220 people. 25 minutes. 4 gymnasts. And 1 doctor.

Rick Owens’s longtime casting director Angus Munro reveals what went into the designer’s behemoth Spring/Summer 2025 show—and other tales from 17 years in Owens’s universe.

Angus Munro is not easily flustered. Having been a judge on the wildly popular 2001 Channel 4 series , the veteran casting director says he’s used to “van drivers driving past calling me a wanker and stuff”—which is to say little can make him sweat. But casting 220 nonmodels in a spectacular Rick Owens show in the high summer heat of Paris did raise Munro’s pulse slightly.“During the show you can see me doing my little Nervous Nellie thing on the headphones,” Munro says with a laugh over a video call. It’s true. At the apex of the Palais de Tokyo’s staircase, beside the bas-reliefs of the nine muses, there’s Munro choreographing the show, doling out groups of models like the conductor of a heavenly human orchestra. Here they come: Tyrone Dylan Susman in a sheer jumpsuit and bold-shouldered coat. Allanah Starr in a draped and caped prong dress. Charles Star Matadin in a gilded hood and Kat Q in sheer layers with shoulders that arc upward toward the sky. And here parades an assemblage of bodies on a litter supported by ten strongmen.

“This is the greatest fashion show I have ever seen,” a fellow critic texts me.But back to Munro on the staircase: “Even though you can see me up there and I’m waving my hands around, I felt this real serenity. I just was like, there’s nothing I can do. It’s all done. It’s going to have to work itself out.”Working it out required two months of prep, some paperwork, and a doctor.“At first we discussed the show just being cast from fashion students and fashion faculty, but it evolved into being an inclusive thing about anybody who was a devotee of Rick Owens,” says Munro. “And if you don’t want to use models in a place like Paris—historically and famously the most bureaucratic place on the planet—you cannot just do that.”Hence the doctor. To get all 220 people cleared to walk in a fashion show in Paris, Munro had to get each one an official voucher from the French government. That required hiring a small modeling agency to issue rights to work, asking each participant to bring their passport and birth certificate, and submitting each person to a doctor for a medical exam. “In order to get those vouchers written out, I had to employ a doctor to sit there who was puffing, puff, puff, puff, tap, tap, tap on all the weird and wonderful characters that we bring together,” he explains. “I mean you’ve got Moon who’s got his tattooed eyeballs and his green hair and I’m thinking, ‘I sure as fuck hope Moon passes his medical.’”Moon passed. And so did 219 other Rick Owens friends, fans, and family who made the show possible. Here, Munro recounts the making of the Spring/Summer 2025 “Hollywood” show and other highlights from his 17 years in Owensville—and he’s currently street casting the womenswear SS25 show taking place in Paris this September. What keeps him coming back? “Rick can draw a line between what he feels in his heart and into theater.”

This show was incredible. I watched it hunched over in my seat, my mouth agape.So, after 17 years together, Rick finally asked you to cast 200 people for a show?When did you start working on this show?

The funny thing is I don’t get to feel that because I’m backstage choreographing the show. But I know what I’m part of and how privileged I am to be part of it. I also know how privileged I am to have elicited this crazy loyalty [from Owens]. I think he’s the greatest living fashion designer, and he’s also the most incredibly loyal person. Funnily enough, in January I cast a model in the [men’s Fall/Winter 2024] show who was not born when I did my first Rick Owens show. I’m really not into these kind of things that make me feel really fucking old, but this one I didn’t mind. I was like, “Wow, that’s really a testament to the body of work that we’ve done together.”Obviously, this one filled me with absolute trepidation and dread more than any of the other ones. Ever since I can remember doing these shows and taking over the choreography of it, there was always something. The day before a show, Rick would say “Oh, did I not mention the fire? Oh God, I’m sorry. Yeah, there’s going to be fire.” Or another time, “Oh, I didn’t mention it’s going to be pitch black?” Every season there’s something.A couple of seasons ago we had skirts that were as tight around the knee as you can possibly get, with boots that are the highest they’ve ever been, and contact lenses in so you can only see through a pinhole. And then smoke that you can’t see through, and then a bunch of stairs. But this one was epic. I kept thinking: How the hell am I going to do this?Two months before the show, because if we’re going to do something this epic, then it has to be done right. But it didn’t really set in until I’ve got fucking 220 people in front of me, all dressed in white, that I have to get around the Palais de Tokyo basin in a decent order. If there was ever a place for me to actually fuck up, and do it on a royal industrial scale, it would be there, you know? So, no pressure!

How did you begin casting and how did you edit it down?What do you look for in someone who wants to walk for Rick?Any fun stories from this season’s casting?

One of our team members was walking around the fashion schools and walking around Paris for ten days. Then I’m presented with all those people and I do an edit. I know that Rick wants everybody, but there are structural concerns that I have to address that Rick doesn’t need to address. Rick doesn’t need to know about the vouchers.Normally when I do a show that ends up at 40 to 50 models, I’ll probably see 600 people. In this instance, I probably saw 500 remotely from street casting. Then the good ones were edited to come and see me on the first day of casting. Then I want to see models too. But then I want to see all these devotees that have submitted themselves to the AMC casting call, which there are hundreds—I mean hundreds. It’s no shocker that everyone wants to be in a Rick Owens show. . .I think everybody understands that Rick Owens is an inclusive brand based on the DNA that we’ve created together in our talent aesthetic, if you like, or our human aesthetic. But this was an opportunity to really do this, but in a delicate way and in a nonforced way.They have to have a reverence to them. They have to have a sophistication. They have to have a frailty actually, in a way. When they’re put into Rick’s creations, their stature grows and they become these highly sophisticated, powerful beings. But I think a lot of that comes from a certain frailty. It comes from reverence to Rick, or irreverence, or people who just generally don’t give a fuck. I know I’m sort of saying everything, but there are a number of factors that meld together. It is intangible.But certainly I can feel when people have the inner power or weakness. One or the other, I see both of them as being a power in a way. Not that I pick who is in the show—I suggest. Rick makes the final choice.There’s this one guy who came to the casting—Simon—he comes every season. I said to him, “How many times have you done the show?” And he went, “I’ve never done the show. I’ve been coming to the casting since 2010.” So that’s 28 times he had gotten a “no.” If that’s not a devotee, I don’t know what a devotee is. He’s a lovely guy, so he finally walked this one.One of my friends, Miles [Langford], who was a male model back in the day that I put in a lot of shows, is a really talented tattoo artist now and does all the England soccer players. Even though he stopped modeling he came back this season for Rick. He knows I’m a soccer fiend and brought his friend Cam[eron Humphreys] who plays [center]-back for Rotherham United, which is like a third-tier team here. He loves Rick. So they brought themselves—they loved it. It’s so fun.Jakob Jakobsson, who Rick mentioned in his press release, was in Rick’s first-ever show in New York. He came with his father and his son. He looked amazing. Another guy, his name is Charles—he’s French obviously—was in the first group on purpose. Tyrone [Dylan Susman] and I put him up there because he’s just so fabulous looking. He’s kind of got a Lyle Lovett vibe. I’ve really wanted to put him in this show before, but this was my opportunity now. He was a model in the ’80s and then he was in the French Foreign Legion for 15 years. He said it was really crazy and brutal. Then he worked on submarines for ten years and now he is the manager of the confectionery for the train station in Paris. I can’t top that story! Honestly, during the whole process, I was thinking: I really want to remember all this.

Will you tell me a little bit about the gymnasts and creating that set piece in the middle? I think in the press release it said the women had been in the Spring/Summer 2016 show, where they were harnessed to each other.When I went backstage before the show, the second I opened the door, one of the bodybuilders who carried the gymnasts was standing right there, with a resistance band looped around his foot, pumping up. He was the biggest, juiciest man I’ve ever seen in my life. I was thinking: I can’t wait to find out what’s about to happen.In the time that you’ve worked with Rick, you have been asked to accomplish what to other people might sound like unaccomplishable missions: Find women that want to be harnessed to each other, find bodybuilders to carry a rig, find men that are OK with having their dick out under a dress at a fashion show—Did you cast them with their pants off?

I think it really evolved in Rick’s mind. He was looking at parades and stuff. I dunno if this was how Rick was thinking, but for me the gymnastics was sort of the gel that held the thing together, didn’t make it just about a large procession of people. It took it away from being pagan and it gave it that—I don’t want to say Olympic spirit, but it gave it that sort of grandeur. It felt like Ancient Egypt to me or Mesopotamia, but also the future. It felt like , it felt like . It was just like, wow, this is fucking awesome.Ylva, the head gymnast, she and I think one of the others had been in the show when they were strapped to each other. Rick’s vision for it was very much realized. We had to overcome a few hurdles because you need very strong people to carry the thing. So we had to find those guys. It kind of is reverse engineering: This is what it wants to do? Can we build this rig? Can they walk on it? How many people do we need to carry this? Can they get up and down the stairs? In the end it was amazing.Ah, must be quarterback Kenny! He’s definitely worth mentioning.By the way, before the dick show casting. . . I mean, I’ve never been sent so many dick pics in my whole life.No. I mean—I can say this, I guess? But with hindsight, we probably should have done that because there were a couple of slightly. . . let’s say less impressive outfits. But yeah, I’ve been asked to do all of it, you name it. I’m down. It doesn’t matter what he asks for. I would do anything for Rick.

There are many people in the Rick Owens universe who are not really models but rather cool, interesting people that come back again and again. How did you find these people and why is it important to have this relationship? I love to hang out with Sam at each show, the tall bald kid.How did you find him and convince him to do this? The other 363 days of the year he’s just a grocery store clerk somewhere in England.Oh, he’s so nice!How did you become a casting director?One last question: Why didn’t you model in this show?

I found him.I cannot believe you are hanging out with Sam!I’m like his older brother. He’s adorable, so adorable! I started casting outside the usual spots really early on because I figured out quickly that there were not enough of the right characters and faces available via traditional route. So we did a lot of street casting. During the year, I see people either on Instagram or my team will send me ideas. We found Moon with the tattooed eyeballs on Instagram. Sam, we found in London. I just knew that he was going to work.It’s a simple one. I went to a very exclusive boarding school called Eton College and when I left, all I wanted to do was drink, take drugs, sleep with women, and ride motorcycles. I ended up dating a model agent. We moved in together and she’d come home with these stacks of Polaroids of people they’d scouted. And I’d be like, “That one’s good. That one’s also good, that one’s good.” And she was like, “Wow, you’re really good at this.” So I ended up as a new faces agent, then I got promoted to be at Elite in London. Then I ended up as the head booker representing Naomi and everybody back in the ’90s.I left there and I went to work with a famous photographer to be his casting director. Then into casting, and then I started getting asked by the stylist that this photographer was working with. They were like, “Oh my God.” They were like, “Would you do—we love your vision, would you do a show?” And the first show I ever did was Louis Vuitton.We did a show once a few years ago [in 2015] where a lot of the OWENSCORP people were in the show, and there was talk of that then. But I quickly reminded everybody that if I was in the show, then who was choreographing it? Which was a handy excuse for the fact that I really did not want to be in the show. I would do it if he wanted me to do it. I was on a TV show in the 2000s that was really famous here [in the UK], and I had my 15 minutes of fame and it was awful, with van drivers driving past calling me a wanker and stuff. I’m good with being behind the scenes.