Rewatching The Early Years

[adam436]

I think it stands out more when the older actors work alongside the younger ones. For example, the actor playing Dylan was nearly 10 years older than the actors playing his peers.

Likewise, the age difference was obvious between the actors playing Ric/Cassie and Henry Hunter, and Jett and VJ once he was recast.

If all actors with a group are a similar age or within 2-3 years, it's less obvious when there older actors playing teenagers. When the age gap is 5+, or in the more extreme cases closer to 10 years, it really stands out.

[CaptainHulk]

Matt took forever to weather as VJ and made Will/Jett look about 11 when he stood next to him.

[nenehcherry2]

All good points RE teenage characters being played by older actors.

Trying to think of examples of actors in their twenties playing teens from the 90s (all less extreme than the more recent ones shared):-

Richard Norton was almost 21 when he started playing Simon.

Isla Fisher was 20 when Shannon was in Year 12. Similar with Kimberley Cooper as Gypsy.

And, as someone else said, Cameron Welsh was significantly older than Mitch.

I'm sure there're some others...

Edited January 11 by nenehcherry2

[Zig]

Okay so was rewatching some 1998/1999 episodes and got to say, i don't get why they didn't just write Chloe and Lachie out a year earlier in 1998, the whole Chloe and James arc was simply pointless.

[cymbaline]

9 hours ago, nenehcherry2 said:

All good points RE teenage characters being played by older actors.

Trying to think of examples of actors in their twenties playing teens from the 90s (all less extreme than the more recent ones shared):-

Richard Norton was almost 21 when he started playing Simon.

Isla Fisher was 20 when Shannon was in Year 12. Similar with Kimberley Cooper as Gypsy.

And, as someone else said, Cameron Welsh was significantly older than Mitch.

I'm sure there're some others...

Greg Benson was 20/21 when he started playing Matt Wilson. It's jarring to see him in a school uniform in the earlier episodes because he's obviously too old to be in the classroom. 

I think they can get away with it more with female actresses. 

[nenehcherry2]

2 hours ago, cymbaline said:

Greg Benson was 20/21 when he started playing Matt Wilson. It's jarring to see him in a school uniform in the earlier episodes because he's obviously too old to be in the classroom. 

I think they can get away with it more with female actresses. 

Oh yes, that's right! I always forget that Matt was at Summer Bay High in the little we see of him in 88.

[adam436]

15 hours ago, Zig said:

Okay so was rewatching some 1998/1999 episodes and got to say, i don't get why they didn't just write Chloe and Lachie out a year earlier in 1998, the whole Chloe and James arc was simply pointless.

I agree - it's not even like they set James up as Chloe's happy ending and wrote them both out together in 1999.

According to Wikipedia, it sounds like Richard Grieve's relationship was somewhat unplanned: Grieve decided to leave the show in 1998, which gave producers a dilemma. They had developed the partnership between Lachlan and Chloe in advance. They cast Michael Piccirilli as Lachlan's brother James to take over the relationship with Chloe.

I also assume that Kristy Wright was too popular at the time to be written out in 1998 with Lachie. She was one of the most popular characters at the time, and the show had already lost some big characters over the previous 12 months with Pippa, Shannon and Selina.

Lachie and Chloe also felt like an afterthought too to be honest - I feel like the original plan was for Shannon to have the Lachie story arc, but when Isla Fisher quit, they threw Chloe into it instead. I may be wrong though. 

Edited January 11 by adam436

[nenehcherry2]

12 minutes ago, adam436 said:

I agree - it's not even like they set James up as Chloe's happy ending and wrote them both out together in 1999.

According to Wikipedia, it sounds like Richard Grieve's relationship was somewhat unplanned: Grieve decided to leave the show in 1998, which gave producers a dilemma. They had developed the partnership between Lachlan and Chloe in advance. They cast Michael Piccirilli as Lachlan's brother James to take over the relationship with Chloe.

I also assume that Kristy Wright was too popular at the time to be written out in 1998 with Lachie. She was one of the most popular characters at the time, and the show had already lost some big characters over the previous 12 months with Pippa, Shannon and Selina.

Lachie and Chloe also felt like an afterthought too to be honest - I feel like the original plan was for Shannon to have the Lachie story arc, but when Isla Fisher quit, they threw Chloe into it instead. I may be wrong though. 

I agree RE Chloe. Though I do feel that she'd ran her course by the start of 1999. There were times when, except for when she's having a drama with James or Diana, you could forget she was even still living in the Bay. Even her (forced) friendship with Sal had, from memory, been largely forgotten.

[adam436]

The show had definitely moved on from Chloe by 1999 - it was like she didn't really fit in anywhere. She even felt like a hanger-on in the Irene/Will/Hayley/Joey unit at times. 

I don't really recall her having any meaningful interactions with anyone other than Irene, James and guest character Diana, though it's been 25+ years since I've watched the episodes. 

[Homeandawayfan.]

Chloe could have just been "Rob Storey"ed  rather than get a proper exit when she decided to leave the bay in 1999 after splitting with James. "Rob Storey"ed being where she could have just vanished from the narrative but said to still be living in the bay.

I liked Rob and feel he did leave too soon, I think the actor Matthew Lilley got married or something and decided not to return, although I am not 100% sure. H&A mania seemed to grip the UK 1992-1997 and the actor still received fan mail some years after he left.