\n<\/p>\n
If you had to do it over again, would you still kill Marissa?<\/strong><\/p>\n SCHWARTZ <\/strong>There was a vocal minority online that had grown frustrated with the Marissa story line. That in conjunction with a lot of network pressure to kill a main character as a way to spike viewership drove the decision to kill Marissa. The night that the show aired, we heard from a whole other swath of the audience that loved the show, watched every week, didn\u2019t feel the need to log into a forum to analyze it. For a lot of people, Marissa was the character they were watching for, Mischa was the actress they found the most exciting and Ryan and Marissa were endgame. We violated that in one fell swoop. It\u2019s now part of the legacy of the show. We\u2019ve had to accept it. It hasn\u2019t stopped us from killing other young women in other shows that we\u2019ve done.<\/p>\n Have you learned nothing?<\/strong><\/p>\n SCHWARTZ <\/strong>We haven\u2019t. But here we are: It\u2019s 20 years later; people still want to talk to us about the show. The legacy feels really secure to us now, and we can appreciate it.<\/p>\n Do you see the influence of \u201cThe O.C.\u201d on subsequent shows?<\/strong><\/p>\n SCHWARTZ <\/strong>\u201cLaguna Beach: the Real Orange County\u201d was a result of the show, which then led to \u201cThe Real Housewives of Orange County,\u201d which has now spawned an entire franchise, which we should have seen coming and gotten a piece of.<\/p>\n SAVAGE <\/strong>Marc Cherry has told us that he doesn\u2019t think he would have been able to do \u201cDesperate Housewives\u201d if it weren\u2019t for the success of \u201cThe O.C.,\u201d in that regard of doing something that had a lot of humor and voice to it.<\/p>\n Nearly all of your subsequent projects are about adolescents and young adults, and \u201cLooking for Alaska\u201d and \u201cCity on Fire\u201d are set in the same time period as \u201cThe O.C.\u201d Did you get a little stuck?<\/strong><\/p>\n SCHWARTZ <\/strong>We love coming-of-age stories. Fashions change, technology changes, vernacular changes, but emotionally, they are truly universal. When you make something for an audience of that age, they love that forever and love it deeply. It\u2019s just a really exciting time. Everything is heightened. Everything feels like life or death, and sometimes it is. And probably we\u2019re still subconsciously working through some [expletive].<\/p>\n How do you feel about \u201cThe O.C.\u201d now?<\/strong><\/p>\n SCHWARTZ<\/strong> Grateful and proud. Which sounds simplistic, but it was a 20-year journey to get there.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n