castingi

Earlier today, a casting call posting briefly appeared on Craigslist seeking actors for an iPhone 5 Commercial. The ad seemed to have been only up for a couple of hours, but long enough to get indexed by Google and screenshot'd by one of our readers.

The ad was looking for both Male and Female commercial actors. The role was described as "Happy, Smiling" and they were looking to cast 5 people in a range of ethnicities, ages and sexes. The payment was curiously listed in british pounds.

It's certainly strange that such an ad was posted in the first place, explicitly mentioning the "iPhone 5". It may have been a mistake or a hoax. Arguing against a pure hoax, however, is the fact that a very similar ad ran in New York about a month ago, but that time just for the "Apple iPhone" (not the iPhone 5):

Commercial Casting Notice for Apple iPhone:
Location: NY
Employer: TIGER PRODUCTIONS
Duration: 1 DAY, starts MAY 4TH.
(Non-Union artist contracts)
Director: H. GOLAN
ROLE: family oriented happy, male and female
AGE: 18-50 - huge range
RATE: $3000 +10%

Apple is known to film commercials ahead of product launches. In fact, last year at about this exact time (May 24th, 2010), Apple was casting commercials for FaceTime in their then-unreleased iPhone 4. That said, we were unable to find any further online information on casting director H. Golan or the production company listed.

Top Rated Comments

mobile-caffeine Avatar
183 months ago
What's also fishy...

The shoot is set for LA (I'm assuming Los Angeles, California) but the payment is in British Pounds. Hmmm....
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
jmann Avatar
183 months ago
This most definitely fake. I work at an online casting software company where 98% of LA's commercials are cast through, and any legitimate casting director would NEVER post a job like this in a public place. The client would fire them in an instant.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
cooldaddybeck Avatar
183 months ago
Why is this even listed here?

Tomorrow on Macrumors:

Nigerian prince will trade $26 million dollars for an iPhone4, if you would please do the needful and please be open to providing your financial information and locate a Western Union near you.
:rolleyes:
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)
FireFish Avatar
183 months ago
If you observe the ad closely, you'll realize that not only is it a fake, it was likely purported by someone connected with Anand Desai-Barochia (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm3652548/).


:confused: Why? Because they conveniently provided two links as examples of who they're 'interested in'. Notice that both links are identical aside from the trailing '/' sign, which effectively does nothing as far as hyper-linking goes.

:rolleyes: Why did they post both variations of this guy's link? Clearly for search engine spider indexing purposes. They knew how much crap would be generated from this chatter and how many times his link would be mentioned all over the web that it would naturally make his IMDB traffic up there next to Harrison Ford. Believe it or not, casting companies using IMDB actually consider an actor's page traffic when searching. Meaning, if an actor's IMDB page has recorded more hits than others, they immediately assume that there's a reason this actor is getting so much 'attention' by other casting agents.

:cool: In a nutshell, while I don't have proof that my theory is correct, I'm willing to bet on it. The first thing I thought when reading the initial posting was why they'd need to say "we're looking for someone like him". If we're talking about an ad for a product that has over $1.5 billion dollars in revenue, you'd think that they could figure out a way to afford that guy instead of posting a casting call looking for his cheaper look-alike. :apple:
Score: 4 Votes (Like | Disagree)
coder12 Avatar
183 months ago
I think that the fact that it's written in all caps, has a few !!!s thrown in there, and a ":)" sends this screaming to be a fake, but hey, maybe I'm mistaken here...
Score: 4 Votes (Like | Disagree)
jmann Avatar
183 months ago
So you're saying the April post was also fake? Serious question.

arn

I would say with almost 100% certainty it is. Many times the Casting Directors when hired by the client (Apple) are required to sign NDAs and are prohibited from listing product or company details when posting the breakdown online for the agents to submit their talent to for auditions.

Legitimate casting directors won't post on craigslist either. If they are looking for someone very particular and they don't get the right submissions from the agents, they can release a project publicly for actors themselves to submit. But that is very rare, and usually only seen when casting for something like an obese person that is a professional bird caller or something super-specific like that, but that is the only time that you will see publicly listed submissions for big time commercial roles.

But I can guarantee they won't be risking being fired by a client for posting a project on craigslist.
Score: 4 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Popular Stories

iPadOS 26 App Windowing

Apple Explains Why iPads Don't Just Run macOS

Friday June 13, 2025 7:46 am PDT by
iPadOS 26 allows iPads to function much more like Macs, with a new app windowing system, a swipe-down menu bar at the top of the screen, and more. However, Apple has stopped short of allowing iPads to run macOS, and it has now explained why. In an interview this week with Swiss tech journalist Rafael Zeier, Apple's software engineering chief Craig Federighi said that iPadOS 26's new Mac-like ...
iphone 16 pro models 1

17 Reasons to Wait for the iPhone 17

Thursday June 12, 2025 8:58 am PDT by
Apple's iPhone development roadmap runs several years into the future and the company is continually working with suppliers on several successive iPhone models simultaneously, which is why we often get rumored features months ahead of launch. The iPhone 17 series is no different, and we already have a good idea of what to expect from Apple's 2025 smartphone lineup. If you skipped the iPhone...
Logitech Logo Feature

Logitech Announces Two New Accessories for WWDC

Friday June 13, 2025 7:22 am PDT by
Alongside WWDC this week, Logitech announced notable new accessories for the iPad and Apple Vision Pro. The Logitech Muse is a spatially-tracked stylus developed for use with the Apple Vision Pro. Introduced during the WWDC 2025 keynote address, Muse is intended to support the next generation of spatial computing workflows enabled by visionOS 26. The device incorporates six degrees of...
iOS 26 Screens

Here Are All the iOS 26 Features That Require iPhone 15 Pro or Newer

Thursday June 12, 2025 4:53 am PDT by
With iOS 26, Apple has introduced some major changes to the iPhone experience, headlined by the new Liquid Glass redesign that's available across all compatible devices. However, several of the update's features are exclusive to iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 models, since they rely on Apple Intelligence. The following features are powered by on-device large language models and machine...
apple beta 26 lineup

Apple 'Sherlocked' These Apps at WWDC 2025

Wednesday June 11, 2025 7:14 am PDT by
Apple at WWDC previewed a bunch of new features coming in its updated operating systems, but certain changes will have been met with dismay by third-party developers who already offer apps with equivalent or similar features. In other words, their product has been "sherlocked" by Apple. When Apple creates an app or a feature that has functionality found in a third-party app, it is referred...
iOS 26 on Three iPhones

Hate iOS 26's Liquid Glass Design? Here's How to Tone It Down

Wednesday June 11, 2025 4:22 pm PDT by
iOS 26 features a whole new design material that Apple calls Liquid Glass, with a focus on transparency that lets the content on your display shine through the controls. If you're not a fan of the look, or are having trouble with readability, there is a step that you can take to make things more opaque without entirely losing out on the new look. Apple has multiple Accessibility options that ...
maxresdefault

Everything Apple Announced at WWDC 2025 in 10 Minutes

Monday June 9, 2025 5:21 pm PDT by
At today's WWDC 2025 keynote event, Apple unveiled a new design that will inform the next decade of iOS, iPadOS, and macOS development, so needless to say, it was a busy day. Apple also unveiled a ton of new features for the iPhone, an overhauled Spotlight interface for the Mac, and a ton of updates that make the iPad more like a Mac than ever before. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel ...
CarPlay Liquid Glass Dark

Apple to Let iPhone Users Watch Videos on CarPlay Screen While Parked

Thursday June 12, 2025 6:16 am PDT by
Apple this week announced that iPhone users will soon be able to watch videos right on the CarPlay screen in supported vehicles. iPhone users will be able to wirelessly stream videos to the CarPlay screen using AirPlay, according to Apple. For safety reasons, video playback will only be available when the vehicle is parked, to prevent distracted driving. The connected iPhone will be able to...