There are some people who just don’t look their age. I’m pretty short, so I always get told I look much younger than I actually am, but my brother’s really tall and has usually gotten the opposite. It’s usually not a newsworthy event when someone doesn’t look their age, unless it’s really, really drastic.
Twitter discovered a pretty drastic one.
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You might remember a little show called *Hannah Montana*.
Miley Cyrus starred as Miley Stewart, whose 16-year-old brother, Jackson Stewart, was played by Jason Earles. In one memorable episode, wrestler and actor John Cena has a cameo where he gets into a bit of an impromptu wrestling match with the much younger character.
However, fans have just realized that the actor PLAYING Jackson was the same age as John Cena when they filmed that scene.
As a viral tweet pointed out, John Cena was born on April 23rd, 1977, and Jason Earles was born on April 26th, 1977.
Obviously fans were shocked to learn that, at the time of the show airing, a 29-year-old actor had been cast to play the 16-year-old character, and that these two characters who looked so different were actually almost the exact same age.
As a reminder, this is what Jackson looked like while he was on the show.
If you’d asked me how old this actor was, I probably would have said over 16, but I wouldn’t have come anywhere near his actual age of 29. I guess the Bieber cut doesn’t hurt his prospects either!
And this is John Cena at the same age on the show.
I get that John Cena is going to look bigger and older than most people just due to his massive muscles and angular face, but there is a world of difference between the two actors that I (and pretty much all of Twitter) could not wrap my head around.
Fans were shocked, and the jokes immediately started coming in.
“Damn, i knew he was older at the time but almost 30???? wtf???” one fan tweeted , while another added that “those 3 days made a hell of a lotta difference.”
It really is hard to believe!
One fan pointed out this meant BOTH men were older than Brock Lesnar.
No shade to Brock Lesnar, but it is really hard to believe that this is possible. John Cena certainly doesn’t look older than him, but Jason Earles looks like he could be Brock’s son!
Some fans were curious about why Jason Earles was cast in the first place.
It makes sense though — hiring an adult actor is a lot easier than a teenage one, and if he looked young enough (and he definitely did!) then why not?
Did you know these two actors were the same age? Let us know your reaction in the comments!
Fans pointed out that it wasn’t Jason’s first acting role, either.
Jason appeared in the definitely not family friendly American Pie Presents: Band Camp in 2005, which was a year before he was in Hannah Montana . So it wasn’t his first time acting as a teen despite already being an adult.
Fans started to point out other actors who are closer in age than you might think.
Like Thomas Sangster and Keira Knightley, who were only five years apart in Love Actually , although they were playing characters who were likely much further apart than that — Thomas’ character was in elementary school and Keira’s was getting married!
One fan brought up the oldest actor to play a Hogwarts student, Shirley Henderson.
Shirley was 37 years old when she took on the part of 14-year-old ghost Moaning Myrtle. The fact that Shirley was only 5 feet tall probably helped, as well as the fact that, as a ghost, she got to wear makeup to help hide her age!
Nowadays, Jason is looking a little bit closer to his age.
Sure, he’s still got a pretty youthful face and energy, but he is definitely not passing for a teenager anymore (which is probably something he’s grateful for these days)! Jason is happily married, and available for Cameo messages , too.
