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For those of you pristine enough to be blissfully unaware of the unholy art of typecasting, I've accrued a definition from one, dictionary.com:

type·cast (tpkst)
tr.v. type·cast, type·cast·ing, type·casts

1. To cast in an acting role akin or natural to one's own personality or fitted to one's physical appearance.
2. To assign (a performer) repeatedly to the same kind of part.

And from myself:

3. Bloody irritating.


Hate them or love them, most of us have one. Discuss yours, the first of the trend, how you escaped one (SHARE TIPS), do directors give typecasts to try and teach us something or is it just for convenience, overall discuss your character type.


I'm stuck forever being the female character actor: comic relief, deadpan delivery, bitchy wife, nagging mother. More or less the same character throughout 6 years of serious acting.

There was one role I was cast in as a last-minute experiment that was pretty serious. I played an old woman looking back on her life in a Japanese internment camp. This was a 5 minute preview for an all womens' play (nobody ever comes to see those at my school, cause they get like 3 weeks rehearsal time and are usually cheesey as hell), but I knocked the hell out of that preview and managed to get compliments from people whose congratulations are not required. I never got that part for real, I never saw a serious role again.

Pissed me off.

Type casting is the way to do it at my school, sadly. This one guy always gets the romantic leads, another always gets the hicks, another the old men, etc. In fact, we were going to do Hairspray because we had a girl who was perfect for the lead.

Even the tech get "type cast" if you will. I'd really like to try my hand at SM or ASM but I've been on lights so long I don't think that will happen.

I know how you feel. And it works to a point, but when you've got a kid whose never played anything but geriatric men (I think every company has one of those), a girl whose been the damsel in distress her entire career and a guy whose so tired of character acting, he's turned to tech for refuge, there's an issue.

My director does this thing where she picks plays based on the talent, which I think is better than picking plays she likes and cramming people into ill-fitting roles to a point, but the director of an excellent high school drama department is supposed to challenge their students in roles that they're not 100% comfortable in. At least that's how I feel about it.

As difficult and silly as it is, typecasting is a fact of life. It's easier for the audience to suspend disbelief, and frankly, once a director has decided what part you are, that's about the end of the road.

I got some good advice from my acting teacher: "Every single actor is always typecast. You can choose to lust after the other roles, or have fun with the ones you're in. That makes the difference between an actor struggling for work and an actor with too much work"

That's excellent advice your teacher gave you. I only wish I was less apt to complain. xd At least I can land semi-decent roles. For this I'm thankful.

So that would be Katisha and...?

Typecasting happens a lot in my school but I think it's cause there's only one real drama teacher. There's a few english teachers who teach drama occasionally but basically there's just the one. He doesn't do it as bad as some people do, but it's still there.

Which movie?