Adolescence Almost Didn’t Cast the Actor Who Plays Jamie Because of His Age—How Old Is He Really?
Jason Pham
As television’s new breakout star, Owen Cooper’s age played an important role in his performance as Jamie in Netflix’s Adolescence.
Adolescence stars Cooper as Jamie Miller, a 13-year-old boy, who’s suspected of killing his classmate, Katie Leonard. The show, which hit number one on Netflix after its release, has received widespread acclaim for its writing, directing, and performances—including from Cooper. But how old is Adolescence‘s leading actor and breakout star compared to the troubled teen he’s portraying?
What’s Owen Cooper’s age?
Cooper is 15 years old, at the time of writing, however, he was only 14 years old when he filmed Adolescence, which made him just one year older than his character, Jamie.
In an interview with Variety, Adolescence director Philip Barantini revealed that the creators originally wanted to find an actor older than Jamie before changing their minds when they found Cooper. “When we got the scripts, it was like, ok, this is about a 13-year-old boy. And we were thinking, can we actually cast a lad at that age?” he said. “Or do we need to look for someone who’s 16, 17, 18, but looks really young? But there’s something about that sort of adolescent age between 12 and 14, where people’s mannerisms change, and people’s bodies change, and people’s voices change, and all of those things. It was quite apparent that we couldn’t go down the road of getting someone older.”
He continued, “Shaheen Baig, who’s our casting director, is amazing at finding new talent. She really goes above and beyond in terms of where she looks. I said to her early on that we should look in the drama schools, youth clubs and established theater schools, but I also wanted to try and find someone who’s never done it before. So we really scoured. There were 1000s of tapes that came through. I watched everything. But we narrowed it down and it was quite apparent that Owen was one of the frontrunners.”
Cooper’s young age also explains why Adolescence his first acting project. “Literally nothing,” he told Variety when asked about his acting experience before Adolescence. “I only really wanted to start acting a couple of years ago. It’s not been long. I grew up wanting to be a footballer. I don’t know what it was that made me want to do it, but I just wanted to do it. And then I went to lessons and enjoyed it. And then I got into a little agency thing, and then I got a self-tape request for Adolescence. And everything came from that really.”
Barantini also told Variety about how the show—which filmed each episode in one take—worked with Cooper despite his lack of acting experience. “So we knew we were going to shoot episode three [with Doherty] first. Once we cast Owen, I was like: oh, I need to make sure he can actually do this thing. So we got some people in to work with him while I was working on other episodes. There was an acting teacher who was there to just help him with his lines and help him get it all off the page,” he said. “Honestly, first day on set was obviously nerve racking for all of us. But he just absolutely blew me away. Actors train for years and years and still can’t really master what Owen has mastered, which is basically just being in the moment and listening and being truthful.”
He went on to describe how impressed he was by Cooper’s acting in his first role. “l’ve obviously worked with a lot of actors in my time as an actor and as a director and a lot of actors can’t do what he can do,” he said. “He doesn’t even realize it! He’s so blasé. Every day, we’d do the tape, which would take an hour, and everyone at the monitors would be crying their eyes out. And we had a psychologist there to make sure that Owen was okay. But she couldn’t find him. She’d be like, where’s Owen? And he’d be off playing swing ball. I’d ask, mate, are you ok? And he’d be like, yeah, hang on, I’m winning here!”
After Adolescence, Cooper will next star in the upcoming Wuthering Heights movie adaptation, alongside Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi. He told Variety that he booked Wuthering Heights from his performance in Adolescence. “Stephen recommended me his agent. So Maddi [Bonura, from Independent Talent] came and watch a bit of episode one, and I got Wuthering Heights from that!” he said.
Adolescence streams on Netflix.
