Josh Einsohn and Us | Casting Director

That Was Us

Film Interviews, Tv & Film, Tv Reviews

4.9 • 2.5K Ratings

🗓️ 31 March 2026

⏱️ 74 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This week on That Was Us, we’re joined by one of the most pivotal people behind This Is Us: casting director Josh Einsohn. Josh reflects on 25 years in casting and shares how he got his start in production, what led him to feel passionate about casting, and how This Is Us ultimately changed his life forever. In this episode, Josh chats about: * His 25-year journey in casting and how he got his start * The role Tommy Lee Jones played early in his career * Working on The Polar Express and The West Wing * Partnering with Tiffany Little Canfield to cast This Is Us * Bringing Jon Huertas onto the show * The pressure of casting multiple ages of the same characters * The urgent recasting of the teen Big Three * How auditions changed after COVID * Casting Griffin Dunne as Nicky * Casting Jennifer Morrison as Cassidy * His advice for actors navigating the industry * How This Is Us influenced his decision to adopt his daughter, Molly" That Was Us is produced by Rabbit Grin Productions. Music by Taylor Goldsmith and Griffin Goldsmith. ------------------------- Support Our Sponsors: - With Shipt, it’s never just a delivery order – it’s shopped same day – in the same way you would. Use code "podcast" to get a year of Shipt for only $49 – HALF OFF the regular $99 price – at https://Shipt.com/offer. Terms apply ------------------------- 🍋 About the Show: The stars of This Is Us, Mandy Moore, Sterling K. Brown, and Chris Sullivan, dive back into the world of the Pearsons, reliving each episode and all the life lessons that came with it. Together, they dig in and dig deep, have the tough conversations, bring in very special and familiar guests, share never-before-heard behind-the-scenes moments, and feature listeners in highly anticipated fan segments. Join your favorite family back in the living room to examine our past, cherish our present, and look to the future with new episodes of That Was Us every Tuesday. ------------------------- 00:00 Intro 00:02:22 Interview 01:10:13 Outro Executive Producers: Natalie Holysz and Rob Holysz Creative Producer: Sam Skelton Production Coordinator: Andrew Rowley Video Editor: Todd Hughlett Mix & Master: Jason Richards About Headgum: Headgum is an LA & NY-based podcast network creating premium podcasts with the funniest, most engaging voices in comedy to achieve one goal: Making our audience and ourselves laugh. Listen to our shows at https://www.headgum.com. » SUBSCRIBE to Headgum: https://www.youtube.com/c/HeadGum?sub_confirmation=1 » FOLLOW us on Twitter: http://twitter.com/headgum » FOLLOW us on Instagram: https://instagram.com/headgum/ » FOLLOW us on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@headgum Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is a Headgum podcast. Who are we interviewing today?
0:27.3	Josh Einson.
0:28.3	Who is Josh Eisenson, Mandy Moore?
0:30.2	Josh Eisen is, was our casting director.
0:34.8	That's correct.
0:35.4	On This Is Us.
0:36.3	Yeah.
0:36.7	The only episode he didn't do was the pilot.
0:38.6	Was the pilot.
0:39.3	So he did not have cast us.
0:41.9	Yeah.
0:42.1	Tiffany cast us.
0:43.3	Yep.
0:43.7	But he came in shortly thereafter and pretty much is, although he does not take full credit.
0:49.1	He says it is a team, a collective, which I'm sure I understand.
0:52.7	Absolutely.
0:53.4	But, you know, he's sort of the one that, that brings in options.
0:58.9	Yeah.
0:59.5	Casting directors, it is their job to ruminate, think back on their experience of people
1:05.4	they brought in for other projects and knowing about other actors that are out there in
1:09.0	the ether and kind of bringing them the right people to the right parts.
1:13.2	So that's what Josh's job was.
	...

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