Since 2009, the number of Americans who say they approve of unions and want them to be more powerful has steadily grown. In 2022, the National Labor Relations Board reported a 53 percent increase in union election petitions over the year before, meaning that more Americans were joining together with their co-workers to try to form unions. The agency also estimates that a whopping 60 million workers wanted to join a union that year but couldn’t.

During the early days of the pandemic, the audition process was turned on its head. Traditional, in-person open calls were too much of a risk, so, instead, directors relied heavily on video submissions. Even as in-person auditions make a comeback, they don’t quite look the same as they once did.