Guest cast type

The question with Starring is, when is it considered the same thing as Guest Star or Show Cast, and when isn't it?

For instance, no matter how often it was used on Twilight Zone, nobody thought that Buddy Ebsen or Cloris Leachman or Joe Mantell "starred on" The Twilight Zone. That's even less so today. Ask anyone and 99 out of 100 people will say that Joe Mantell wasn't a star of the Twilight Zone. And that the only person who starred on the show was Rod Serling. (who, ironically, was uncredited in his "show cast" role as narrator).

So if most people come along here and sees Joe Mantell listed as "Starring" in "Nervous Man in a Four Dollar Room," if they bother at all then they're going to change him to a guest star. Because he's literally a star who guested.

Ditto with examples like Millennium or House. If Peter Jacobson appeared in every episode of season 5 of House, what purpose does listing him as Starring (which I believe he was credited as) or Regular serve rather than listing him as Show Cast for episodes in that season?

So IMO, the question is what does TVMaze want to do? Go for the literal truth, which varies by era and country? Or provide broad caetgories? Listing the people above as Starring may literally be the truth as far as how they're credited onscreen. But... if it causes more edits (which cause more errors), and goes against "conventional wisdom", is the overall benefit greater or worse?

You could scrap the whole distinction of cast/guest stars and just list actors who appear in an episode, sort of like IMDB (tries) to do it.

That's pretty much what TVMaze has now. Or at least they will until/if David groups cast by cast-type categories.

I think there is a noteworthy distinction between Main Cast, Guest Stars, Co-Stars, Uncredited, and Special Guest Stars. But they're more logistical than an exact match for what the on-screen "type" is. IMO.they rank how important the character is in the episode as the producers and SAG decided, and that seems noteworthy to me,

Neil McDonough and Brandon Routh, as Special Guest Stars on Arrow, serve more important roles than Echo Kellum. And Echo Kellum as a guest star serves a more significant role than Skell or Technician #2 (co-stars). It's an approximate, but at least it's not arbitrary.

On the other hand, I don't see much distinction in importance between co-stars and featurings. Or Starrings and Main Cast.

That's why, broadly speaking, I'd say stick with what TVMaze currently has. There'll be exceptions, but when you're trying to encompass every TV show in every country for the last 50 years, you're always going to have exceptions.

The on-screen rankings have unfairness as well. I was working on Kolchak: The Night Stalker tonight. Jack Grinnage was in 18 out of 20 episodes, but he's never ranked higher than a co-star. Some sources list him as a show star. Some as a guest star. Somebody might decide that he was Starring. It might not be "fair" that he never made better than co-star, but it provides a consistent way to list him and others.

Gadfly wrote:
The question with Starring is, when is it considered the same thing as Guest Star or Show Cast, and when isn't it?

I believe that's simple: show cast is usually in the title sequence. Starring in the guest capacity is those listed after the title sequence, but before those explicitly listed as (special) guest star. As brought up, they're sometimes listed under something like Also Starring, but most cases they have no title accompanying their names. Anthology shows don't include their Starring cast in the title sequence, so they obviously go under guest cast. I really believe if the editing policy is written out on this well enough, there shouldn't be much conflict. There will be some anomalies, of course, because not everything follows a simple copy-and-past template, but that's where someone asks questions and a discussion ensues until a consensus is reached. But, yeah, for the most part, I believe it isn't too complicated to figure out as long as there aren't too many exceptions to the rule.

The problem is that at least 90% of contributors don't read editing policy. And the more something is written out, the less likely they are to read it. :(

Gadfly wrote:
The problem is that at least 90% of contributors don't read editing policy. And the more something is written out, the less likely they are to read it. :(

That's maybe true, but if we write it down and somebody does it wrong, we can notify him/her that s/he is doing wrong.
If s/he keeps doing it wrong we can ban him/her for that.
If noting is written down they just say "I didn't know that" and we can't do anything about it.

Right. But you want to go with as intuitive a system as possible so that things don't have to be written out in great detail.

So for Starring, you either say:

"List them the way they appear on screen. If it says Starring, list them as Starring."

or

"For Anthologies, only list the hosts as Show Stars. Everyone else is a Guest Star."

Either of those (I don't care which) is a lot simpler and intuitive than: "show cast is usually in the title sequence. Starring in the guest capacity is those listed after the title sequence, but before those explicitly listed as (special) guest star. As brought up, they're sometimes listed under something like Also Starring, but most cases they have no title accompanying their names. Anthology shows don't include their Starring cast in the title sequence, so they obviously go under guest cast."