Can I retrieve a ViewModel from an ActionResult?

Question

Trying to avoid repetition here. I have an action in a base class controller which I am not allowed to modify. I'd like my action to do some checks, call the base class action, and modify the result in some way before rendering. But part of what I need to do involves modifying some properties of the ViewModel, and the base class returns an ActionResult. I see no way to get the ViewModel from the ActionResult, and so I may have to write a custom method, most of which would just mimic what the base class is doing. I'd strongly prefer not to do this. Any suggestions?

Answer 1

That's because ActionResult is a fairly high-level base class. Try casting it to the appropriate subtype, such as ViewResult.

Quick sample code:

    public ActionResult WrapperAction()
    {
        // do your initial stuff


        // call your base controller action and cast the result
        // it would be safer to test for various result types and handle accordingly
        ViewResult result = (ViewResult)base.SomeAction();

        object model = result.ViewData.Model;

        // do something with the model

        return result;
    }