Entertainment
Gossip Girl showrunner reveals who Gossip Girl was originally meant to be: ‘It makes much more sense’
The show first aired back in 2007 (Picture: The CW)
It might have featured one of the most memorable TV reveals of recent times, but things were nearly very different on Gossip Girl.
As fans will remember, Penn Badgley‘s character Dan Humphrey was famously revealed to be the person behind Gossip Girl on the hit show.
However, Joshua Safran, who wrote for the original programme and is serving as the the showrunner on the upcoming HBO Max reboot, said that another character was originally envisioned as the anonymous blogger.
‘I think there would have been holes in anybody being Gossip Girl, and it wasn’t Dan when I left the show [after Season 5], but I also understand why it is Dan,’ he told The Daily Beast.
‘Yes, I agree there are things that don’t line up, but it had to be Dan. I wanted it to be Nate, and it actually makes much more sense when it’s Nate – even when it doesn’t make sense. I mean, it would have been great to never reveal it.’
Joshua went on to explain why Chace Crawford‘s character Nate was originally planned to be Gossip Girl, and how things changed when he left the drama after season five.
Chace starred as Nate Archibald in Gossip Girl for all seven seasons (Picture: CW)
‘It was Nate. It was Nate until the day I left,’ he said. ‘I think we all came to the conclusion that it might be Nate by the end of season four, and then we spent season five teeing it up.
‘If you watch it, there are many clues to it being Nate. But I also think weirdly, in noir fashion, it’s great that we dropped a red herring. But it wasn’t as organic as Dan.’
Penn Badgley’s character Dan was revealed as Gossip Girl (Picture: Rex)
He added: ‘With Dan, it makes sense because he wanted to find a way in; but with Nate, it was because he’d never sent anything in to Gossip Girl, and if it had been Nate, it was based on this idea that he’d felt so guilty for sleeping with [Serna Celia van der Woodsen, played by Blake Lively] that he had to create an alter ego to bring us all to it.’
The series began in 2007 and ran for six seasons before finishing in 2012.
The saga isn’t over just yet, either. Fans across the world were delighted to see a reboot announced last year.
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The full trailer hit the internet recently and shows the new queen bee welcoming a new According to the official description of the reboot, viewers will see how much social media and New York has changed through the eyes of private schoolers.
More: US TV news
New cast members include Emily Alyn Lind as Audrey Hope, Thomas Doherty as Max Wolfe, Tavi Gevinson as Kate Keller, Eli Brown as Obie Bergmann IV, and Whitney Peak as Zoya Lott.
Jordan Alexander plays Julien Calloway, Zión Morena as Luna La and Savannah Smith plays Monet de Haan.
Gossip Girl premieres July 8 on HBO Max. A UK release date and platform has yet to be announced.
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