While the years following the wrap up of The O.C. are shrouded in drama (namely bullying allegations), it remains one of our favourite early ’00s series. Even if Marissa Cooper was killed off far too early. You can imagine our reaction this morning when it was revealed that on-screen exes, Rachel Bilson and Adam Brody, reunited with nothing but compliments for one another.
The pair joined fellow co-star Melinda Clarke on her podcast Welcome to the OC, Bitches!. From 2003 to 2007 the duo played on-again off-again teen couple, Summer Roberts and Seth Cohen.
“Watching the show and, like, going back into that time and everything else, you really—I don’t even know how to put this—you taught me how to act well,” Bilson told her co-star. “You made it, like, so comfortable to just go for it and not be afraid, and everything you did and working with you really made me have the confidence to kind of, like, do whatever I wanted and go for it. And I just want to say thank you because it just, like, brings that all up. And I was like, ‘Dude, I was never better than when I was acting with you.’”
Unbeknown to some, Bilson and Brody also dated in real life for three years during the series. They split in 2006.
“It was my pleasure and it was such a joy,” Brody said of filming the series together. “I mean, look, I take the compliment. At the same time, in the pilot, you made it your own instantly and everyone fell in love with you. I felt like we were sparring so well together so fast.”
Given similar series such as Sex and the City and Gossip Girl are releasing reboot iterations, Brody was asked whether he would be interested in a remake of The O.C. But like questions raised about the “political correctness” of SATC, he said it just wouldn’t work in a social sense today.
“I kind of don’t think it can be done because I feel like, socially, I think we’re in a different place. And I think we’re in a more conscious place,” he said. “I feel like The O.C., while it claims to be in a similar sense of Gossip Girl, while it would sort of say it’s a critique, it’s not. It’s a celebration. It’s a celebration of affluence, in my opinion.”
