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by ajsnigrutin 1446 days ago
Yep, and the reverse also... 35+yo people playing highscoolers was the norm.

I mean, i guess it's kinda hard to film scenes not-in-chronological-order with a teenager who visibly changes during the filming, but it's not an impossible thing to do.

2 comments

I was rewatching earlier seasons of Buffy The Vampire Slayer, and it's hilarious that the character Xander Harris(0) was perceived as a scrawny high school nerd.

0. https://assets.mycast.io/characters/xander-harris-794251-nor...

> I was rewatching earlier seasons of Buffy The Vampire Slayer, and it's hilarious that the character Xander Harris(0) was perceived as a scrawny high school nerd.

Uh, except he wasn't perceived as scrawny, and was a jock-adjacent slacker, almost an anti-nerd.

Yeah maybe nerd was the wrong term, but he was definitely perceived as being wimpy, even by people outside of the gang.
35 year olds also don't have to go to school, or be tutored. And they're allowed to work longer hours than actual children are.
Funny that actors in their 20s, especially early 20s isn't the obvious solution when bodily change has slowed but age can still easily pass for HS aged.
> Funny that actors in their 20s, especially early 20s isn't the obvious solution when bodily change has slowed but age can still easily pass for HS aged.

They are. Sure, there are some that are wildly out of that range, but since someone else raised BtVS let's look at how old the main cast was in 1997, when they were playing sophomores in high school:

- Sarah Michelle Gellar was 20

- Alyson Hannigan was 23

- Charisma Carpenter was 27

- Nicholas Brendan was 27

I hard that in the recent book from the Howard brothers.

If you are under 18 there are all sorts of restrictions on hours worked, supervision, etc. So it is a lot easier to get a 18+ actor to play a 12-17 year old than someone the actual age.

Part of the reason child actors struggle to transition to adult roles. 3-4 year enforced gap in their career.