Generally speaking, if you're watching something with a teen character,
they're likely being played by an adult actor. There are many reasons
for this—but some castings truly push the boundaries of believability. Here
are some of the most notable cases of grown adults playing high schoolers.
Beverly Hills 90210's cast was a mixed bag of teens and adults when the show
first premiered in 1990. The characters were supposed to be sophomores in high
school during the first season, so a range of 15 to 17 would have been realistic.
But most of the cast members were already in their upper teens when the show began.
Tori Spelling was 17 when she started out as Donna Martin, as was Brian Austin Green,
who was actually playing a freshman as David Silver.
Shannen Doherty and Jason Priestley, who played fraternal twins, Brenda and Brandon Walsh,
were 20 and 21 years old—while bad boy Dylan was played by the late Luke Perry,
who was a whopping 25 at the time.
The most shocking casting, however, was that of Gabrielle Carteris as Andrea Zuckerman.
The character is supposed to be super smart and way more mature than her peers:
Andrea focuses on getting ahead academically instead of partying.
But Carteris was 29 years old when she signed on to play 16-year-old Andrea.
According to reports, Carteris lied about her age
and told the casting director she was "over 21" when she auditioned.
But in the show's fifth season,
Carteris' real-life pregnancy forced the writers to incorporate the pregnancy
into Andrea's storyline, which led to the character's eventual exit from the show.
When Party of Five premiered in 1994, the main characters consisted of 24-year-old eldest brother
Charlie, played by Matthew Fox, 16-year-old Bailey, played by Scott Wolf, Julia, 15, played
by Neve Campbell, 11-year-old Claudia, played by actress Lacey Chabert, and baby Owen, age one.
Chabert was obviously in the same age range as her character,
as was baby Owen. But Campbell was 21 when the series began, and Fox was 28.
Scott Wolf was 26 when he landed the role of Bailey—a full 10 years older than his
character. Bailey was a rebellious teen who took on more responsibility
after the Salinger parents were killed in a car accident.
Later in the storyline, Wolf's character deals with alcoholism,
and pulls away from his family. Bailey's arc is defined by his relationship with
his on-again-off-again girlfriend Sarah, played by Jennifer Love Hewitt. In the end,
perhaps Wolf's maturity helped him capture the essence of his Bailey counterpart.
Dawson's Creek had quite a few teenagers among its original cast when it first aired in 1998.
Many of the characters were high school sophomores. And
a majority of those starring roles went to actors of a pretty close age range.
Michelle Williams was 17 when she played the 16-year-old Jen Lindley,
15-year-old Dawson was played by 20-year-old James Van Der Beek, and 15-year-old Pacey and
16-year-old Joey were played by a 19-year-old Joshua Jackson and 18-year-old Katie Holmes.
But then the McFee siblings arrived and threw off Dawson's age-appropriate groove.
"I've always been this complete klutz. Some things never change." "No. Everything changes."
In season two, Jack and Andie McFee joined the gang
and all those teenage hormones were interrupted by 20-something shenanigans.
Actor Kerr Smith was 26 when he stepped onto the set of Dawson's Creek as Jack.
The record, however, goes to Meredith Monroe, who was 28 years old when she started playing Andie.
Both siblings are supposed to be just 16.
On Fox's musical high school comedy Glee,
it might as well have been a requirement to be an adult playing a teenager. Most
actors were significantly older than the teenage characters they were playing:
Lea Michele was 23 when she took on 15-year-old Rachel Berry, as were Mercedes actor Amber Riley
and Quinn actor Dianna Agron. Heather Morris and Naya Rivera were both 22 when the show began.
The only one whose age still ended as a teen was 19-year-old Chris Colfer,
whose character Kurt is supposed to be 16.
But the biggest age gap goes to the late Cory Monteith, who was 27 years old when he was cast
as the 15-year-old Finn Hudson. Sure, Monteith seemed young, but not as young as an actual
15-year-old. With the incredible shooting and rehearsal demands of a show like Glee,
it's not surprising the producers went with actors who were all over 18—so
that they didn't have to deal with any minor-centric acting laws.
Monteith's age afforded him a unique wealth of life experience,
especially when compared to some of his castmates. Before he broke into Hollywood,
Monteith had worked as a Walmart greeter, roofer, cab driver, and school bus driver.
As is the case with so many shows, all of the kids on Gilmore Girls were played by adults.
When the show started out, Rory, played by Alexis Bledel, and her pals are sophomores
in high school. Bledel was 19 while playing her 16-year-old character,
by far the show's most reasonable age match. Her main love interests are 16-year-old Dean,
played by an 18-year-old Jared Padalecki, and 15-year-old Jess, played by a then 23-year-old
Milo Ventimiglia . Rory's 16-year-old nemesis Paris was played by 23-year-old Liza Weil.
You might think those 23-year-old actors are pushing it. But the president of the "too old for
school" club on Gilmore Girls has to be Rory's BFF Lane Kim, who was played by Keiko Agena.
"If you could live in any city in the world you pick Philadelphia?"
"M. Night Shyamalan lives there." "Who?" "The guy who directed The Sixth Sense."
At the time, Agena was 27. With Lorelai Gilmore being 32, played by a 33-year-old Lauren Graham,
the actor playing Lane was closer in age to her best friend's mom than she was to her best friend.
We can't say Agena didn't pull it off—her Lane is full of youthful exuberance.
But there's something undeniably funny about Graham and Agena being real-world peers,
playing a mom and a young girl on TV.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer began in 1997 with main characters who are supposed to be sophomores in
high school. Buffy, played by Sarah Michelle Gellar, was 19 playing a 16-year-old. Willow,
her witchy best-friend-forever, is also 16, and was played by 19-year-old Alyson Hannigan.
Nicholas Brendon was much older, at 26, than his sophomore character, Xander. The oldest
member of the cast was David Boreanaz, who, at 35, was playing vampire-with-a-soul Angel,
who is supposed to be about 20 ... or like 250, depending on how you look at it.
But the oldest actor playing an actual teenager was Charisma Carpenter, who at 27 took on the
role of Cordelia Chase, yet another sophomore. When Cordelia leaves the Scooby gang in season
three for the cast of Angel, they bumped her up in age a bit, so that it didn't feel so awkward.
We'll give you one guess as to how old the characters in Riverdale are supposed to be.
If you guessed sophomores in high school, you win!
The cast of Riverdale features a whole gang of actors in their early 20s playing
characters who are supposed to be 15 or 16 years old. The only actual teen is KJ Apa,
who was 19 when the show started out. The other actors—Lili Reinhart, Ross Butler, Camila Mendes,
Ashanti Bromfield, Madelaine Petsch, Cole Sprouse and Casey Cott—all range in age from 20 to 26.
But the eldest member of the Riverdale gang is Ashleigh Murray,
who was 30 when she started playing teen rocker Josie, of Josie and the Pussycats.
"They were from your father's gang weren't they?"
This means that Murray is old enough to have been
the target audience for the 2001 Josie and the Pussycats movie.
How's that for perspective?
Zombie apocalypse drama The Walking Dead isn't a teen show, though a lot of teens count themselves
as fans. It's a show full of grown adults fighting for their lives. Occasionally,
however, kids and teens become entangled in the violent, bloody fight for survival.
One character of note is Carl, lead character Rick Grimes' son, who grows from being a kid
to a teen throughout the series. But aside from Carl's actor, Chandler Riggs, there
aren't many teen actors on the show. Much like other shows in which adults are cast as teens,
The Walking Dead probably did so because of the series' super-demanding shooting schedule.
The most popular teen on The Walking Dead has likely been Beth Greene,
fan-favorite Hershel's youngest daughter. Beth appears in seasons two through five,
and is supposed to be about 16 years old. In reality, Beth was played by Emily Kinney,
who was 26 years old when she was on the series. Beth's death is a sad one,
since the character is so sweet and kind, but hey—them's the breaks on The Walking Dead.
Smallville tells the story of Superman's high school days in the Kansas town he grew up in.
Though the young Clark is supposed to be 14 years old when the show begins,
the lead actor, Tom Welling, was 24 years old at the time. But really,
does age matter when aliens and superheroes are at play?
Superman Returns, starring Brandon Routh, debuted in 2006—smack
in the middle of Smallville's run. Returns centers around a grown-up Superman,
well into his cape-wearing years, dealing with mature issues of romance and his career.
Yet Routh was three years younger than Welling, then playing Clark Kent as a high schooler.
By the time the show wrapped up, Welling was 34 years old. Throw in a 29-year-old
Michael Rosenbaum playing a 21-year-old Lex Luthor, and you've got one "geriatric" cast.
Of the four main characters on The O.C., only one started out the show as an actual teenager.
Mischa Barton was 17 years old when the series began,
only a blip older than her character Marissa, who is, you guessed it, a sophomore in high school.
Other leads like Seth and Summer were played by
23-year-old Adam Brody and 21-year-old Rachel Bilson.
The oldest member of The O.C. cast was Ben MacKenzie,
who was 24 when he started playing Ryan Atwood. Bad boy Ryan is supposed to be
the new guy in town who shows the rich kids of The O.C. how to misbehave and have a good
time. At least MacKenzie's age gave his bad-boy vibe a little more believability.
Veronica Mars premiered in 2004 with Kristen Bell playing high school private detective
Veronica. In a major departure from teen-show tradition, Veronica Mars is actually a junior
when the show begins. The second season follows her senior year, while the third
chronicles Veronica's freshman year at the fabulously named Neptune's Hearst College.
Bell was already well into her 20s when the show began. In 2004, she was 24 years old, making her
about seven years older than the character. By the time the series wrapped, she was 27.
"I'm heading out of town and I'm not sure when I'll be back."
The Veronica Mars film that debuted in 2014 sees the Neptune High gang attend
their 10-year high school reunion, even though their graduation was in 2006. The fourth season,
which hit Hulu in 2019, is set in that year, with Veronica presumably around age 32,
again played by Bell at the age of 39.
All things considered, Veronica Mars should be proud of itself. Few teen shows could have
handled such a disjointed, decade-spanning existence with as much smoothness as it did.
Fonzie isn't a high-schooler on Happy Days, but he does start out as a teenager. The 1970s series
created by the late Garry Marshall is set in the 1950s, starring Ron Howard as Richie Cunningham,
an average high school kid in the Midwest. His best friend—and the Cunningham's tenant,
who lives above the garage—is Arthur Fonzarelli, AKA Fonzie or The Fonz, played by Henry Winkler.
Fonzie starts out the show at 19 years old, but Winkler was already way into his 20s when the show
began. At 29, the actor was a full decade older than his character,
a high school dropout who is seen as the bad boy of the very traditional 1950s setting.
Fonzie proves them all wrong, however, when he earns his high school diploma via night school,
eventually becoming a teacher. By the time Happy Days ended, Winkler was 39!
Check out one of our newest videos right here! Plus,
even more Looper videos about your favorite stuff
are coming soon. Subscribe to our YouTube channel and hit the bell so you don't miss a single one.