Dawson Casting: Difference between revisions

* ''[[Mr. Holland's Opus]]'' - Rowena, the high school senior who tempts Mr. Holland because she's intellectually mature and looks older than her years? She looks mature for her age because she was played by 23-year-old Jean Louisa Kelly. The baby-faced 13-year-old freshman clarinet player who later becomes governor? Played by 20-year-old Alicia Witt.

* All of the "kids" from ''[[Easy A]]'' are between 21 and 25 years old. This actually presents a minor problem, as one of the characters is ''supposed'' to be too old for high school, having been held back repeatedly, but appears indistinct from the other actors. Additionally, they had gotten age-appropriate actors for the flashbacks, and this meant that, in the four years between the past and present, the characters seemed to have aged ten years.

* ''Female Trouble'' - Mink Stole, in her late 20s, plays a 14-year-old, and it's heavily [[Lampshade|lamp shaded]].

* [[Howard Stern]] in his film ''[[Private Parts]]'' played an 18-year-old version of himself... He was 42 at the time. The incongruity is extremely obvious when we first see him walking around campus, and Stern (as a [[Narrator]]) comments that "for this movie you've got to suspend disbelief."

* Ralph Macchio was in his early twenties when he first played the 15-year-old Daniel La Russo in ''[[The Karate Kid]]''. By the time the third movie came out, Macchio was still playing teen-aged Daniel despite being in his ''late'' twenties. (His boyish good looks and the fact that his voice remained in a higher register after breaking helped.)

* [[David Lynch]] loves this trope.

** ''[[Twin Peaks]], [[The Movie|Fire Walk with Me]]'' [[Prequel|takes place days before the TV show]] and all the 20-something actors (mentioned in the TV section) are a few years older, with some flashbacks taking place ''years'' before the TV show, and Sheryl Lee playing 15. There were some additions to the movie that weren't in the TV show, such as 24-year'old Moira Kelly as 17-year'old Donna Hayward, and 27-year'old Pamela Gidley as 17-year'old Teresa Banks.

* ''[[Carrie]]'':

** The eponymous character was a high school senior and portrayed by a 26-year-old [[Sissy Spacek]], the same as P.J. Soles, who played Norma Watson. As well as the other teenagers, who were, oddly enough, only a few years younger than the actor playing Miss Collins.

* A particularly ironic example is ''[[Logan's Run]]'' in which the film's hook is that it's about a society where people are killed once they reach 30. Predictably, much of the cast were well into their thirties and looked it as well.

* [[Selma Blair]] was subject to this a lot.

** For more, see the Television section.

* ''Earth Angel (1991)'' was a movie about a prom queen who dies in the 1960s and then has to do a good deed 30 years later. It was seemingly influenced by movies such as ''[[Back to the Future (film)|Back to The Future]]'' and ''[[Peggy Sue Got Married]]'', and like those movies, needs actors that can pass as both teenagers and middle-aged people. Of course, no real teens were cast, and most of the actors were in their 30s and 40s, most notably 42-year-old Erik Estrada.

** Inverted: On the other hand, Channing's character accuses another student of looking too young: this particular character is indeed a 15-year-old actor... playing a senior in high school.

** Played straight: With the rest of the "high-schoolers" cast, especially the main drug dealer played by 26-year-old Dave Franco which if he played one of the title characters he would still be playing this trope slightly straight as Tatum and Hill's characters graduated in 2005 Franco likely graduated in 2003 based on his age.

* ''[[Portrait of Jennie]]'': When introduced, the titular character is about 13 and played by a 29-year-old [[Jennifer Jones]].

* In ''[[Bunraku]]'', teenage Momoko is portrayed by 25 year old Emily Kaiho, who sort of pulls it off by being fresh-faced and [[Teens Are Short|petite]].

** Much is made of how Yoshi is the youngest of the protagonists, and inexperienced and hot-headed as a result. [[Gackt]] meanwhile is pushing forty (but looks twenty years younger).

* Not sure if straight or inverted: In Oliver Stone's ''Alexander'', Colin Farrell plays Alexander, and Angelina Jolie plays his mother despite being nearly the same age. Diana Cook of ''[[Cracked.com]]'' calls out ''Alexander'' in #2 of "[http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-unwritten-rules-hollywood-needs-to-stop-following/ 5 Unwritten Rules Hollywood Needs to Stop Following]".

* Deliberately played with in ''[[A Stupid and Futile Gesture]]'', the 2018 [[Biopic]] about ''[[National Lampoon]]'' co-founder Doug Kenney. Kenney, who died in his thirties, is portrayed in the film by ''two'' different actors -- Martin Mull [[Narrator|narrates]] the film as a never-to-exist [[Grumpy Old Man|elder version of Kenney]], while on-screen, the twenty-something Kenney is played forty-something Will Forte; this latter casting is explicitly [[Lampshaded]] when a rapid [[Crawl]] appears in the middle of the movie listing its creative liberties, starting with the age disparity.

 

=== Live-Action TV ===

* All of the teenagers in ''[[Casper (film)|Casper]]'' were played by people between the ages of 13 and 15 (including the voice actor for the titular character), and the {{spoiler|temporarily revived Casper}} is played by a 17-year-old. For somebody used to Dawson Casting in movies, the sight of an entire classroom of teenagers who ''actually look like teenagers'' is actually rather jarring.

* The live action adaptation of ''[[The Last Airbender]]'' both plays this straight and subverts it. Jackson Rathbone (Sokka) was 25 playing 15 and Dev Patel (Zuko) was 19 playing 16, but both Noah Ringer (Aang) and Nicola Peltz (Katara) were the same age as their characters during filming (12 and 14 respectively).

* ''[[The Sound of Music]]'' largely kept the actors relatively close to their ages - Nicholas Hammond (Friedrich) was fifteen playing fourteen, Heather Menzies (Louisa) fourteen playing thirteen, Duane Chase (Kurt) thirteen playing eleven, Angela Cartwright (Brigitta) twelve playing ten, Debbie Turner (Marta) eight playing seven, and Kym Karath (Gretl) six playing five. Played utterly straight, however, with Charmian Carr (Liesl), who was ''twenty-one'' playing sixteen-going-on-seventeen.

* In ''[[Another Cinderella Story]]'', [[Selena Gomez]] was 15 and playing a 15-year-old high schooler. Critics were squicked that Drew Seeley, who played her love interest, was 24, but the movie makes it clear that his character really is that age.

* Borderline case: Most of the actors playing students in ''[[Sky High (film)|Skyhigh]]'' were between 17 and 19 at the time of the film's release, although many of them played high school freshmen.

* In the 2010 version of ''[[True Grit]]'', then 13 year old [[Hailee Steinfeld]] played 14 year old Mattie Ross.

* [[Mandy Moore]] was 18 when she played high school student Jamie in ''[[A Walk to Remember]]'', though her also high school aged love interest was played by Shane West, who was 21 at the time.

* Walking the line in ''[[Mystery Team]]''; the actors are in their early twenties, and their characters are high school seniors.