XOXO: How Gossip Girl Became A Pop Cultural Phenomenon

Hello, Upper East Siders, Gaius Bolling here, and it’s time to celebrate the 10 year anniversary of the guiltiest of guilty pleasures: Gossip Girl. Some might think you could lose your credibility as a critic of film and TV by acknowledging your love for this show but time has not forgotten that at the height of its popularity, Gossip Girl was obsessed about by just about everyone. While never a huge ratings winner, the show broke through the pop culture stratosphere and was one of the first shows to bring awareness to the fact that there was more to the ratings picture than who was watching it live. The show ended its 6 seasons run in in 2012 (oddly enough on December 17, my birthday) but it’s still heavily talked about today due to a cultural relevance that still resonates and the power of streaming services like Netflix which has introduced the show to a new generation that wasn’t glued to the television when it premiered on September 19, 2007.

But let’s start from the beginning. How was Gossip Girl able to make it to the small screen in the first place? It all starts with another show that broke down the walls of pop culture: The O.C. Created by Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage, The O.C. premiered on August 5, 2003, and the summer launch proved to make the show an instant hit for Fox. It was dubbed the new 90210  and it really tapped into an audience that was being underserved. There were other teen shows that had come and went but most of the ones that dominated the late 90’s were ending their runs or becoming dated. The O.C. spoke to a newer generation and, particularly for teenagers who grew up where the show took place, it became instantly identifiable. Some teen shows feel a bit out of reach but The O.C. felt like it was attainable for the teen audience.

The O.C. made instant stars out of its main cast, it made an impact on fashion (particularly those who lived the beach culture lifestyle), it served as a vessel for indie bands to get discovered through its fantastic use of music and it achieved true pop culture status by being mentioned by other popular shows and becoming a hot topic for many media outlets. By the end of its first season, the show was the highest-rated new drama of the 2003-2004 season in the 18-34 demographic and averaged about 9.7 million viewers.

Like many teen shows, The O.C. burned bright and fast but also became overexposed rather quickly too. The first season consisted of 27 episodes (the norm is about 22) while season 2 consisted of 24 episodes and was followed by the third season that consisted of 25 episodes. By the time the show reached its fourth and final season it was facing diminished ratings and fading popularity which resulted in a shortened 16 episode season. The O.C. aired its final episode on February 22, 2007, and its fans were left with a void that they didn’t know would be filled a few short months later.

In 2006, The WB and UPN ceased independent operations. The former was the central hub for teen programming beginning in the late 90s and made hits out of shows such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Dawson’s Creek, Gilmore Girls, and Charmed to name a few. UPN wasn’t as successful but it did attract younger viewers as well, particularly in the minority demographic with such hits as Moesha, The Parkers and Eve. The folding of these two small networks led to the creation of The CW, which would combine the resources of The WB and UPN to form one network. In May 2006, The CW announced that it would pick up a combined thirteen programs from its two predecessors to air as part of the network’s inaugural fall schedule: seven series held over from The WB (7th Heaven, Beauty and the Geek, Gilmore Girls, One Tree Hill, Reba, Smallville, and Supernatural) and six held over from UPN (America’s Next Top Model, Veronica Mars, Everybody Hates Chris, Girlfriends, All of Us and WWE Smackdown). Upon the network’s launch, The CW chose to use the scheduling model utilized by The WB due in part to the fact that it had a more extensive base programming schedule than UPN, allowing for a larger total of weekly programming hours for the new network to fill. (The WB carried 30 hours of programming each week because of its having a children’s program block and a daytime lineup that UPN did not offer; UPN was primarily a primetime-only network with 12 weekly hours of network programming at the time of the network’s shutdown).

The beginning stages of The CW were a little rough. They did have some established viewers with the shows it brought over but it was a network that lacked an identity. Why create a new network when it only looked like an awkward combination of the two that came before? Back then, The CW could never truly compete with the big four networks (NBC, CBS, ABC, and Fox) but it needed to do something generate more buzz to make it more of a destination for younger viewers. That was the one motif that carried over from the other two networks. They wanted this to be the destination for the younger demographic to get their viewing fix.

When The O.C. ended its run in February of 2007 the creative team of Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage were looking for their next project and it would come in the form of a book series called “Gossip Girl”, written by Cecily von Ziegesar. The book series was very popular with its young readers (It actually topped the New York Times Best-Sellers List). The book series revolves around the lives and romances of the privileged teenagers at the Constance Billard School for Girls, an elite private school in New York City’s Upper East Side. The CW was looking to make a bigger splash with the launch of its 2007 Fall TV season, which led to the network reaching out to the creative duo to adapt the books. However, this wasn’t something that they immediately said yes to:

“I was very skeptical. I don’t want to do The O.C. NYC. But I thought the books were smart. The characters are worldly in a way that Orange County kids aren’t.” – Josh Schwartz

Ultimately it was a project that they felt they could make their own while also respecting the source material. By October of 2006, the duo was hard at work on the pilot, and the characteristics of the main characters would be derived from the first Gossip Girl book. When the pilot was finished, The CW liked what they were reading and the project was greenlit by the network in January of 2007.

Casting for the series would be crucial and the process took place between February and April of 2007. The two female leads (Serena van der Woodsen and Blair Waldorf), ultimately played by Blake Lively and Leighton Meester, began their auditioning process in 2006. Lively was actually considering giving up acting to go to college. The actress had appeared in The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants in 2005 and Accepted in 2006 but was still young enough to take the break and focus on her education. Plus, she had been a bit jaded by the whole concept of the fame that comes with wanting to make acting a profession.

“I realized that [acting] was a business as much as a craft. People will go see your movie based on your standing and all of that, and it didn’t make sense to me because I was 18 and being an artist.

When they started to cast the show, Savage and Schwartz looked at online message boards, where fans of the book series had already decided that Lively—known at this point primarily for her role in 2005’s The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants—would be the perfect Serena.

“We didn’t see a lot of other girls for Serena. She has to be somebody that you believe would be sitting in the front row at Fashion Week eventually.”

When it was clear that Lively was their choice for the role of Serena, she still wasn’t quite sold on the project. Mostly because of her decision to go back to school, which she had deferred for a year in order to play the Hollywood game.

“I said, ‘No, I want to go to college. Thank you, though.’ Then they said, ‘O.K., you can go to Columbia [University] one day a week. After the first year [of the show], it’ll quiet down. Your life will go back to normal and you can start going to school. We can’t put it in writing, but we promise you can go.’ So that’s why I said, ‘O.K. You know what? I’ll do this.’”

With Serena and Lively now in the fold, it was time to cast the role of Blair, her brunette counterpart. Leighton Meester was the front-runner for the role but she would have to make a physical change first to truly land the role.

“She came in and she was really funny, and really smart and played vulnerable. But there was one problem: she was blonde. And Blake was blonde, obviously; Serena had to be blonde. So, [Leighton] went to the sink and dyed her hair. She wanted it.’” – Josh Schwartz

Much like Meester, the next casting choices consisted of relative unknowns at the time. Penn Badgley, who would go on to play Dan Humphrey, had worked with co-creator Stephanie Savage before on a short-lived show called The Mountain. It made him an easy choice for the role and despite his feelings on the show now (rumor has it that he doesn’t like talking about it and didn’t enjoy his time on the show for some of its run), it was clear that he was Dan.

“Penn didn’t like being on Gossip Girl, but . . . he was Dan. He may not have liked it, but [his character] was the closest to who he was,”

Badgley landed the role officially in March of 2007 and was joined by Chace Crawford (Nate Archibald), Taylor Momsen (Jenny Humphrey), Kelly Rutherford (Lily van der Woodsen) and Connor Paolo (Eric van der Woodsen), who also landed their roles in March. Momsen was a child actress who was probably the best known as Cindy Lou Who in the film adaptation of How the Grinch Stole Christmas and Rutherford had already dipped her toe in the primetime soap opera pool with her role as Megan Lewis Mancini for three seasons on Melrose Place.

The roles of Chuck Bass and Rufus Humphrey would be filled by Ed Westwick and Matthew Settle in April, but Westwick actually auditioned for the role of Nate first. Westwick was actually in the States on a work Visa, since he’s from England, and the network had concerns about that not working out. Schwartz and Savage said they were adamant about casting Westwick as Chuck Bass and when the network asked them to prep a backup in case his visa situation did not work out, the duo refused. Wrapping up the season one casting would be Jessica Szohr, who would go on to play Vanessa Abrams. Her character began as recurring but she was bumped up to series regular by the fourteenth episode.

But what of our title character? The narrator of the books and show is a crucial character and voice of the series but the network didn’t have to look far to find someone to fill the role. As rumors swirled about the impending cancellation of Veronica Mars, it was revealed at The CW’s 2007 Upfronts on May 17, 2007, that Kristen Bell had narrated the pilot, thus making her the title character of another show on the network. Despite only being the voice, Bell would become one of the most popular aspects of the show.

Primarily filming in New York, Gossip Girl has been declared by New York Magazine as the “Most Restauranty Show Since Sex and the City“, citing the pilot episode filming locales such as the Japanese restaurant, Geisha, the Campbell Apartment where Nate and Serena were filmed having sex and the New York Palace Hotel bar Gilt. Other New York City landmarks and well-known establishments were filmed throughout the first season. Victor/Victrola filmed the fictional infamous Chuck Bass burlesque club, Victrola, at The Box Manhattan, a sister club to The Box Soho in London. The fictional Constance Billard-St.Judes School, based on novel writer Cecil Von Ziegesar’s alma mater, Nightingale-Bamford used external shots of the Museum of the City New York.

New York would become a character itself on the show but the network initially wanted them to fake it to save costs.

“We were quickly told it would be too expensive, too complicated” at the beginning of the series. It had been proposed to shoot in a Los Angeles studio that would recreate Central Park. There’s no New York City on TV, or there wasn’t when we started making the pilot, except what you could see in the background behind the dead bodies on cop shows. We’ve never seen the city from the point of view of teenagers. It felt like a world with high stakes for young people.” – Stephanie Savage

Josh Schwartz would go on to say:

“What’s funny about these teenagers is they grew up watching Sex and the City, even though it wasn’t about them. And I think they’ve probably incorporated that into how they mythologize New York. I fought really hard to shoot the show in New York because we want New York to be a character in the show.”

By the time the series was set to premiere on September 19, 2007, the buzz was pretty hot. Many outlets pegged it as one of the must-see pilots of the 2007 Fall TV season and because of this buzz, a lot was riding on the show to be successful. The CW was looking for its signature series and they had great faith that this was the one. The series premiere was watched by 3.50 million viewers and achieved a 1.6 Adults 18–49, coming in last place in its 9:00 pm timeslot on Wednesday nights. You might say, “that sounds pretty awful” but keep in mind that The CW is not a big four network and that it had not seen numbers like this from a new series that was launched specifically by them. They were having bad luck launching new series and their only hits were leftovers from The WB and UPN. The show was also noted to have held the best audience retention of America’s Next Top Model, which was the signature programming on the network at the time. Benefiting from the network rerunning the show during the 2008 Writers Strike, the season retained most of its premiere numbers and ended with 3.00 million viewers.

Despite live ratings that weren’t huge, Gossip Girl set the tone for how viewing habits would change, especially among younger viewers. The show premiered as shows were still being viewed live but also on the horizon was digital downloading and online viewing. As the show progressed, the series would see a 42-50% increase in viewers due to DVR numbers (something that is even more responsible for saving shows from cancellation today) and it consistently hit number one on Itunes’ list for most purchased TV shows week to week. As it was approaching its conclusion in 2012, the series was the 5th most-binged TV series on Subscription Video-on-Demand (SVOD) Services; derived from NPD’s VideoWatch Digital, consumer tracker based on data from 313,866 SVOD TV transactions across 26,176 SVOD subscribers that were completed between January 2012 and January 2013. You can honestly look to Gossip Girl for showing networks that there is revenue to be made from other viewing habits and that the whole story isn’t simply based on live viewing.

Even more so than its loyal viewership, the true test of its relevance was its impact on culture. CW executive Dawn Ostroff later compared Gossip Girls role as the show that defined its network to House of Cards for Netflix. Its television audience was never very large, but the show was very influential on culture; Savage recalled that the crew likened working on it to working for a lifestyle magazine. A hairstylist for the show compared media interest in Lively’s hair to that for Jennifer Aniston’s “The Rachel”. In 2008, The New York Times reported the show has had a profound impact on retail, saying Gossip Girl is probably “the first [show] to have been conceived, in part, as a fashion marketing vehicle”. While it has had modest success in terms of ratings, it “may well be the biggest influence in the youth culture market”. According to Zoe Fox of Mashable, the show popularized social media networks and mobile communication, becoming “a pioneer in its use of mobile”. In 2008, New York Magazine named the series as “Best Show Ever” and in 2009, Rolling Stone named the series as “TV’s Hottest Show”.

On January 26, 2012, in honor of the series’ 100th episode, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg visited the set and proclaimed the date Gossip Girl Day, citing the show’s cultural influence and impact on the economy of the city. “Gossip Girl has made New York a central character. While Gossip Girl is drawing fans in with its plot twists, the show also attracts many of them to visit New York, contributing to our incredible 50.5 million visitors last year. In fact, the economic impact of Gossip Girl and other television shows and films that are made in New York really can be felt directly in all five boroughs. The 100th episode of Gossip Girl is a real landmark, and I want to congratulate the show’s cast and crew,” he stated.

The show spawned a reality series on Bravo called NYC Prep and Gossip Girl spawned several adaptations in other countries. The Turkish version is known as Küçük Sırlar (Little Secrets). A Mexican version of the series was produced by Mexican producer Pedro Torres as Gossip Girl: Acapulco. Filming of the Mexican adaptation began in January 2013 and the series aired on July 5, 2013, on Televisa. Gossip Girl itself, as of 2012, was broadcast in 197 countries.

On the fashion side of things, Gossip Girl probably made its biggest impact.

“Merchants, designers and trend consultants say that Gossip Girl … is one of the biggest influences on how young women spend. Fans stride into boutiques bearing magazine tear sheets that feature members of the cast and ask for their exact outfits. Or they order scoop-neck tops and hobo bags by following e-commerce links from the show’s Web site.” – The New York Times

Gossip Girl was very influential in fashion for teenage and young adult women. The show was intended in part as a way for fashion companies to market their products. Some brands paid a fee, and the show’s Web site provided referral links so viewers could purchase items they saw on television. In 2009, Anna Sui created a line inspired by Gossip Girl. Daman, who based his costumes on what Manhattan private-school students wore, said that by the sixth season the show was “getting one of a kind couture from Paris”, because “they wanted their wares on Blake Lively”

Along with fashion, there was revenue made from product placement. The show had a contract with Verizon Wireless for its first five seasons; all the characters were seen with phones chosen by the brand until the deal ended by the sixth season. During their contract, Verizon Wireless offered exclusive Gossip Girl content and created a website where ringtones of the songs featured on the show could be downloaded. In the summer of 2008, executives of VitaminWater approached The CW for a placement deal. During the second season, the drinks were mentioned several times in dialogues. The partnership helped pay the costs of shooting on location in the Hamptons  According to OneNewsNow.com, other sponsors have included Procter & Gamble L’Oreal, Target, and Johnson & Johnson, which allowed the series to earn $28.2 million in ad dollars in 2007.

The series would also shape what shows The CW would pick up. The decision to revive 90210 was heavily influenced by the success of Gossip Girl and when the 90210 revival launched in September of 2008, it was watched by 4.65 million viewers, even more than the premiere numbers of the first season of Gossip Girl. The network’s marketing strategy began to focus on the attractiveness of its young stars and even the salacious nature of its shows storylines. The Parents Television Council had shown particular criticism of Gossip Girl, especially with its “OMFG” ad campaign from April 2008. Quotes from the Parents Television Council review, as well as negative quotes from the San Diego Union-Tribune, New York Post and the Boston Herald, were used on various advertisements for the second season.  The ads included quotes like “Every Parent’s Nightmare”, “Mind-Blowingly Inappropriate” and “A Nasty Piece of Work” in what appears to be an effort to continue the ‘rebellious teen’ style of the show and it certainly worked. It only made the target audience want to check out the show even more.

Like any series, (especially one aimed at teens) the popularity began to wane, especially as other networks began their own brand of teens behaving badly programming. During Gossip Girl’s run, Pretty Little Liars premiered in 2010 and became a mammoth hit for the then ABC Family (now Freeform). It became the new teen show du jour as Gossip Girl began to spin its wheels creatively and as the cast was becoming a bit bigger than the show. Some of the cast, notably Blake Lively and Leighton Meester, were doing some films outside of the show. Lively did a sequel to The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants and earned critical raves for her small role in The Town. Meester starred in the critical misfire, The Roommate but it did open at number one and grossed $40 million on a $16 million budget. She even found success on the music side things by being featured on Cobra Starship’s top ten hit “Good Girls Go Bad”, which went on to go double platinum. Taylor Momsen left the show during season four to tour with her band The Pretty Wreckless while the rest of the cast seemed to be growing antsy being on a show that was producing 22-25 episodes before it entered its sixth season.

“Some of the actors were not entirely happy to be there after a certain point and no matter what we did, they were never going be happy. . . . They were kids. They were young.” – Joshua Safran

The show wrapped up its run in December of 2012 after airing 121 episodes but its cultural relevance still has an impact 10 years after its series premiere. The show is still heavily binged on Netflix and a new generation continues to discover the show. A lot of this has to do with the show not feeling daring. Sure the first few seasons feature flip phones that are no longer in use but its depiction of the internet and social media is still very prevalent. It’s interesting that Gossip Girl launched before Twitter, Facebook and Instagram became the stalking playground to comment on all things pop culture because the central themes of the show have a lot do with that privacy being exposed for all the world to know. This is why Gossip Girl still works in today’s landscape and why it will continue to be relevant for years to come. On the surface, this is guilty pleasure programming at its finest but the show had a lot to say about youth culture and that’s how Gossip Girl changed the pop culture landscape. Shows like this dream of such exposure and Gossip Girl got to live it for six seasons and continues to live it today.

XOXO


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About Gaius Bolling 3795 Articles
At the age of five, I knew I wanted to write movies and about them. I've set out to make those dreams come true. As an alumni of the Los Angeles Film Academy, I participated in their Screenwriting program, while building up my expertise in film criticism. I write reviews that relate to the average moviegoer by educating my readers and keeping it fun. My job is to let you know the good, the bad, and the ugly in the world of cinema, so you can have your best moviegoing experience. You can find more of my writing on Instagram @g_reelz.