‘The O.C.’ creator Josh Schwartz: Why ‘I felt I had failed’ when the show ended
It’s taken 20 years, but the cast and creators of “The O.C.” are ready to say “California here we come” once again.
Rolling Stone critic Alan Sepinwall interviewed those involved in the show to write “Welcome to the O.C.: The Oral History,” discussing the making of the hit teen drama. The book details the aspects of the Fox show that made it a cult classic, but also its rapid fall from grace during its third season.
“The O.C.” ran for four seasons from 2003 to 2007, and starred Ben McKenzie, Adam Brody, Mischa Barton and Rachel Bilson.
“Welcome to the O.C.” is brutally honest about flaws in the writing and showrunning process. While conducting interviews with Sepinwall and reading what the cast and crew had to say two decades later, show creator Josh Schwartz was able to reflect on his immaturity at the time.
At 26, Schwartz was one of the youngest showrunners in Hollywood. Similar in age to the cast, the professional and friend boundaries blurred, leading to cast members being able to convince him to change episode plotlines.
“Part of it is just being young and inexperienced and having to go through that for the first time,” Schwartz told The Post. “I think I’m better able to balance the responsibilities of wanting to be a showrunner with wanting to be liked. Sometimes those two things can’t be the same thing.”
The pace of scripts increased by Season 3, leading to a sharp quality decline. When the cast brought up concerns, they fell on deaf ears. He also found himself bound by the opinion of TV reviewers, whom he tried to satisfy by making the controversial decision to kill off lead Marissa Cooper (played by Barton).
Schwartz barely went to set during the third season, as he was embarrassed by the cast’s disappointment toward storylines. Most of his responsibilities were then delegated, something he said he’s “not proud of.”
“There’s a lot of things in the book that I’m very frank about that I would love to have done differently just in terms of how I handled conflict, and how I handled people not being happy with the show,” Schwartz told The Post. “And hopefully, those are things that I have learned and will not repeat.”
Executive producer Bob DeLaurentis once found Schwartz hiding in the stairwell with his hood on to avoid going to set or to the writers’ room. Additionally, Schwartz recounted a video shown at the Season 3 wrap party where he could be found crouching under his desk repeating: “Is it over? Is it over?”
Those episodes were largely considered a low point. Schwartz and his producing partner, Stephanie Savage, discussed pressures from Fox executives for “promotable elements” of the show, leading them to up the ante for the characters.
“There was a version of just saying no and letting the show be canceled, but I think we felt so much pressure to redeem ourselves, to keep the show going,” Savage says in the book.
As a solution, the writing team began introducing new characters — all of whom would have short and largely unmemorable stints on the series.
The sharp decline in writing quality and ratings led to feelings of embarrassment. Plotlines like Seth Cohen (Brody) becoming addicted to marijuana were created because Brody was giving such a lethargic performance and refused to connect with the material.
However, after listening to Bilson — who portrayed Summer Roberts — and Melinda Clarke — who played Julie Cooper — on their podcast “Welcome to the OC, Bitches!,” Schwartz and Savage realized that cast members were still interested in talking about the show.
“[The podcast] made us feel that maybe people are ready to talk about this and be more open to talking about it. It was kind of therapeutic for everyone and really set everyone else up for this book because we really wanted this book to be honest,” Schwartz said.
Savage chimed in: “I think 20 years is the amount of time needed to pass for everyone to have processed the experience and feel comfortable being that vulnerable revisiting.”
Savage wanted to make sure that the cast and crew were able to reminisce about the camaraderie on set, but also reflect on the interpersonal struggles they experienced.
“It’s been 20 years, it’s not like these things are gonna keep us up at night any more. But they certainly kept us up at night then, and it was a challenging time,” Schwartz told The Post.
In the end, working on the book was a therapeutic experience for Schwartz.
“I’m not joking when I say when the show ended, I felt like I had failed. And then here we are 20 years later, and people still want to talk about the show. It feels like more so than even when the show was on originally,” Schwartz said.
“I think it just really allowed us to make peace with the overall journey of the show and just be really proud and grateful that we got to make it.”
