Hilarie Burton reflects on speaking out against One Tree Hill showrunner Mark Schwahn. The series premiered on The WB in 2003 and enjoyed nine seasons of success before ending in 2012, moving to The CW after season 3 due to the network's merger with UPN. Set in the titular town in North Carolina, One Tree Hill begins by following the lives of two half-brothers, Lucas (Chad Michael Murray) and Nathan Scott (James Lafferty), who compete for spots on their high school basketball team.
The series also follows the drama that ensues from the brothers' various romances, including with their frequent love interests Brooke Davis, Peyton Sawyer, and Haley James Scott, which were played by Sophia Bush, Hilarie Burton, and Bethany Joy Lenz, respectively. Now, the former One Tree Hill trio has reunited on a recent episode of CBS' medical drama Good Sam. This onscreen reunion, coupled with the trio's rewatch podcast Drama Queens, have both served to shed further light on the sexual harassment accusations made by the One Tree Hill cast against showrunner Mark Schwahn in 2017.
During a conversation with Variety, Burton reflected on speaking out against Schwahn five years ago. The One Tree Hill actress says she and her co-stars expected an apology or at least a conversation with someone about the accusations but alas, they were met with silence. Burton was disappointed in the situation at the time, though she has now been able to move past it and begin healing. Read her full comments below:
I mean, me personally, for a long time, I kept waiting for someone to reach out. In my mind, I was like, surely, someone’s going to say something to us. Surely, someone is going to apologize or want to have a conversation or anything and kept waiting for it. It’s crazy to think that you could be disappointed more, but you always can be. This process has been so healing that I don’t need it anymore. I don’t need the “I’m sorry.” I don’t need the contact. We’re so good. That silence has spoken for itself, and what we have is so much better than anything I could have expected that I feel very good about the position we’re in right now.
In 2017, One Tree Hill writer Audrey Wauchope was the first to speak out against the showrunner, detailing her and fellow writer Rachel Specter's horrific experiences with Schwahn in the workplace, which included inappropriate contact and unwelcome advances. In response, Bush, Burton, and Lenz penned a letter supporting Wauchope and condemning Schwahn's behavior, which helped draw attention to the toxic environment on set which prevented much of the One Tree Hill cast and crew from speaking up out of fear that they would lose their jobs.
Five years later, the events that unfolded on the One Tree Hill set sound like an all-too-familiar occurrence in Hollywood. Based on Burton's recent comments, it appears the content of their letter ultimately fell on deaf ears. However, their outspokenness likely had an effect on the #MeToo movement at large and inspired other victims to speak up about similar experiences.
Source: Variety