I FEEL LIKE A DEFECTIVE TYPEWRITER: In the Too Old To Play A Teenager Hall of Fame, Stockard Channing in
Grease and 90210's Gabrielle Carteris are first-ballot, no-doubt inner sanctum inductees. Those two, and many other contenders,
are slideshowed here.
Tisdale's inclusion for Hellcats is weak, as I am reasonably certain (based on the ads I saw before the show started) that the show takes place at a college, and that, as a team captain, she's probably at least a junior. They could replace her with Amanda Bynes in Easy A.
ReplyDeleteThe odd thing about Kristen Bell is that I thought she actually looked like a high schooler for two seasons of VM, but looked way too old to be a college freshman the third season.
I'm suprised Joshua Jackson from Dawson's Creek isn't on this list. He was far into his 20's when the series started.
ReplyDeleteI ammend that. He was 21 when the show started; 6 years older than his character.
ReplyDeleteTom Welling should be on there as well; he was already 24 when Smallville began and now...well, it's gotten slightly ridiculous.
ReplyDeleteBut the all-time winner here for me is Shirley Henderson. When she played Moaning Myrtle in Chamber of Secrets she was 37, and 40 for her return in Goblet of Fire.
Here's another one:
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_Earles
At least he was smart enough to go with the "comb the bangs in front of the forehead" style from day one to hide the forehead wrinkles....
I'll disagree with the slide show on McAdams--as she was styled/madeup, she looked much younger than she was. Similarly, Zach Gilford even now seems younger than he is. (Because of that and how much I identify him as Saracen, can be hard to watch him be such a dick on Off the Map.)
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, Hellcats is about a college cheerleading team. High School Musical is the better choice for Tisdale.
Going back further, Dwyane Hickman and Bob Denver were in their mid-20s when they started <span>The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis.</span>
ReplyDeleteI'd like to nominate most of the cast of West Side Story. Natalie Wood and Richard Beymer were both mid-20s. Russ Tamblyn and George Chakiris were late 20s, and I think Rita Moreno was 30.
ReplyDeleteI had no idea about that until I saw an episode of Doctor Who that she was in (playing someone who was likely in her twenties, though age wasn't discussed).
ReplyDeleteMaybe he gets a pass for his overall awesomeness. I watched every single episode of that stupid show, and there were many, many episodes where he'd be the only redeeming factor. Well, him and the Dawson's Wrap/MBTV/TWoP recaps. And the only reason I stuck with "Fringe" through the first season was his interaction with John Noble. I'm happy I kept with it, because it's now one of my favorite shows.
ReplyDeleteRIGHT?! Crazy, but helped by ghost effects and whatnot.
ReplyDeleteI don't know, just started watching FNL and in the scene where he and the coach's daughter almost have sex I was kind of thinking oh eech is she a lot younger than him.
ReplyDeleteThat second guest in this thread was me.
ReplyDeleteHow about Natalie Portman in the Black Swan? She's 30, for goodness sake, and her character still lived at home under Mommy Dearest's watchful eye, slept with stuffed animals, and had little-kid furniture in her room. I know her character wasn't supposed to be 12, but was she really supposed to be 30? By the way...I did NOT like that movie, in case you were wondering.
ReplyDeleteCharmian Carr was 22 when she was cast as the 16-going-on-17 Leisl von Trapp.
ReplyDeleteYeah, but like Nicholas Brendon in Buffy she felt pretty much right.
ReplyDeleteAgreed. Pacy's Pond>Dawson's Creek.
ReplyDeleteI think that was supposed to be kind of the point. That she was so controlled and made to feel like a child still even though she was at least in her mid twenties. All those stuffed animals and the pink princess twin bed weren't made to make us think that she was 16, but that she was still under the control of her wack nut mama.
ReplyDeleteWhile I don't think it's a bright line between simply "not a teenager" and "doesn't look, even for Hollywood, like a teenager," I think that line does exist, and there's plenty of room on both sides.
ReplyDeleteOn the looks-too-old side, there are the obvious ones, like Stockard Channing and most of the cast of 90210 (Original Recipe). But there are also younger ones, like the aforementioned Bynes (who's only 24 now), and Eric Balfour, who I don't think looked like a teenager when he was a teenager.
On the just-in-their-20s side, there are any number of 21- and 22-year-olds who I have no trouble believing are 16. But that can skew older, too; Brendon was still a believable-for-TV high schooler, and I think Stacey Dash's age must be a typo.
Stacey Dash was born in 1966 and Clueless was made in 1995. It's amazing to me that she was 28 AND that Clueless is 15+ years old.
ReplyDeleteStacey Dash is seven years older then me?!?
ReplyDeleteExactly my reaction! And on top of that, she made three seasons of the TV show afterwards.
ReplyDeleteNot only is it about a college cheerleading team, but I'm pretty sure Tisdale's character is supposed to be over 21, since we haven't had a "busted for underage drinking" plotline.
ReplyDeleteThe first guest was me.
ReplyDeleteMaking her crush on Christopher Plummer less ooky.
ReplyDeleteAnd she looked age-appropriate! That's the crazy part. But it doesn't mean she was mis-cast.
ReplyDeleteI'm with Jen, Pacey gets a pass for his believability in whatever he does. Didn't discover the recaps until Dawson's Creek was almost over, but they were my gateway drug to snark, cynical fandom, and online communities in general. Still chuckle over "the Fivehead" each time I visit TWoP, which is sadly less and less all the time.
ReplyDeleteDoesn't quite fit the category, but Dustin Hoffman was 30, Anne Bancroft 36 when The Graduate was made. And The Karate Kid was 23
ReplyDeletePlus, he can laugh about the Pacey and not get all defensive like a certain fivehead-owning title actor or, ugh, Mrs. Tom Cruise.
ReplyDeletePaceyCon! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUCzWrvlxcg
I was just talking with a friend of mine about why neither of us really visit TWoP anymore. It used to be a daily destination, but now it's more a once a month thing. In my case, I don't have the time to read multiple-page recaps of TV shows anymore, no matter how wonderfully snarkily they're written.
Henry Winkler - 29, Fonzie - 19
ReplyDeleteOn the flip side of this equation, I think Holland Taylor looks younger on Two and a Half Men than she did on Bosom Buddies.
ReplyDeleteFonzie was supposed to be 19???
ReplyDeleteIn the current season of Smallville everyone might as well be thirtysomethings, but ymmv. Tom Welling ages slowly, I will say. I could still buy him as a mid-twentysomething no problem.
ReplyDeleteI think that the fact that so many teenage characters are played by adults makes it noteworthy when an actual teenager plays one. My biggest example-- I could not watch the movie Thirteen. Evan Rachel Wood was 16 when she made that movie and I could not watch a kid doing what she was doing in that role. I don't think it would have been as powerful of a movie (at least the parts I could bear to watch) if a grown up was cast in the role.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of Buffy (were we speaking of Buffy?), Charisma Carpenter is my age (39) and was playing a teenager. Even in 1997 when the show started she was 26. I remember in Angel when she slept with Conner people were icked out, but realistically her character was 20 or 21 and Conner was supposed to be 17 or so, not nearly as squick-worthy as a 21 year old sleeping with the 250+ year old Angel.
ReplyDelete