Remembering Eddie Foy III

We’re sad to learn that casting director Eddie Foy III has passed away at the age of 83. Foy came from a show business family - his grandfather, Eddie Foy, Sr., created "The Seven Little Foys," a vaudeville act with his children, including Eddie Foy III’s father, Eddie Foy, Jr. Eddie Foy III's casting credits include dozens of television shows and movies: The Donna Reed Show, Gidget, I Dream of Jeannie, The Monkees, Mork & Mindy, Barney Miller, "The Poseidon Adventure," among many others.

Below are some selections from his 2003 interview:

On advice to aspiring casting directors:

First thing I would do is get with somebody who really knows what they’re doing. Don’t get up from behind a secretarial desk or get up from behind an agent’s desk and say, “I want to be a casting director.” Go find the right person that you can study with. Find out what it is to learn the psyche of the actor. Forget whether the actor has talent. Forget whether she’s good looking or he’s handsome. Or she’s got great breasts and he’s got a great set of buns. Forget all that. Find out what the actor is all about. Then go out and read a little book called The Complete Works of Shakespeare and find out what our theatre is about. And then go find out what Noel Coward was about. And then go find out what Rogers and Hammerstein were about. And then go find out what Lerner and Lowe were about and Edward Albee. And find out why people… that were in our business like Spencer Tracy and Miss Hepburn never took their clothes off. And they left their love to be your fantasy. Today I would say study the actor. Watch theater. Watch television. Watch movies.

On advice to aspiring actors:

Study, study, study. Acting schools. Actors go to bad acting teachers. Bad acting teachers are bad actors and they’re teaching young actors their bad habits. They’re out of work because they’re rotten actors. The good acting teachers are people who are professional. They care about the student. They have ways of reaching in to get organic performances out of them. A good acting teacher will sit with you for two or three weeks before he even asks you to do anything…will sit there and help you and make you work inside and get it outside so that when you’re ready for it, your life becomes part of the art. I believe so strongly that an acting teacher can make or break a performer. So therefore, come to Hollywood prepared. Know what you’re going to do. Make sure Mom and Dad are behind you. Make sure you have a good faith background. That you can rely on yourself. Keep sure that you always stay within a good work place; mental work place. Take care of your body. Take care of your fate. Take care of your health. And take care of and respect your talent.

On how he would like to be remembered:

I told it like it was. I never screwed an actor. [I] always told me the truth. [I] never hurt anybody. And very truthfully, a man who loved his family more than himself. If that was to be anything, he loved his family more than himself.

Watch Eddie Foy III's full interview here.