Some fans have noted that the cast look a little older than high-schoolers… <\/p>
There\u2019s a longstanding tradition of 20-something \u2013 and sometimes even 30-something \u2013 actors playing high school kids on the big screen, and new movie musical Dear Evan Hansen<\/a> is the latest film to keep that tradition going.<\/p>\n You might have noted from the trailer that lead star Ben Platt \u2013 who also originated the role in the stage show from which the film is adapted \u2013 looks considerably older than the 17-year-old he\u2019s supposed to be playing, and indeed a quick look at his date of birth reveals that to be completely true.<\/p>\n But Platt isn\u2019t the only cast member whose school days are a few years behind him \u2013 read on for everything you need to know about the real ages of the stars playing high school kids in Dear Evan Hansen.<\/p> \u00a0<\/p>\n Two of the stars are exactly a decade older than the characters they\u2019re meant to be playing \u2013 Platt, and Nik Dodani, who plays Evan\u2019s acquaintance Jared Kalwani. Both actors are 27-years-old, meaning high school is rather a distant memory for the pair of them.\u00a0 Of course, Platt was a little younger when he first played the title role as part of the original Broadway cast in 2016, but even then he was already 22.<\/p>\n Interestingly, Platt previously took aim at those who pointed out the age difference in a now-deleted Tweet, writing \u201cto the randos being jerks about age, read this great article and\/or watch Grease\u201d.<\/p>\n Another cast member who has previously been part of the Broadway cast (albeit as an understudy) is Colton Ryan, who takes on the role of Connor Murphy \u2013 the character whose tragic suicide occurs at the beginning of the film. Ryan is 25-years-old \u2013 meaning he is eight years older than the character he\u2019s playing.<\/p>\n Meanwhile Zoe, Connor\u2019s 16-year-old sister and Evan\u2019s love interest, is played by Booksmart star Kaitlyn Dever who is 24-years-old \u2013 another eight-year age gap.<\/p>\n One star of the film who left school a little more recently is Amandla Stenberg, who at 22-years-old is just five years older than her character, the high achiever of Evan\u2019s year Alana Beck.<\/p>\n Some fans have noted that the cast look a little older than high-schoolers… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":4800,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2021\/09\/how-old-is-ben-platt-in-dear-evan-hansen-casts-real-age.jpg",1806,1204,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2021\/09\/how-old-is-ben-platt-in-dear-evan-hansen-casts-real-age-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2021\/09\/how-old-is-ben-platt-in-dear-evan-hansen-casts-real-age-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2021\/09\/how-old-is-ben-platt-in-dear-evan-hansen-casts-real-age-768x512.jpg",768,512,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2021\/09\/how-old-is-ben-platt-in-dear-evan-hansen-casts-real-age-1024x683.jpg",800,534,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2021\/09\/how-old-is-ben-platt-in-dear-evan-hansen-casts-real-age-1536x1024.jpg",1536,1024,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2021\/09\/how-old-is-ben-platt-in-dear-evan-hansen-casts-real-age.jpg",1806,1204,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Some fans have noted that the cast look a little older than high-schoolers...","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/4799"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4800"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4799"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4799"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"