore "an independent authority that advises production companies".
Of course, she makes her work easier with a card index that "is constantly growing with every job". However, Kettenbach's aim is to look for new characters and talents for each commission as exclusively as possible. To this end, the specialist regularly visits theater productions across the country or graduation projects at drama schools. She makes targeted calls on the website www.kettenbachcasting.ch, for example when she needs to find Indian or Asian people, goat farmers, foresters, truck drivers or boxers.
With all this work, Patrizia Kettenbach is increasingly expanding her card index with professional actors. Based on her background, her aim is to "carry out more and more professional actor castings". However, with every job you have to develop a feeling for whether a trained actor or a talented amateur could be the right cast. Patrizia Kettenbach likes her job because it offers the opportunity to look into completely different worlds again and again. She is also aware of her responsibility. When she spends a week as a guest in countless farmhouse parlors for the Appenzeller commercial and is allowed to photograph the children, she has to "develop a certain flair" for dealing with people in a different way to model casting. "But that suits me well. I love dealing with people and have no fear of contact."
Patrizia Kettenbach first studied German and history after completing her business baccalaureate in Zurich. However, her secret love has always been the theater. During her semester breaks, she attended acting workshops in Berlin and Munich. At the age of 24, she decided that now was the last opportunity to switch to acting. So she switched to a full-time drama school in Hamburg. Three years of training were followed by play contracts and she was able to make a living from her dream job, most recently with a permanent engagement in the ensemble of a municipal theater.
During this time, however, she realized that although this profession is beautiful and exciting, "there is more to it than just this kind of work". Acting is also a way of life. You always have to be ready to move to another city for a new role, you live out of a suitcase for a long time. Your private life is turned upside down ...
Back in Switzerland, Kettenbach has found her new stage in advertising. She worked in strategic planning at Wirz Werbung for a year. She conducted street interviews for the then current pitch for Sunrise. Later, she also had to find out "what people think" for other pitches. After a year, she decided she wanted to gain experience in the film industry.
Kettenbach applied to various film productions and ended up at Kontraproduktion, the company run by Michael Steiner, Pascal Walder, Adrian Frutiger and Andi Huber. She worked there for almost two years as a production assistant between the two feature films "Spital in Angst" and "Eugen". They shot apple juice, Appenzeller and many music clips for Obi. "I was able to gain a lot of experience with these videos and had a completely free hand in organizing the production." Kettenbach did castings and production for clips with Stress, Bligg, Tears and Adrian Weiermann.
When the financing for the later feature film success "Eugen" was not yet secured, Kettenbach's next professional challenge came with Pumpkin Film. Here she got to know the world of international advertising films. After a year in a permanent position, Kettenbach took the plunge into self-employment. This idea had been buzzing around in her head for a long time. Initially, she worked as a freelance production manager or production assistant for various production companies. Since the fall of 2006, however, she has worked exclusively as a caster.
She was already fascinated by the complex considerations involved in casting roles during her time as an actress. As she has worked in front of the camera herself and is also familiar with the needs of the production side, staging a casting is now definitely her core competence. "I can create a pleasant atmosphere and use my background to assess an actor's potential well." She is therefore also pleased to receive feedback from seasoned professionals that they felt comfortable at the casting and were able to try things out.
Patrizia Kettenbach explains this ability to motivate with her interest in people and their stories - "which is also what originally prompted me to become an actress".
Shortly before starting Kettenbach Casting, she also began a postgraduate degree in cultural management at the University of Basel. However, as her casting work takes up all of her time, she decided to postpone her degree for two years.
The next goal is to move to a larger office on Bremgartenstrasse in the spring. Kettenbach Casting will be sharing an office there with freelance production manager Nicole Spring, with whom she has worked a lot in the past.
She is currently casting the supporting roles for an international Renault commercial starring Formula 1 star Fernando Alonso on behalf of Pumpkin Film.
 
Andreas Panzeri