Conception and Casting
Cordelia was originally intended to serve as a dramatic foil to the series' main character Buffy Summers. Adapting the concept of the movie into a television series, Whedon decided to reinvent the character of Buffy. The shallow cheerleader of the 1992 Buffy film, as played by Kristy Swanson, had grown more mature and open-minded. Buffy now identified with the social outcasts, such as Willow and Xander. As a result, Cordelia Chase was created to embody the traits of that shallower Buffy. Despite portraying a shallow, valley girl stock character, actress Charisma Carpenter felt that Cordelia in early seasons was not "one-dimensional", nor was she "as superficial as people thought". At the same time, Carpenter was critical of her frequent role as the damsel in distress. Angel co-creator and executive producer David Greenwalt describes Cordelia in her Buffy years as "a somewhat shallow, somewhat vain, somewhat self-centered but lively and honest character who spoke her mind".
Charisma Carpenter had originally planned to read for the role of Buffy, but was late for her audition and instead tried out for Cordelia. Carpenter, who had dressed casually for the role of Buffy—who she believed "could really be herself"—felt unprepared to read for Cordelia because she "was definitely a character to dress for". Although she had only fifteen minutes to prepare for the character, the producers were "really responsive" to Carpenter's audition, and she left feeling confident she had got the part. After Carpenter's audition, actress Sarah Michelle Gellar, who had been offered the role of Cordelia before Carpenter, was asked to come back and audition for the part of Buffy. Bianca Lawson originally won the role of Cordelia Chase, but turned it down due to other contractual obligations. Lawson would later be cast as vampire slayer Kendra in the show's second season. Carpenter, proud of her own character's growth across the two series, did not envy Gellar for winning the role of Buffy over her.
Read more about this topic: Cordelia Chase
Famous quotes containing the words conception and, conception and/or casting:
“We are weighed down, every moment, by the conception and the sensation of Time. And there are but two means of escaping and forgetting this nightmare: pleasure and work. Pleasure consumes us. Work strengthens us. Let us choose.”
—Charles Baudelaire (1821–1867)
“Into all that becomes something inward for men, an image or conception as such, into all that he makes his own, language has penetrated ... logic must certainly be said to be the supernatural element which permeates every relationship of man to nature, his sensation, intuition, desire, need, instinct, and simply by so doing transforms it into something human, even though only formally human, into ideas and purposes.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)
“For the gods, though slow to see, see well, whenever a man casting aside worship turns folly.”
—Sophocles (497–406/5 B.C.)