History Main / CrossCastRole

* Ancient Greek plays were performed entirely by men. Indeed, whether women were allowed to even watch plays is a matter of debate.
* All traditional kabuki theatre, due to a 1629 ban on female actors. This effectively created an entire industry of GenderBender "actresses" (see Website/TheOtherWiki on ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oyama_(Japanese_theatre) onnagatta]]''). Note that when Kabuki first appeared in the early 1600s it was female only, and had females playing male roles. Either way, it's an example.
* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noh Noh theater]] used male actors in all roles from the beginning. A few females have begun to act in Noh in later years, but even today it's most common to find an all-male cast.
* Elizabethan England prohibited women from acting in stage productions, so female roles were typically played by boys. This is apparently why Creator/WilliamShakespeare often wrote crossdressing into his plays, exploiting the meta-irony of [[RecursiveCrossdressing boys playing women who disguise themselves as men]].
* Numerous ballet productions in 19th-century Europe had the male roles be played by crossdressing women, for two reasons: firstly, due to changing ideas about gender, ballet was viewed as being too feminine for men to participate in, leading to a shortage of male dancers, and secondly, the male audience-members of the time ''really'' dug the GirlOnGirlIsHot. Contrariwise, Mother Ginger in ''Theatre/TheNutcracker'' and Widow Simone in ''Theatre/LaFilleMalGardee'' are traditionally danced by men.
* The Japanese musical theatre troupe Creator/TakarazukaRevue is an all-female troupe, and inevitably they play a lot of [[{{Bifauxnen}} male]] [[{{Fanservice}} characters]]. It's usual particular cast members who get the male roles, and they tend to get a large fan following usually ''mostly'' consisting of straight women.

* ''Series/WinterBegonia'': Shang Xirui, one of the main characters, is a male UsefulNotes/PekingOpera ''dan'' performer (i.e. a man who plays female roles onstage).

* In ''Manga/UFOBaby'', the infant Ruu is cast as a baby princess in the main group's play. Keeping his gender concealed is no issue. Keeping his ''psychic powers'' concealed, on the other hand...
* In ''Manga/KOn'', the main characters' class puts on a production of ''Theatre/RomeoAndJuliet'' for their school festival. As it's an all-girls school, the male parts are played by girls.
* Several of the productions from ''Anime/KaleidoStar'' feature females in male roles. Ana especially tends to play male characters.

* Israeli satire show ''Eretz Nehederet'' had Tal Friedmann, a man, play women regularly, to the point that Orna Banay, one of the two actresses on that show left in frustration over him getting all the good roles for women. Ironically, Banay rose to fame partially by playing a man and briefly playing one on ''Eretz Nehederet'' herself.

# Early opera also has a number of roles written for castrati: [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin boys who were castrated]] to [[DisabilitySuperpower prevent their voices from changing]]. Since this isn't done anymore, modern productions of such roles fall under this trope by necessity.[[note]]The other options are to cast a male falsettist (which encompasses most [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Countertenor countertenors]]) or, if the production is exceptionally lucky, to find a man whose voice naturally falls in a typically female range for whatever reason (most often a medical condition, especially of the hormonal variety that prevents a man's voice from changing without any mutilation necessary).[[/note]]

# Theater troupes may be all male, usually because the MoralGuardians have decreed that women should not go on TheWickedStage; such troupes will use this trope by necessity.

This is a role that, for whatever reason, is played by an actor who is of the opposite sex to the character and holds a different mental gender identity to their physical sex that was observed and reported by a doctor or midwife at birth. Some common reasons for this involve a gender imbalance in the supply of actors:

* In the 2015 ''Manga/{{Naruto}}'' stage musical, Haku, who is known for his androgynous appearance, is played by actress Miho Imamura.

* ''Film/ScaryMovie'' has CreepyCoach [[MeaningfulName Ms. Mann]], who is a huge muscular man posing as a woman and is clearly attracted to his female students. His balls are even shown hanging out of his shorts in order to remove any doubt. "He" was portrayed by Jayne Trcka, a female bodybuilder.

* Tamamo-no-Mae, [[GenderFlip a man]] in ''VideoGame/{{Onmyoji}}'', is played by a former Creator/TakarazukaRevue ''otokoyaku'' in the [[TheMusical musical adaptation]]. It helps that he already is CampStraight, can transform into a woman, and is voiced by a woman in the game to begin with.

* The LiveActionAdaptation of ''Manga/NegimaMagisterNegiMagi'' [[WTHCastingAgency infamously]] cast a ten-year-old girl as Negi. This was the least of its problems.

* The ''Theatre/FarndaleAvenue'' plays revolve around an all-female amateur theatre troupe, so all the male roles in their plays are played by women. An inversion of the rule occurs in ''The Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen's Guild Operatic Society's Production of The Mikado'', which begins with an announcement that the actress playing the schoolgirl Pitti-Sing has become unavailable at short notice, so for one night only, the role will be played by the elderly male vicar.

'''Please do not list "retroactive" examples''' of transgender actors who performed characters of their biological sex before they transitioned some point post-production. This trope requires the casting to be an intentional decision. When they were cast for the role, they ''were'' considered by the world at large to be the same gender as the character. For example, Creator/ElliotPage played real life cisgender teenage girl Sylvia Likens in 2006's ''Film/AnAmericanCrime'', but had been assigned female at birth and was presenting as such when cast for that film. If the film was being made now, after Page's transition, a cisgender girl would be cast by the director as Sylvia. The same applies to Page's other pre-transition roles as, with the exception of his character from ''Series/TheUmbrellaAcademy2019'', none of these characters have been {{retcon}}ned as trans.

'''Please do not list "retroactive" examples''' of transgender actors who performed characters of their biological sex before they transitioned some point post-production. This trope requires the casting to be an intentional decision. The fact that an actor no longer corresponds to the gender of a character they played is ultimately irrelevant to the work itself, and doesn't change the fact that when they were cast for the role, they ''were'' considered by the world at large to be the same gender as the character. For example, Creator/ElliotPage played real life cisgender teenage girl Sylvia Likens in 2006's ''Film/AnAmericanCrime'', but had been assigned female at birth and was presenting as such when cast for that film. If the film was being made now, after Page's transition, a cisgender girl would be cast by the director as Sylvia. The same applies to Page's other pre-transition roles as, with the exception of his character from ''Series/TheUmbrellaAcademy2019'', none of these characters have been [[{{Retcon}} retconned]] as trans.

** In the original cut of Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack Emperor Palpatine was portrayed by actress Marjorie Eaton but voiced by the actor Clive Revill, but this was adverted in the 2004 rerelease with Creator/IanMcDiarmid completely portraying him.

* To mark the release of ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker'' in 2019 and as a nod to ''Franchise/StarWars''' popularity in Japan, Disney teamed up with the Ichikawa family to do a Kabuki play retelling of the franchise's [[Film/TheForceAwakens first]] [[Film/TheLastJedi two]] installment of the sequel trilogy titled ''Kairennosuke and the Three Shining Swords'' with Leia, Rey and Admiral Holdo (renamed Reian, Reino and Amiri, respectively for this) played by male actors. It even helps the fact that lead actor Ebizo (now Danjuro XIII) Ichikawa is a big fan of the franchise.

* To mark the release of ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker'' in 2019 and as a nod to ''Franchise/{{StarWars}}''' popularity in Japan, Disney teamed up with the Ichikawa family to do a Kabuki play retelling of the franchise's [[Film/TheForceAwakens first]] [[Film/TheLastJedi two]] installment of the sequel trilogy titled ''Kairennosuke and the Three Shining Swords'' with Leia, Rey and Admiral Holdo (renamed Reian, Reino and Amiri, respectively for this) played by male actors.

* The 2015 ''Manga/{{Naruto}}'' stage musical, Haku, who is known for his androgynous appearance, is played by actress Miho Imamura.
* It is very common for the title character in ''Theatre/TheNutcracker'' to be played by a woman (a notable example being the 1989 Bolshoi recording, in which the role was danced by Marisa Okothnikova). Because, ya know, the [[{{Pun}} nut]][[GroinAttack cracker]] jokes weren't easy enough already. Mother Ginger is often played by a man in drag.

* ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfHeroesTrailsInTheSky'' has an extended sequence wherein the leads are made to act in a school play. The play's director, for her own amusement, has decreed that all roles in the play will be this, leaving Estelle as the dashing red swordsman while [[{{Bishounen}} Joshua]] is forced to play the damsel princess.

* Rogan from ''Film/RikiOhTheStoryOfRicky'' is played by actress [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yukari_Oshima Yukari Oshima]], presumably because no actual man was pretty enough. This is probably the ''least'' [[WhatDoYouMeanItWasntMadeOnDrugs insane]] thing in the whole movie.

* In ''Film/TheAdventuresOfBarryMckenzie'' and its sequel ''Barry [=McKenzie=] Holds His Own'', Aunt Edna is played by Barry Humphries. Humphries would later find fame reprising the role in numerous productions in the US and UK.