Actress Hilarie Burton has revealed that Chad Michael Murray, her ‘One Tree Hill’ co-star, defended her from harassment by series creator Mark Schwahn. The revelation was made on the Drama Queens podcast, where the actress recalled the incident that occurred while the series was taping in Honey Grove, Texas in 2007.
“Chad came up and said, ‘What are you doing?’ He told our boss at a bar… He saw our boss making out with me in front of a bunch of people, and you know, Chad had nothing to lose because he knew our boss hated him anyway,” he said. said.
“A lot of people had a lot to lose, so you don’t speak up when you have a lot to lose,” she said. “But (our boss) felt so comfortable that it wasn’t a problem for him. (He thought, ‘I can do whatever I want to her in public with her boyfriend standing there.'”
The Drama Queens Podcast is hosted by Burton, along with Sophia Bush and Bethany Joy Lenz, his ‘One Tree Hill’ co-stars. During the conversation, Bush said he believed Murray’s lead role in the series contributed to her ability to stand up for Burton.
“He was protected as number 1 on the call sheet,” she said. “He had more power, so he could show up and take our boss away from you and fight. And I’m glad he did that. I want everyone to follow that example.”
“This idea that looking away is okay — no, it’s not,” Sophia Bush continued. “And thank God, Hilarie, you had that moment with Chad, who was already at odds with our boss.”
While he was never punished for allegations of on-set harassment, during the production of ‘One Tree Hill’, Mark Schwahn was later fired from another series he created, ‘The Royals’. He was fired in 2017 after screenwriter Audrey Wauchope accused him of sexual harassment during the time she and co-star Rachel Specter worked on ‘One Tree Hill’.
The couple were soon joined by several other former “One Tree Hill” cast and crew members, including Bush, Burton and Lenz, who signed an open letter detailing Schwahn’s harassment. They described being “psychologically and emotionally manipulated”, “put in awkward positions”, “threatened” and feeling “physically insecure” throughout the series.
Subsequently, Mark Schwahn could no longer find work in the television industry.
Source: Terra
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