To be fair, Grease is a parody, and that was part of what they were parodying at the time. So they went a little extra with it too.
It’s a parody of the super common “beach fling” style of movies from the 60’s. They even reference some common actors and actresses from those movies.
It’s why each scene seems so poorly tied together, and the characters aren’t very consistent.
He looks like Rodney Dangerfield.
So is the dude next him. Neither are passible.
Lol, that dude is John Travolta
He was 24 when Grease was made.
The guy next to him is Michael Tucci, who was 32 at the time.
Luke Perry at the beginning of 90210 was the same age as Travolta. Then later on the same age is Tucci in the same series.
Yes, that’s the point.
Just like my boy Jotaro Kujo
Sometime the reverse is true.
Keira Knightley had just turned 18 when she filmed Love Actually (2003). She played a newlywed woman in her mid to late twenties. Her famous “floppy hat” was used because she had a giant teenager zit on her forehead.
Sometimes the casting is dead on.
Mariel Hemingway was 16 when she played the 17 year old love interest to Woody Allen’s 44 year old man in Manhattan.
I think, in movies, a big driver in casting is trying to guide the audience. Had they cast actual teenagers in Grease, the audience would have been scandalized by the subject matter rather than focus on the comedy and music. That’s why they cast a teen to play a teen in Manhattan. The entire thing is meant to feel off and uncomfortable, which would not have been apparent had they cast a woman in her mid twenties. They cast a teen Keira Knightley because they needed the audience to instantly understand why the character had a crush on her. Whether we like to admit it or not, our monkey brains register teen women simultaneously as angelic/pure and “peak breeding material” (yes, it’s yuck when put that way).
Movie magic is built on multiple layers of subconscious manipulation.
Even with the casting choices, I’m flabbergasted that Grease became a cult classic. As far as I can tell the overall message of the film is: “if a woman wants to keep her man, she must act like a dirty slut.”
Didn’t Travolta’s Greaser character turn clean-cut in order to be with her? I always thought the point was that they originally liked each other for who they were, without pretense but society was forcing them to conform to standards and pigeonhole them.
Or maybe it was all about the dancing and singing and we are trying to get too deep into it.
Yea and that “Did she put up a fight?” line in Summer Nights always creeped me out.
To be fair, people don’t really watch musicals for their plots.
All true! And they cast older guys to give the character gravitas.
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There must be some rule of film that forbids 13-19 year olds being on camera. Young children are played by actual children. Elderly people are played by the elderly. But teenagers are almost always someone between 20 and 30 and not an actual teenager. What’s up with that?
Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz is supposed to be 12 years old. Been this way since the day the world turned to color.
Directors simply like to work with adult actors more than to deal with teenagers.
Younger actors have less experience.
Teenagers are legally required to take longer breaks and can’t work into the night.
And if you’re planning on a sequel or a series, you have no idea what your actor will look like in 2-3 years.Something that a lot of replies are missing is how quickly and dramatically we change appearance at that age. Imagine if filming runs over a year and the 14-year-old you hired is now a foot taller and the shape of his face changed through puberty. Sure, little kids grow fast, but features don’t change nearly as much, especially for boys in their teens.
That’s what happened to Walt in Lost. The actor had growth spurts and couldn’t play a 10 years old anymore and they just written his character out.
The labor laws for children (<18) in film are brutal. As they should be. Better to avoid the whole thing unless really necessary. Extras definitely won’t be under 18.
Sometimes extras have to be kids, so filming can stretch out a few days.
Knowing there’s kids on set can actually be nice, because you know there’s only so long they can shoot for, instead of stretching a Friday night out indefinitely. Especially if it’s a director like Fincher who is known for doing a lot of takes.
Acted as a kid, mainly in locals and some true crime shows for New Dominion Pictures, back before the true crime mania.
This one lady who was on a lot of the same projects I was on called me “her little guarantee” meaning she got to get home to her kids at reasonable hours because I was on set. Lol
Not to mention you don’t want underage actors in explicit scenes. So with shows like euphoria is kind of impossible to use people actually that age
You assume they follow the law
That’s exactly where it would be followed.
When they get caught, sure…then they partly their lobby fees and it gets sweeped under the rug. These mega corps don’t play by our rules, they have no rules.
Unions are very, very strong in that industry. The regs are followed.
Sigh. This is exactly where it’s easily monitored (part of the regulation I’m pretty sure), observable, and thus enforceable.
That’s what unions are for, which are very strong in the movie business.
I’d bet there’s a ‘sweet spot’ for age where the average person watching a movie can mentally overlook the adult in a teen role, while children and elderly can’t be portrayed by a different age without it being a deliberate effect choice or farcical (though when I was learning makeup effects, I saw a ~25 year old turned convincingly into a 60+ person). Maybe it has to do with ease of an adult actor compared to a teen, or maybe it’s because there are just more of the ‘young’ adult actors in the pool than readily accessible teenage actors. Maybe the hiring team wants to ensure they have someone who can act without being taught during the production, and the slightly older actors have more proven track records?
As an example of the makeup to age someone: The actor that played “Mr. Six” in the 6 Flags commercials in the US was actually 29.
I remember a coworker saying, “I’ve heard rumors he’s not that old…” Yeah, no kidding, Angela.
(Also, while researching this comment, I came across the fact that Dan Snyder, prior owner of the team that is now the Washington Commanders, is the guy that killed that wildly popular series of commercials. Another example of his bad instincts, and demonstrating that he should leave things to the experts. Many people remember Mr. 6, but practically no one remembers the 6 Flags commercials that followed.)
Bo Burnham’s “Eighth Grade” features a 13-year-old playing a 13-year-old. He said he wanted to capture the natural awkwardness and self-consciousness that we all experienced at that age.
There’s a handful of movies where it totally works. The kids in Stand By Me were all the right age and Rob Reiner got incredible performances out of them. It might be a little bit harder, but it can be done.
Speaking of King movies, the kids in IT knocked it out the park. King’s great at taking you back to your childhood. “Yep, that’s exactly how we thought, talked and acted.” Sometimes though, his child characters are a bit ahead of their age.
Great point and excellent movie. Come to think of it, it was very common through the 80’s. The Sandlot, The Goonies, The Lost Boys…any Cory movies lol
Perhaps something related to child labour laws making it more complicated to hire minors?
Shorter days for the kids also increases the cost of making a movie and makes crunch time harder too.
There are certainly incentives for using young adults in place of teenagers.
Unless they’re children?
Or teenagers give a fuck on being a movie star.
zits, probably
Michael Tucci, born in '46. He was 32 here.
Got that stereotypical leather skin boomers got from growing up with smoking indoors and no sunscreen.
That’s what you get for smoking as a teenager.
Was gonna say, even if you weren’t downing at least a pack a day yourself there’s nobody around you who isn’t.
Vsauce - Did People Used To Look Older? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjqt8T3tJIE
I was able to grow a full beard in 10th grade so this isn’t that unrealistic.
One of my classmates started having a receding hairline when he was 15. He was always able to buy alcohol (the age is 19 in Ontario).
Yeah, but you got held back 4 times.
Do you like getting held back? ಠ◡ಠ
JAV: first time?.jpg
