Gossip Girl Was Supposed To Be Another Major Character, Not Dan Humphrey

Celebrity Sightings - Bauer-Griffin - 2012

Remember when Dan Humphrey, played by Penn Badgley, was revealed to be Gossip Girl? The big reveal didn't sit well with many fans of Gossip Girl because, well, it didn't really make that much sense. After years of confusion, Gossip Girl writer and producer Joshua Safran finally admitted Dan was never supposed to be Gossip Girl. In fact, another major character was supposed to be the tea spilling blogger of the Upper East Side.

During an interview at Vulture Festival over the weekend where he was promoting the highly anticipated revival of the popular show, Safran spoke about Gossip Girl's original run, as well. According to Buzzfeed, Safran revealed that Dan was never supposed to be the unmasked Gossip Girl. Instead, he had his heart set on Eric [Van der Woodsen]" from the beginning. Eric, of course, is Serena's little brother, played by Connor Paolo.

Safran even went on to say the writers started planting hints that Eric was really Gossip Girl from very early on in the show. "We worked hard to kind of lay in tiny seeds about it being Eric, and then the NY Post wrote an article saying that Gossip Girl was Eric so we were like, 'We gotta scratch that,'" he explained.

After their plot to reveal Eric as Gossip Girl was foiled, they planned to make Nate Archibald, played by Chace Crawford, the titular tea spiller. Safran told the crowd that "one of the writers realized that Nate had never sent a tip in to Gossip Girl, which is true at least through the end of season 5. Nate never sent in a tip in through all of those episodes, which is when we're like, 'Oh, well then he's Gossip Girl.'"

Ultimately, though, Safran left the show and the decision was no longer in his control. "I like to joke that Dan was Gossip Girl because I had left the show by then. Dan was not my intended Gossip Girl, so honestly you'd have to ask someone else," he said of the ultimate decision to make Dan Gossip Girl.

Safran is involved in the revival for HBO Max, so, perhaps this time around he'll get his first choice for which major character ends up being Gossip Girl.

Photo: Getty


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