Actors Who Were Too Old to Play Teens But Did Anyway
By Jeff on Mar 2, 2010 in Daily Distractions, Lists | Comments

The Mathletes Club here at UsedWigs High have compiled a classroom full of actors who were well past their teenage years when they portrayed high-schoolers on the big and small screens. Age calculations are based on when the film was released or the year the character debuted on the TV show. The information was gleaned from IMDB.com.
Update! Actor Eric Christian Olsen is 31 and looks it, but that didn’t stop him from playing a high school jock in the upcoming awful movie “Fired Up!”
| ACTOR | BORN | FILM/TV SHOW | YEAR | AGE |
| Stockard Channing | 1944 | Grease | 1978 | 34 |
| Curtis Armstrong | 1953 | Better Off Dead | 1985 | 32 |
| Sean Patrick Thomas | 1970 | Save the Last Dance | 2001 | 31 |
| Eric Christian Olsen | 1977 | Fired Up! | 2009 | 31 |
| Olivia Newton-John | 1948 | Grease | 1978 | 30 |
| John Cho | 1972 | Better Luck Tomorrow | 2002 | 30 |
| Derek Luke | 1974 | Friday Night Lights | 2004 | 30 |
| Alan Ruck | 1956 | Ferris Bueller’s Day Off | 1986 | 30 |
| Frank Whaley | 1963 | Swing Kids | 1993 | 30 |
| Stacey Dash | 1966 | Clueless | 1995 | 29 |
| Gabrielle Carteris | 1961 | Beverly Hills, 90210 | 1990 | 29 |
| Ron Lester | 1970 | Varsity Blues | 1999 | 29 |
| Gedde Watanabe | 1955 | Sixteen Candles | 1984 | 29 |
| Parry Chen | 1973 | Better Luck Tomorrow | 2002 | 29 |
| P.J. Soles | 1950 | Rock ‘n’ Roll High School | 1979 | 29 |
| Tony Danza | 1951 | The Hollywood Knights | 1980 | 29 |
| Glynn Turman | 1946 | Cooley High | 1975 | 29 |
| Kerr Smith | 1972 | Final Destination | 2000 | 28 |
| Adrian Zmed | 1954 | Grease 2 | 1982 | 28 |
| Gabrielle Union | 1972 | Bring It On | 2000 | 28 |
| Jeff Conaway | 1950 | Grease | 1978 | 28 |
| Antwon Tanner | 1975 | One Tree hill | 2003 | 28 |
| Jon Heder | 1977 | Napoleon Dynamite | 2004 | 27 |
| Parminder Nagra | 1975 | Bend It Like Beckham | 2002 | 27 |
| Selma Blair | 1972 | Cruel Intentions | 1999 | 27 |
| Charisma Carpenter | 1970 | Buffy the Vampire Slayer | 1997 | 27 |
| Rebecca Gayheart | 1972 | Jawbreaker | 1999 | 27 |
| Lori Singer | 1957 | Footloose | 1984 | 27 |
| Sissy Spacek | 1949 | Carrie | 1976 | 27 |
| Tobey Maguire | 1975 | Spider-Man | 2002 | 27 |
| Denise Richards | 1971 | Wild Things | 1998 | 27 |
| Kevin Bacon | 1958 | Footloose | 1984 | 26 |
| Jamie Kennedy | 1970 | Scream | 1996 | 26 |
| Matthew Lillard | 1970 | Scream | 1996 | 26 |
| Skeet Ulrich | 1970 | Scream | 1996 | 26 |
| Paul Walker | 1973 | She’s All That | 1999 | 26 |
| Scott Wolf | 1968 | Party of Five | 1994 | 26 |
| Minka Kelly | 1980 | Friday Night Lights | 2006 | 26 |
| Ian Ziering | 1964 | Beverly Hills, 90210 | 1990 | 26 |
Before you fire off the "Hey, dummy you forgot...." email, there are hundreds of 23-, 24- and 25-year-old actors who played teens and we certainly can’t list them all here. I’m sure there’s some creepy website out there devoted to this nonsense. Google it.
Keep in Touch:
More News!
- Twitter 2.0!
- New Facebook Terms You Should Know!
- Is There Anything Sayid Can’t Do Well?
- Bad Design: The Huffington Post: Making Reading Painful
- Photoshop Now Offers "Family Beach Photo" Generator
![]()
Tags: Celebrities • humor • List • Old actors • Teen Actors • Teens











