Harvey Weinstein Lost His Sh*t Over ‘Gossip Girl’

Earlier this month, actor Ed Westwick — most famous for portraying the Donald Trump Jr.-esque real estate scion Chuck Bass on Gossip Girl — went live on TikTok and revealed to his followers that he’s keen to do a Gossip Girl “reboot” with the original cast, or a “spinoff show.”

The allegations notwithstanding, Gossip Girl creators Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage tell Rolling Stone that fans shouldn’t get their hopes up about a reboot with the original cast anytime soon.  

In an interview to promote the upcoming book Welcome to the O.C., a comprehensive (and fun) oral history of the beloved Fox series timed to its 20^th anniversary, and written by our own Alan Sepinwall, Schwartz and Savage talked a little Gossip Girl. As for Westwick’s pot-stirring, Schwartz is shutting any speculation down with a resounding, “No.”

“We had the Gossip Girl requel two years ago that we produced, and in a lot of these cases you make it, people like and that’s a miracle, and you should take the win and walk away,” he says.

HBO Max’s Gossip Girl was created by Josh Safran, produced by Schwartz and Savage, and failed to connect with audiences or critics. It was seen as Euphoria-lite and, in this writer’s opinion, sorely lacked the humor and playfulness of the original. Despite a big promotional push, the show was canceled after two seasons and 22 episodes. When asked why the “requel” didn’t quite land, Schwartz takes a long pause before replying, “We’re not sure.”

“Look, we can only speak to the things we do as writers, and obviously, we always try to find that balance [between humor and drama],” he continues. “That show was telling a story with a different tone and different set of characters, and it just had a different approach. You found out who Gossip Girl was right away, and it was turning the original concept inside-out in a way that we were proud of. It was important to Josh Safran, the creator, to make it be separate from the original show.”

The OG Gossip Girl ran for six seasons and 121 episodes, became a bona fide cultural phenomenon, and its cast was featured on the cover of Rolling Stone. It was also surprisingly topical, even containing a character at NYU, Willa Weinstein, whose father is implied to be Harvey Weinstein, the movie mogul (who’s now in jail for a series of rapes). Apparently, Weinstein did not take kindly to having his daughter be a character on the show.

“Stephanie got a very angry call from Harvey Weinstein. He’s in jail now. You can talk about it. He can’t hurt you,” Schwartz jokes with Savage, who still seems quite scared of Weinstein.

“This was the jumping-off point for Harvey Weinstein to call me because he had a bone to pick with the show. We never even said the character was his daughter, but she did have his last name,” explains Savage. “I didn’t even know that he had a daughter and that, to him, felt like an overstep and ‘who do we think we were’ and all that. We did some ADR to fix that. But it meant that Harvey Weinstein had my cell phone number, and that Harvey Weinstein would call me anytime he needed anything. The man does not take ‘no’ for an answer, as we have found out.”

Order Welcome to The O.C.: The Oral History here.

And the character of Nate Archibald, played by Chace Crawford, was modeled after Jared Kushner. Like Kushner, Archibald descended from a wealthy family, his father went to jail for financial crimes, and he eventually ended up purchasing a newspaper similar to The New York Observer.

“It was for sure an inspiration,” Savage maintains. “It’s literally like, his dad went to jail for financial crimes, and he bought an Upper East Side newspaper to try to do positive stories about his family. We were like, ‘Let’s do that!’ Jared and Ivanka were also on the show when they were just normal New York City socialites, and the crazy thing is the life that they had after that.”

The enduring connection between Gossip Girl and The O.C. lies in the union of its two stars: Leighton Meester (Blair Waldorf) and Adam Brody (Seth Cohen), who got married in 2014 and have two children together.

And yes, they were introduced to each other by Schwartz and Savage. The Gossip Girl cast was in L.A. for a Television Critics Association event, so Schwartz and Savage threw a party for the cast and their friends at Canter’s Deli.

“We invited everyone out to a late-night thing at Canter’s, which is what we always did, so everyone was there, and they met then,” Schwartz recalls. “But then they did a film together called The Oranges a couple of years later, and that’s when they connected romantically.”

Welcome to The O.C. will hit bookstores on Nov. 28. Our longer interview with Schwartz and Savage about the show will run that same day.

Earlier this month, actor Ed Westwick — most famous for portraying the Donald Trump Jr.-esque real estate scion Chuck Bass on Gossip Girl — went live on TikTok and revealed to his followers that he’s keen to do a Gossip Girl “reboot” with the original cast, or a “spinoff show.”

The allegations notwithstanding, Gossip Girl creators Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage tell Rolling Stone that fans shouldn’t get their hopes up about a reboot with the original cast anytime soon.  

In an interview to promote the upcoming book Welcome to the O.C., a comprehensive (and fun) oral history of the beloved Fox series timed to its 20^th anniversary, and written by our own Alan Sepinwall, Schwartz and Savage talked a little Gossip Girl. As for Westwick’s pot-stirring, Schwartz is shutting any speculation down with a resounding, “No.”

“We had the Gossip Girl requel two years ago that we produced, and in a lot of these cases you make it, people like and that’s a miracle, and you should take the win and walk away,” he says.

HBO Max’s Gossip Girl was created by Josh Safran, produced by Schwartz and Savage, and failed to connect with audiences or critics. It was seen as Euphoria-lite and, in this writer’s opinion, sorely lacked the humor and playfulness of the original. Despite a big promotional push, the show was canceled after two seasons and 22 episodes. When asked why the “requel” didn’t quite land, Schwartz takes a long pause before replying, “We’re not sure.”

“Look, we can only speak to the things we do as writers, and obviously, we always try to find that balance [between humor and drama],” he continues. “That show was telling a story with a different tone and different set of characters, and it just had a different approach. You found out who Gossip Girl was right away, and it was turning the original concept inside-out in a way that we were proud of. It was important to Josh Safran, the creator, to make it be separate from the original show.”

The OG Gossip Girl ran for six seasons and 121 episodes, became a bona fide cultural phenomenon, and its cast was featured on the cover of Rolling Stone. It was also surprisingly topical, even containing a character at NYU, Willa Weinstein, whose father is implied to be Harvey Weinstein, the movie mogul (who’s now in jail for a series of rapes). Apparently, Weinstein did not take kindly to having his daughter be a character on the show.

“Stephanie got a very angry call from Harvey Weinstein. He’s in jail now. You can talk about it. He can’t hurt you,” Schwartz jokes with Savage, who still seems quite scared of Weinstein.

“This was the jumping-off point for Harvey Weinstein to call me because he had a bone to pick with the show. We never even said the character was his daughter, but she did have his last name,” explains Savage. “I didn’t even know that he had a daughter and that, to him, felt like an overstep and ‘who do we think we were’ and all that. We did some ADR to fix that. But it meant that Harvey Weinstein had my cell phone number, and that Harvey Weinstein would call me anytime he needed anything. The man does not take ‘no’ for an answer, as we have found out.”

Order Welcome to The O.C.: The Oral History here.

And the character of Nate Archibald, played by Chace Crawford, was modeled after Jared Kushner. Like Kushner, Archibald descended from a wealthy family, his father went to jail for financial crimes, and he eventually ended up purchasing a newspaper similar to The New York Observer.

“It was for sure an inspiration,” Savage maintains. “It’s literally like, his dad went to jail for financial crimes, and he bought an Upper East Side newspaper to try to do positive stories about his family. We were like, ‘Let’s do that!’ Jared and Ivanka were also on the show when they were just normal New York City socialites, and the crazy thing is the life that they had after that.”

The enduring connection between Gossip Girl and The O.C. lies in the union of its two stars: Leighton Meester (Blair Waldorf) and Adam Brody (Seth Cohen), who got married in 2014 and have two children together.

And yes, they were introduced to each other by Schwartz and Savage. The Gossip Girl cast was in L.A. for a Television Critics Association event, so Schwartz and Savage threw a party for the cast and their friends at Canter’s Deli.

“We invited everyone out to a late-night thing at Canter’s, which is what we always did, so everyone was there, and they met then,” Schwartz recalls. “But then they did a film together called The Oranges a couple of years later, and that’s when they connected romantically.”

Welcome to The O.C. will hit bookstores on Nov. 28. Our longer interview with Schwartz and Savage about the show will run that same day.