# What's the biggest difference between character and actual age of actor? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 10, 2014, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-biggest-difference-between-character-and-actual-age-of-actor/685791 "2014-04-10T11:58:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2014, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-biggest-difference-between-character-and-actual-age-of-actor/685791/61 "2014-04-13T16:51:08Z")
Cool, I couldn’t remember. Still quite a disconnect. ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2014, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-biggest-difference-between-character-and-actual-age-of-actor/685791/62 "2014-04-13T17:06:29Z")
> [@AncientHumanoid](#): > > Cool, I couldn’t remember. Still quite a disconnect. Yeah, it doesn’t make much difference. It was just my geeky nitpickery coming out. ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2014, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-biggest-difference-between-character-and-actual-age-of-actor/685791/63 "2014-04-13T18:16:25Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > Yeah, it doesn’t make much difference. It was just my geeky nitpickery coming out. 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![Tess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e480ec/32.png) [@Tess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tess)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2014, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-biggest-difference-between-character-and-actual-age-of-actor/685791/64 "2014-04-13T18:30:29Z")
Sarah Bernhardt was officially 70\* and still performing on stage as 13-year-old Juliet. \*Her birth records were apparently destroyed in a fire, so she may have fudged the numbers a bit when she forged some new ones. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2014, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-biggest-difference-between-character-and-actual-age-of-actor/685791/65 "2014-04-13T18:46:45Z")
How old is Connor MacLeoud supposed to be? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2014, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-biggest-difference-between-character-and-actual-age-of-actor/685791/66 "2014-04-13T19:13:38Z")
Marvin the Paranoid Android is 37 times older than The Universe itself. (HHGttG) So, Stephen Moore or David Learner have a pretty good claim. ---
**Author:** ![Steophan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steophan/32/9595_2.png) [@Steophan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steophan)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2014, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-biggest-difference-between-character-and-actual-age-of-actor/685791/67 "2014-04-13T19:47:28Z")
> [@priapus](#): > > Henry Fonda starred in the film version of “Mister Roberts” when he was about 50. One of the points mentioned in the film was he was a med student before enlisting. > > From Wiki: > Fonda was not the original choice to star in the film version; Warner Bros. was considering William Holden or Marlon Brando for the lead role. The studio thought Fonda had been on stage and off the screen so long (8 years) that he was no longer a movie box office draw. In addition, when filming began he was 49, much older than the average lieutenant junior grade. Fonda was only hired because director John Ford insisted. Ford did this sort of thing more than once. In The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence, John Wayne and James Stewart, both in their mid fifties, play characters in their early twenties. Conversely, 12 year old Roddy McDowall plays a character who ages to his early twenties in How Green Was My Valley. Speaking of John Wayne, it’s not clear exactly how old the brothers are meant to be, but in The Sons Of Katie Elder, there’s a 36 year age gap between Wayne and the man who plays his youngest brother, and it’s obvious in the story that the gap should be nowhere near that large. In none of these cases does it harm the film, though, and in How Green Was My Valley it actively improves it, adding to the dreamlike, surreal quality of an old man’s memories of childhood and early adulthood. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2014, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-biggest-difference-between-character-and-actual-age-of-actor/685791/68 "2014-04-14T13:08:52Z")
I recall Rob Reiner had a short-lived 1978 TV series in which he did a Dustin Hoffman a la _Little Big Man_. He was 31 years old, but his character was 89. He would appear at the beginning in the “present day” (1978) and reminisce about events in the early 1900s, and those events would then be portrayed. [Free Country](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Country_%28TV_series%29) was the show. It was pretty good, and I was disappointed when it got pulled. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2014, 1:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-biggest-difference-between-character-and-actual-age-of-actor/685791/69 "2014-04-14T13:16:01Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > At the beginning of the first novel, Sansa is 11 and Arya is 9. I don’t know how old the television Margaery Tyrell is supposed to be (I’d guess 22-23), but book-Margaery is 16 when she’s introduced. Natalie Dormer. the TV actress portraying her is 32 ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2014, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-biggest-difference-between-character-and-actual-age-of-actor/685791/70 "2014-04-14T14:41:06Z")
> [@Biggirl](#): > > Right now I think it’s a tie between Moaning Myrtle Roughly a 25-year spread, plus or minus a few years. > [@](#): > > and Diana Ross’ Dorothy. A good 20 years in your estimation. Without any plot trickery, Joan Allen’s Morgause had a 31-year spread. The winner? ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2014, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-biggest-difference-between-character-and-actual-age-of-actor/685791/71 "2014-04-14T15:08:42Z")
Well, if we aren’t excluding supernatural/alien/immortal/whatever characters as a special case, Sarek was stated to be 102 in his Original Series appearance as is of course correspondingly older when he shows up in The Next Generation. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2014, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-biggest-difference-between-character-and-actual-age-of-actor/685791/72 "2014-04-14T15:48:56Z")
> [@Steve\_MB](#): > > Well, if we aren’t excluding supernatural/alien/immortal/whatever characters as a special case, Sarek was stated to be 102 in his Original Series appearance as is of course correspondingly older when he shows up in The Next Generation. Also 102 is Maester Aemon in _Game of Thrones_, but the actor who plays him, Peter Vaughan is only … um … 91. Never mind. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-biggest-difference-between-character-and-actual-age-of-actor/685791.md?page=3)