Huffington Post recently released a list of 25 celebrities who played teenagers on television and in films while they were over the age of 25.  Many would be surprised to learn that Cory Monteith who plays Finn, Harry Shum, Jr. who plays Mike and Matthew Morrison who plays Mr. Schuester, all from TV's "Glee", are all relatively close in age.  Most of the cast could have already graduated with Master's degrees, yet they're playing high-school kids.  Gabrielle Carteris was one of the first to raise eyebrows when she, at 29 years-old, played 16 year-old Andrea Zuckerman on "Beverly Hills 90210" back in 1990. 

What is Hollywood's fascination with casting older actors in younger roles?  It seems as if actors are thought of as "Lassie" dogs.  Lassie was supposed to be a female, yet multiple males were cast in her role, as males were much easier to train.  Do studios choose older actors because they feel they need to "train' younger actors?  There are undoubtedly a number of teenagers out there who could interpret and express dialogue just as well as their twenty-something counterparts. 

More perplexing is that if being young is such an issue, why do we still have so many child actors?  It is no secret that many of them (Corey Haim and Tracy Gold, to name a few) end up in legal trouble or permanently miserable from attempting to cope with fame at such a young age.  Is Hollywood more comfortable with ruining young lives still in development than working with more mature actors, even if the gap between the two may be slight?

So we have plenty of adult actors and plenty of child actors, but a deficit of teenaged actors?  That seems a bit...odd.  Yet, shows have been doing this for years with everything from "Dawson's Creek" to "The O.C.".  One would think that perhaps it has something to do with labor laws, but surely the hours worked per day don't change once an actor turns 25.  This is an oddity that we have all acknowledged but that has never really been disputed.

So come on, Hollywood; what gives?