"Lead roles Seymour and Audrey were cast by Gresham in New York earlier this year; he asked contenders for the roles to read in pairs. "When I brought in Brian Michael Hoffman and Tessa Faye, … there was just an absolute, undeniable, exciting chemistry between them," he recalled. "It was funny, it was moving, and I literally — this is not hyperbole at all — was covered in goosebumps the entire time. I might have gotten a little teary at one point, and at the end, I burst into applause, when normally I'd say, 'Thank you very much.' "It was very funny because at the end of it they are supposed to passionately kiss. They actually did not in the audition, but just shy of it, the gentleman auditioning for Seymour extended his hand and said, 'Hi. I'm Brian. Nice to meet you.' You really would have thought, watching it, that they had known each other forever. It was just one of those things that was perfect," he added. "I knew after that audition that we really had found the people for the romantic leads: the boy and the girl in the 'boy-meets-girl-meets-man-eating-plant' story." - Amy Wilder, The Columbia Tribune