|
TV's O.C. is cancelled
04/01/2007 11:07 - (SA)
Los Angeles - The once-hot teenage soap opera The O.C. has been cancelled.
The final episode of the television drama, that saw its ratings plummet during the last seasons, will air 21:00 on February 22, Fox TV and Warner Bros Television Production Inc said on Wednesday.
The finale "will deliver real closure to the series, to the story we began telling four years ago," series creator Josh Schwartz said in a statement. "It will be fun and emotional and I think really satisfying. It is the finale we always planned to do."
Based in the affluent Orange County, California, city of Newport Beach, The O.C. caught fire in its first season, 2003-04, as the top-rated drama among advertiser-favoured young adults and with a total audience of nearly 10 million.
The show's story lines revolved around Ryan (Benjamin McKenzie), an outsider thrust into a heady new world of money and sex, and rich high school kids including Seth Cohen (Adam Brody) and Marissa Cooper (Mischa Barton) and their families.
The O.C. did not sustain its momentum, dropping to about 7 million weekly viewers during 2004-05 and then to fewer than 6 million last season. This year, returning in November after Fox wrapped its postseason baseball coverage, The O.C. has only drawn about 4 million viewers.
The third-season finale's high drama, in which Marissa was killed in a car crash, did not turn the series around. This year found Ryan confronting the death of his one-time girlfriend and the man who caused it.
Fox ordered 16 episodes for the 2006-07 season and all will have aired when the series concludes in February, a network spokesman said on Wednesday.
Others in the show's cast include Peter Gallagher, Kelly Rowan, Melinda Clarke, Rachel Bilson and Autumn Reeser.
Despite its brief heyday, the show helped establish cast members including Brody, Bilson and Barton as fan and tabloid favourites.
A replacement for the series was not immediately announced by Fox.
On the net:
www.fox.com
|
South Africa
