The creators of the hit 00s Upper East Side drama Gossip GirlGossip Girl have expressed their regrets over its largely white cast and general lack of diversity.
In an interview with VultureVulture, the show's creators Stephanie Savage and Josh Schwartz and executive producer Joshua Safran discussed regrets over the lack of representation of non-white, non-straight people in the show. Safran says, 'When I look back on Gossip Girl, the only things I regret were not as much representation for people of colour and gay story lines. Those are the two things I think we probably could have delved into more deeply'.
The show's only non-white character was Dan Humphrey's best friend Vanessa, played by Jessica Szohr who is of Hungarian and black ancestry. There was also one featured gay character, Serena van der Woodsen's brother Eric who came out to family and friends in Season 1, but the show never focused on his dating life like it did on other heterosexual couples.
Rewatching the show ten years on in 2017, the mostly white, straight characters and heteronormative story lines are even more glaringly obvious, as TV and film have begun to recognise and rectify their diversity issues.
Only showing straight romance and having just one non-white cast member isn't the only controversial issue presented by Gossip Girl that audiences have picked up on. Viewers have long commented on the Gossip Girl's problematic nature in other areas, like the attempted sexual assault by Ed Westwick's character Chuck Bass on two women in the show's first episode. He ends up finishing the series by getting married and goes on to live happily ever after with Blair, apparently facing no repurcussions.
Meanwhile, in the same Vulture interview, Schwartz revealed that Blake Lively's character Serena was almost played by Jennifer Lawrence, who auditioned for the role when she was 16 and was 'bummed to not get it'.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.