Camila Canó-Flaviá - Actor of the Month for October 2024

Actor: Camila Canó-Flaviá| Interviewed by: Destiny Lilly, CSA

1) Has there been a Casting Director that has encouraged and/or supported you in your career?

Over the years, I have felt particularly supported by Stephanie Yankwitt, CSA of TBD Casting, Kim Miscia, CSA and Beth Bowling, CSA of Bowling/Miscia Casting, as well as Karyl Casl, CSA and, of course, you, Destiny, over at The Telsey Office. Whether meeting in person or online, I have felt truly welcomed and invited to play in a space where I know I will be pushed to do the best work that I can in the room and be cheered on no matter the outcome. 

2) What work are you most proud of?

Dance Nation at Playwright’s Horizons changed my life. It was my first job right out of college, I was the youngest person in an ensemble of incredibly gifted actors–so I felt that I was witnessing a masterclass–and I was well aware that I was working on a play that was making waves in the contemporary American theater scene in how young girls are portrayed in all of their tenderness and ferity. I still count myself so lucky that I was given the opportunity to (pretend to) tap dance in a sailor outfit and rub blood all over my face in one production. 

3) What or who inspired you to pursue acting as a career?

Were it not for my parents being as supportive as they have always been about me going after what I want, I think coming to the realization that I wanted to do this for a career would have been considerably harder to arrive at, if not downright impossible. They have pushed me to be as diligent as I can be in my endeavors, so it felt only natural that I would audition for a performing arts high school (I’d been bitten by the bug a couple of summers prior) and, after meetings with an audition coach that my mom arranged for me and took me numerous times to see, I got in. There, I learned what it meant to really love this thing and work at it year after year. It felt like my fate was sealed after freshman year, in the best way; not like locking a box and throwing away the key, rather as in a cracking open. And despite the bumps on the road, it has honestly felt like that since. 

4) What was your first IMDbPro credit, and how did you feel when you saw it?

That would be a co-star role on Madam Secretary that I was so thrilled to get. I remember not really understanding how long it took between filming and when the episode would air, so the wait felt like forever. But seeing the IMDbPro credit show up one day on my profile helped make the wait feel worth it–it was an impactful “I made it!” moment. Watching the episode felt surreal: I had never seen myself on a screen bigger than a laptop for the occasional pre-pandemic self-tape, much less hearing my voice mic’d and mastered and booming out of television speakers. I remember thinking that I still had a lot to learn, but how lucky I was to have been able to dip my toe in the water.

5) How has IMDbPro helped you market yourself to filmmakers?

There’s rarely a moment in which I watch a film or a show or meet someone from the industry after which I am not pulling up IMDbPro to get my bearings on who has worked on what and when with whom. I think of IMDbPro as the spider’s web that ties the moving parts of the industry together to create a clearer image of the whole. It is a wonderful tool that has kept me as informed as it has kept others up to date about what I have been up to, which never hurts!

6) Any funny casting room stories?

A few years ago, I went in for a character that spoke a short monologue in French with the accent of a Spanish speaker on top of it. Now, French is a language I don’t really speak but adore, so I try to convince myself that I can pull it off if I put my mind to it. I figured if I got the French down, the additional accent would take care of itself. Anyways, I go into the casting room, we go for one take and… the wheels are coming off quite fast. I stumble on a word here, which makes me forget a word there, and now I’ve changed the tense on every other word after that, and you can just forget about the Spanish-speaker accent to boot. I’m also profusely sweating now because I’m so embarrassed and can’t believe that I said I could do this and there is now video proof and an eye witness that can attest otherwise.  The casting assistant kindly asks if we could go for another take and I am simply grateful that she did not just leave it at that. And in the next take, the text…flies off my tongue like I’ve always known how it’s supposed to go. And I got the part! 

7) If you could play any character in a movie, past or present, who would it be and why? 

Oh man, it would be Gelsomina in “La Strada”. Few can do what Giulietta Masina does in that film, therefore I would have to put a few more years between having watched it and playing the character so I don’t feel woefully unfit to take on the role, but I would love to work on a character as heart-wrenchingly tender and physically dynamic and not very verbal yet deeply communicative as that. Also, Fellini!

8) What is something you’ve watched recently that you would recommend?

I recently went to see Mike Leigh’s latest film, “Hard Truths” in theaters. Marianne Jean-Baptistet and Michele Austin are impeccable. 

9) Tell us a fun fact about you outside of acting.

I am currently reading the last book of the Wolf Hall trilogy, “The Mirror and the Light”, which is phenomenal. It also has me realizing that the last book series I read may have been the Twilight books…in middle school. 

Actor of the Month is a monthly collaboration between IMDbPro and Casting Society that celebrates the casting community and spotlights its members through a series of interviews between casting directors and actors about their acting journey, the casting process, and how IMDbPro helps them advance their careers.