Quotes / Dawson Casting

"Wow, Miranda's getting good! Maybe when she's thirty years old she can play a teenager on Dawson's Creek."

— Lizzie, Lizzie McGuire

"She's running away from home and she's only thirty!"

— Butthead, commenting on the music video for Pat Benatar's "Love is a Battlefield", Beavis And Butthead

"Let's have a warm welcome for the stars of the popular teen soap opera, Springfield Heights 90210! He's cool, he's sexy, he's 34 years old! Say hello to Kyle Darren!" [Darren smiles, obvious wrinkles show on his face]

— Kent Brockman, The Simpsons, "Marge vs. The Monorail"

"These guys probably had sons the same age as their characters."

— Mike Nelson commenting on the "teenagers" of Reefer Madness

Cdr. Jansen: (referring to Jansen's daughter ^note played by the visibly middle-aged Cisse Cameron) Can you remember when you were that young?

Tom Servo (as Capt. Devers): I am that young!

—Mystery Science Theater 3000 riffs Space Mutiny

[Deep voice] "I'm 15, really."

— "Robin", RiffTrax of Batman Forever

"I don't think anyone in the casting department has ever seen a real teenager."

— Linkara, History of Power Rangers

Principal: You're already repeating your senior year.
Obscurus Lupa: How many times, eight?

— Obscurus Lupa Presents: Sleepy Hollow High

"...there's no real age limit, although we cast age-appropriate
(meaning that an actor needs to be roughly the same age as the character he/she plays)."

— Stephen Stohn via Twitter, describing a famous subversion.

"If the report is that the children are too old for their characters; then that’s ridiculous. It's BEYOND ridiculous. The other show I’m a huge fan of right now is Pretty Little Liars. Some of the 16 year old characters on that show are LITERALLY 26 and 28 in real life. So the kids of Outnumbered ARE IN NO WAY TOO OLD FOR THEIR PARTS."

— "Catherine" of the Save Outnumbered Campaign.

"Hollywood Secret: If you put a 30-year-old in a letterman jacket, he's 16 again."

— Vanessa Ramos, comedian/comedy writer, via Twitter.

"Hollywood's version of high school is filled with students so far along in their maturation they appear to have kissed the ravages of puberty goodbye sometime during the Clinton administration...Not only is it distracting when the adults and "kids" look roughly the same age, it also sets up false expectations for teens. Most male high school students aren't broad-shouldered, deep-voiced men sporting a five o'clock shadow by fourth period."

— Cracked, 5 Unwritten Rules Hollywood Needs to Stop Following

"As we do discover, the people in this town are not very bright, which is why all the high school students are forty years old. They're the same age as the teachers. […] The only way I could keep track of who was the teacher and who was the student is that the teacher had a Tom Selleck mustache."

—Jay Bauman, Best of the Worst Episode 70 (Black Roses)

Notes: Summoner with a horn / Precocious / Big Bridge's caretaker / She doesn't sound 6!

— Who's Who page on Eiko Carol, World of Final Fantasy

"'Teenager' must mean something else in space - cuz, I mean, these guys look like... thirty-somethings. Y’know, my age."

— Elvira (on Teenagers from Outer Space), Elvira's House of Horrors

"It's age-blind casting!"

— Kaveh Taherian (in the MusicalSplaining podcast, discussing the 2015 The King and I revival)

"Between seasons 2 and 3 [of Glee], news began to break that most of the cast would be graduating at the end of the third season. Obviously the cast couldn't stay forever, or else they'd look... even older than they already are."

— Mic The Snare, "Here's What We Missed on Glee"

Josh: And, by the way, that girl [Betsy] is apparently much younger than she looks.
Melissa: Yeah, I tried to warn you. Have you not seen The Sound of Music? Liesl is 16 going on 29.

— Schmigadoon!

Ron: But aren't [Heather and Quinn] a little old to play us?
Jimmy Blamhammer: Haven't you heard the expression "act your age"?
Ron: But they're 28.
Blamhammer: What did I say? They'll be acting your age, not their age. See? It's Hollywood magic.

— Kim Possible, "And the Mole Rat Will Be CGI"

"Zendaya is here from Euphoria. Hello, Zendaya. [She] just turned twenty-six last week, happy birthday. Twenty-six is a weird age in Hollywood: I mean, you're young enough to play a high school student, but you're too old to date Leonardo DiCaprio."

—Kenan Thompson's opening monologue at the 74th Primetime Emmy Awards

Ange: I'm surprised a 20-year-old can masquerade as a student.
Dorothy: Wh—what choice did I have?! I'm following orders! Besides, I do look like a secondary-school student, don't I? Hmm?
Ange: Your class must be especially kind.
Dorothy: Don't make it sound like they pity me.

—Princess Principal, "Dancy Conspiracy"

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