I just realized something really weird...

[Hale Caesar]

I don't know how you all define 'twice', but 3 main cast actors, David Boreanaz, Charisma Carpenter and James Marsters, were all main cast in Buffy AND Angel, that's two shows, thus two collaborations in my book! Not to speak of all the other cameos multiple other actors had...
Just because they played the same characters doesn't mean it shouldn't be counted, I think. Joss Whedon didn't have to make a Buffy spin-off, but the fact that he did shows a lot of dedication to certain actors and the storyline.

I don't consider playing the same characters on Buffy and Angel as a collaboration. The shows ran (mostly) during the same time, and they were under contract, so it's not like they went out of their way to do a guest appearance. I just find it really, really weird...

And Joss has gone on record saying he never wanted to put Angel in BtVS, it was mostly some of the female writers, he never liked the idea of putting a tall, good looking, mysterious guy in his show because he couldn't relate to them. The success of Angel is 95% David Greenwalt and the other Angel writers. David Greenwalt was the one who wanted Charisma Carpenter on Angel, not Joss. Hell, Joss fired Charisma because she was pregnant and claimed her character arc was finished....which I think is complete BS. I've always questioned how much Joss liked Angel, hell, if your reading season 8 and 9 Angel and his cast get almost no respect

 

[Skytteflickan88]

I don't consider playing the same characters on Buffy and Angel as a collaboration. The shows ran (mostly) during the same time, and they were under contract, so it's not like they went out of their way to do a guest appearance. I just find it really, really weird...

Do people who create shows usually re-use the actors they've worked with more often than Joss?

I just think it seems unlikely that he would re-use the actors at all, considering there's thousands and thousands of actors in Hollywood. And while Joss has worked on several projects, done the casting for several of those, if one has thousands of people to choose between, picking someone you've already worked with seems unlikely. Not that I don't believe he hasn't written something then thought "Hey, xx would be perfect for that" and asked them to addiction, he must have, but it's about who's best for the part. And who can and want to do it.

He has had a limited amount of roles to cast since Buffy. What are the odds any actor he's worked with so far would fit? I'm happily suprised he worked with the same actors several times so far. That those actors mainly seem to be from Ats and Firefly is probably coincidence, and that the actors he worked with from Buffy and worked with again weren't the main cast seems to be coincidence as well.

Like others have said, the main cast have been busy.

 

[Hale Caesar]

Do people who create shows usually re-use the actors they've worked with more often than Joss?

I just think it seems unlikely that he would re-use the actors at all, considering there's thousands and thousands of actors in Hollywood. And while Joss has worked on several projects, done the casting for several of those, if one has thousands of people to choose between, picking someone you've already worked with seems unlikely. Not that I don't believe he hasn't written something then thought "Hey, xx would be perfect for that" and asked them to addiction, he must have, but it's about who's best for the part. And who can and want to do it.

He has had a limited amount of roles to cast since Buffy. What are the odds any actor he's worked with so far would fit? I'm happily suprised he worked with the same actors several times so far. That those actors mainly seem to be from Ats and Firefly is probably coincidence, and that the actors he worked with from Buffy and worked with again weren't the main cast seems to be coincidence as well.

Like others have said, the main cast have been busy.

Joss re-uses actors all the time. The "actors are busy" line is garbage. You can make a case that everyone in Hollywood is busy all the time, but guys like Nathan Fillion or Amy Acker still find the time to be part of multiple projects.

And what about his smaller, more personal projects? Joss has admitted he enjoys casting his friends. Look at the cast of "Much Ado About Nothing" none of the BtVS main cast. But he still put in his regulars like Nathan Fillion, Alexis Denisof, Fran Kranz, etc.

Dollhouse's second season basically became one giant party (something he mentions on the DVD speacial features). Summer Glau, Alan Tudyk, Felicia Day, Alexis Denisof all came out.

I recommend everyone check out the chart on Joss Whedon's wikipedia page. It's an overview of the actors he's worked with multiple times in his career.

 

[Skytteflickan88]

It's so nice to hear that my opinions are garbage...

And like I said, not only might they be busy with other parts(some might simply not like doing multiple projects) and private lives, they might simply not have been interested in any parts Joss might or might not have offered. He wanted Sarah for a Buffy movie, but she wasn't interested. He wanted Nick for Mal, but that didn't work out. He wanted to do Ripper with Anthony. There was talk of a Spike movie. Things just didn't line up, maybe for perfectly understandable reasons.

I just don't see the weirdness, not based on the very small amount of info that's been presented. Maybe he simply think some of the actors he's worked with are more versatile, and they're they first people he calls?

---------- Post added at 01:31 AM ---------- Previous post was at 01:21 AM ----------

Hale Caesar agrees: You had some great points. The "actors are busy" line is just such a weak and overused argument

So what is your counter argument? Can you actually be sure they weren't busy at the time Joss was casting? I'm just throwing it out there, because I have no clue if they are busy or not. It just seemed like you were stuck on that Joss didn't want to work with them, when it could have been that he didn't offer anything they wanted to work with.

 

[Hale Caesar]

It's so nice to hear that my opinions are garbage...

And like I said, not only might they be busy with other parts(some might simply not like doing multiple projects) and private lives, they might simply not have been interested in any parts Joss might or might not have offered. He wanted Sarah for a Buffy movie, but she wasn't interested. He wanted Nick for Mal, but that didn't work out. He wanted to do Ripper with Anthony. There was talk of a Spike movie. Things just didn't line up, maybe for perfectly understandable reasons.

I just don't see the weirdness, not based on the very small amount of info that's been presented. Maybe he simply think some of the actors he's worked with are more versatile, and they're they first people he calls?

---------- Post added at 01:31 AM ---------- Previous post was at 01:21 AM ----------



So what is your counter argument? Can you actually be sure they weren't busy at the time Joss was casting? I'm just throwing it out there, because I have no clue if they are busy or not. It just seemed like you were stuck on that Joss didn't want to work with them, when it could have been that he didn't offer anything they wanted to work with.

So out of the 11 main cast members of BtVS, all of them have been conveniently busy for the 6 projects Joss has done since 2005 (7 years). There's "things not lining up" and facts that paint an obvious picture.

Despite him doing something like "Much Ado About Nothing" which is basically him calling up his friends and shooting a movie at his house (they actually filmed at his house)

 

[Jodast]

It certainly looks as though he gets on better with his supporting cast than his leads and it's a shame in a way, but we all have people we work with that we like a lot, some we like just fine for working with and others, well....

Joss, though a God amongst men, is susceptible to the same issues as the rest of us. It's just that he can afford better therapists 🙂

 

[prophecygrrl]

Maybe the easy explanation of why most of the BtVS/Angel cast haven't worked with Joss again is because they aren't very good friends anymore. Occam's Razor or whatever. It's been a long time since the end of both of those shows so I'm guessing things are all right now, but it didn't seem like all marshmallows and rainbows with SMG, David Boreanaz, Emma Caulfield, Amber Benson, Charisma Carpenter, etc. when they left the show or asked to leave the show.

 

[Sweet J]

Sarah Michelle Gellar, Alyson Hannigan, Nicholas Brendan, Anthony Stewart Head, Charisma Carpenter, David Boreanaz, Seth Green, James Marsters, Marc Blucas, Emma Caulfield and Michelle Tratchtenberg were all main characters on Buffy and Joss has never worked with any of them twice...this is weird.

And you can throw Amber Benson in that list if you want too

You know I haven't really thought about this that much, maybe we're looking at it the wrong way, sure he collaborates with some actors a lot, but perhaps we're looking at it through the lens that him doing so is the rule, rather than the exception?

It seems like he is just really good friends with Nathan Fillion and regards him as a brilliant actor, but with the main cast of BtVS & Ats, he's probably just regular friends with them?

As mentioned already, 'Mal' from firefly being originally written for Nick Brendon, had he accepted that role, would throw this whole idea out the window, would it not?

 

[Skytteflickan88]

Hale Caesar agrees: But he didn't...so there's no point play the "if" game

So what's the weird part of all of this?

 

[Hale Caesar]

So what's the weird part of all of this?

Are you serious?

That Joss never worked with any of the main Buffy actors twice...its in the first post.

 

[Skytteflickan88]

Are you serious?

That Joss never worked with any of the main Buffy actors twice...its in the first post.

I got that's what you thought was weird, but I don't get why. I've been assuminh you though Joss didn't like them. It seems like I'm not the only one thinking that. But you didn't respond to me saying that maybe they didn't want to work with him or seemed to have changed your mind after the vomment about Brendan/Mal.

So what's weird?

 

[Hale Caesar]

I got that's what you thought was weird, but I don't get why. I've been assuminh you though Joss didn't like them. It seems like I'm not the only one thinking that. But you didn't respond to me saying that maybe they didn't want to work with him or seemed to have changed your mind after the vomment about Brendan/Mal.

So what's weird?

Well he was committed to Buffy, so he couldn't be in Firefly. But none of them (I swear this is the last time im saying this) worked with him twice. This is especially weird considering Joss has a small pool of actors he likes working with, hell he even threw Alexis Denisof a little role in Avengers.

Sure, Nicholas Brendon was considered for Mal, Faith was supposed to have a spin-off and Giles was supposed to get one too, but if you notice all of those things happened while Buffy was still in production and there were still some stories to tell. Once the show ended, he hasn't (to my knowledge) shown any real interest in working with any of the BtVS cast again.

I'm getting tired of repeating myself with you. So I respectfully am done with our discussion

 

[Skytteflickan88]

Fine. If you don't reply to this, I'll accept that. If you haven't noticed, I kept repeating the same questions and opinions too, not getting a reply that was clear enough(sorry if I missed a post where you already said what you said in your last post).

I still don't get what's weird about the actors either not being able/willing to work with him, or him prefering certain actors over others, both reasonable explanations. I just tried to get you to pinpoint exactly what you thought was weird, since I, and many others, didn't seem to get it. I'm still not sure why it matters when he wanted to work with them. Do you think they had a falling out after Buffy ended?

And he has shown interest in making a Buffy movie, as seen on the Paley Reunion. The ball seems to have been in Sarah's court, but I guess she's done with Buffy. I assume Joss would have wanted the other actors as well.

 

[dexeded]

Fine. If you don't reply to this, I'll accept that. If you haven't noticed, I kept repeating the same questions and opinions too, not getting a reply that was clear enough(sorry if I missed a post where you already said what you said in your last post).

I still don't get what's weird about the actors either not being able/willing to work with him, or him prefering certain actors over others, both reasonable explanations. I just tried to get you to pinpoint exactly what you thought was weird, since I, and many others, didn't seem to get it. I'm still not sure why it matters when he wanted to work with them. Do you think they had a falling out after Buffy ended?

And he has shown interest in making a Buffy movie, as seen on the Paley Reunion. The ball seems to have been in Sarah's court, but I guess she's done with Buffy. I assume Joss would have wanted the other actors as well.

What the OP means is that Joss is known for using the same actors over and over again (just look at his Wiki page; it even has a chart listing all the actors he's used repeatedly), so it's weird that he has never reused a regular from his longest-running project, BtVS, in another show (AtS doesn't count since it's in the Buffyverse). Whether or not it has to do with scheduling conflicts or fallouts is secondary.

 

[Anya2012]

I didn't know Mal was written for Nick either. You really do learn something new everyday!

 

[dexeded]

[MENTION=8557]Skytteflickan88[/MENTION] agrees: I get what he thinks is weird, I just didn't know why. Still not sure why it's weird that Joss may or may not prefer some actors over others(which is just one of several likely reasons they don't get cast).

It's more of the coincidence of things. There are scheduling conflicts (ASH, Eliza Dushku with the Faith spinoff, Nick Brendon with Mal), and there is dislike, and some other factors, and it so happens that none of the main cast are used again. Funny. Weird. That kind of thing.

 

[zianna]

Mal's role was NEVER written for Brendon. There is absolutely no source to confirm this, only Nick himself in a con (I think) in which he was probably kidding/joking whatever. Other than him, I dare anyone to find me a confirming source of that. Nick had many personal problems at the time (alcohol) and the network wanted to get him fired. It was Joss himself that kept him in BtVS. Nick himself has admitted his problems many times and also added that there were days that he couldn't remember what he was doing on set and was wondering later if he had actually done his work. There's no way that a writer who already works with a "problematic" actor would ever write/trust the same actor to get another role at the same time. Plus that Nick was a regular in BtVS, meaning he had to be there on set, the 2 shows were in different networks meaning the same actor wasn't allow to work in both shows as a regular even if he could have found the time to do that.

 

[orpheusxi]

Its an interesting observation but I don't really read much into it other than coincidence. I doubt its out of dislike or anything.

Also I always though Mal was intended for David Boreanaz