The Beauty of Average-Looking Actors
Shows are much better if the actors are mid. It's one reason British TV is so great.
Of all the article topics people request, I never once suspected that the beauty differential between US-based and UK-based media would ever pop up, but alas, multiple subscribers have asked me to write about this. The request came after I briefly covered the fact that I found a relationship between British actors Olivia Colman and Benedict Cumberbatch in the recent comedy film Roses slightly implausible, because (IMO) he’s slightly better-looking than she is.
Not everyone agreed—they thought Benedict Cumberbatch looks like a ferret who got Handsome Squidward surgery, and perhaps to them Colman is the hotter one. For me, I think the disconnect came in part because he usually plays a bit younger than his age and she plays older (in real life, she’s only two years older than he is.) If a movie includes a dowdy, middle-aged British woman, she’s usually a top pick for the role, and she has been for a while. Meanwhile, Cumberbatch is only now entering his bumbling tweedy fuddy-duddy era. Otherwise known as “going unc mode.”
In part, this is because Hollywood sees men and women’s aging differently—not just that women are valued more for their youth (although they are) but we often see the same facial signs of aging on a woman and a man and conclude the woman is aging worse. In fact, we might come to this conclusion even when the man is older and objectively shows more signs of aging (Brad Pitt’s skin on a woman his age or even older would not be considered “aging well.”) And we are asked to believe, over and over again, that a male and female actor who are ten years apart are actually around the same age.
But aging aside, one thing that struck me (and my subscribers, apparently) about Olivia Colman—and one of the many reasons I really enjoy watching her, along with her tremendous talent—is the fact that she does really look like a random British lady walking around at Tesco. Actors like Colman make TV and movies better—more realistic, more immersive, more engaging. And you see this a lot more with British media than with American. I will up the ante: even when movies are supposed to be sexy, “regular hot” actors are better than model-tier actors.
I actually first discovered Olivia Colman when she played the love interest on the amazing sitcom Peep Show. This show continued for eight seasons, and for about half of those seasons, we were following a love story between two people who looked like this:
