Sophia Bush and Hilarie Burton say 'One Tree Hill' creator forced them to do a Maxim photo shoot or risk losing their jobs
- "One Tree Hill" stars Sophia Bush and Hilarie Burton said they were forced to pose for Maxim.
- On the "Drama Queens" podcast, they claimed show creator Mark Schwahn threatened their jobs.
"One Tree Hill" stars Sophia Bush, Hilarie Burton, and Bethany Joy Lenz have shared the real story behind the show's memorable Maxim cover shoot.
Burton and Bush claimed that they initially turned down the offer but said that the show's creator Mark Schwahn — who they accused of sexual harassment in 2017 — threatened their jobs if they didn't participate, while Lenz was not asked to take part.
In Monday's episode of their iHeartRadio rewatch podcast, "Drama Queens," the actors delved into a season four episode in which Rachel Gatina (Danneel Ackles) lands the cover of Maxim's "Hometown Hotties" issue thanks to photographs that Brooke Davis (Bush) took of her.
Life imitated art, as not long after the episode aired in 2006, Bush, Ackles, and Burton appeared together on the cover of a real issue of Maxim, but it turns out that the actors weren't so thrilled about taking part.
Bush explained that she initially didn't want to do in the tie-in photo shoot with the men's magazine because her character, who was supposed to be 16 on the show, was already overly "sexualized."
"I was like, 'Look, if the girls want to do it, that's great. I don't. I have gone to battle trying to make Brooke less of this thing that you guys tried to force me into. I don't want to do it,'" she said.
Bush continued: "I literally got told, 'If you do not go and shoot this cover with your costars, we will guarantee you that you will never be let out for a press day, a movie, an event, any of your charities. We will keep you here forever.'"
Bush's costar Burton, who portrayed Peyton Sawyer on the teen drama, claimed she was explicitly told by Schwahn not to "turn your nose up" at the offer since no other magazine wanted to feature them.
"It was very much a, 'No one else wants you, the studio wants to cancel your show,'" she said. "'You don't start to generate some buzz and attract these male numbers, we're dead, and all your friends are going to lose their jobs.'"
Lenz left her cohosts shocked when she shared that she was told she was "too fat" to be on the magazine cover. The actor, who played Haley James Scott on The WB/The CW series, said she was swapped out for Ackles.
"They told me that they didn't come to me because I was too fat," she said. "I wasn't a 'hot girl' on the show anymore."
Bush and Burton said they were lied to and led to believe that Lenz had refused to take part in the cover shoot.
"When I said I don't want to do it, I was like, 'But Joy's not doing it! She said no. Why does she get to say no?' They go, 'Well she said no, so you have to say yes. She said no first,'" Bush explained.
"They scapegoated you to tell the three of us we couldn't say no. We weren't mad at you but we were pissed about it."
The women were three of many former female cast and crew members who detailed being "psychologically and emotionally" abused by the series creator in an open letter published by Variety more than five years ago. Schwahn has never responded to the allegations.