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Mischa Barton stayed busy in 2009, working on movies, attending events and playing the role of Sonja Stone in a new TV show The Beautiful Life that unfortunately was canceled after two episodes.
We’ve already covered the first half of 2009 in Mischa Barton: 2009 in Review Part I, so here is a look at Mischa’s second half of 2009, which kicked off with her hospitalization.
July-December 2009 in Mischa’s life:
In early July, a new Save the Children Bvlgaria campaign came out featuring Mischa as well as other celebrities.
On July 15, 2009, Mischa was taken to a hospital in Los Angeles, missing the premiere of her new movie Homecoming. Once in the hospital, Mischa was kept on an “involuntary psychiatric hold” called a 5150. Not much was said about why she was there, though there was lot of speculation.
Making matters worse, production for Mischa’s new show The Beautiful Life was pushed back from July 22 to July 31. But according to the producers, the delay was not caused by Mischa’s hospitalization.
Mischa’s rep finally talked to the media a little, saying she left the hospital and was doing better. TBL executive producer Ashton Kutcher was nice enough to go on record as well and say Mischa was doing better.
On July 28, Mischa was spotted at JFK airport in New York arriving for TBL production to start.
It was announced that Mischa’s 2007 movie St. Trinian’s would be given a limited release in the U.S. in August.
On July 30, photos of Mischa were taken outside of the TV studios where she was working. These photos of Mischa in a white fringe vest are some of my favorite from 2009. She looked really good, which helped the rumors start to die down about her recent hospitalization. It wasn’t until Mischa started promoting her show in September before we heard in her own words why she was hospitalized.
At a Music Unites party in New York, Mischa told OK! magazine that she was “really happy.”
Ashton Kutcher and others defended Mischa at the Television Critic Association’s Summer Press Tour while promoting The Beautiful Life.
In early August, Mischa and others starring in The Beautiful Life were photographed Gossip Girl-style while filming scenes on the streets of New York City. Mischa was wearing a sparkly gold and silver Versace gown and featured in a carriage-Cinderella-like scene. If you look back through the August 2009 posts, you will find lots of TBL shots of Mischa and other members of the cast.
In mid-August, The CW released more photos from the show.
While on set, Mischa was caught on video slipping while stepping down from a trailer. Poor Mischa!
Later in the month, Mischa attended the JC Penney-Charlotte Ronson “I Heart Ronson” event in NYC.
The CW tried to be creative in marketing the show with “naked promos” of some of the TBL stars. New promos of TBL started appearing on TV.
In late August, Mischa talked to Time Out New York about the new show and her breakdown.
Ever since The Beautiful Life was picked up, TBL star Ashley Madekwe (she played a model named Marissa) has written a couple of blog posts and has Tweeted about her experience. Here is one of her posts about working on the show.
The Beautiful Life creator Mike Kelly and executive producer Karey Burke discussed the new show and Mischa during a special Q&A panel.
In early September, Mischa was spotted posing for a magazine shoot. Those photos were actually for her Donna Moderna magazine spread, which are really beautiful.
She also was seen at a party with TBL co-stars Sara Paxton and Nico Tortorella. Photographers also snapped a photo of Mischa standing next to Gossip Girl star Taylor Momsen.
In early September, Mischa appeared on The View to promote the show. To me, this is a painful interview to watch. They asked her a lot of questions about her hospitalization. At the time, I don’t think she did a good job answering the questions. But later in magazine articles, when she had time to reflect on what she went through, she did better. Mischa said complications with her botched wisdom teeth surgery caused the problems that led to her hospitalization, along with the stress of everything going on in her life.
Here’s part of the interview:
During Fashion Week in New York, Mischa looked really good. This is Mischa at the LaCoste show. She also was dressed in black for the Mercedes-Benze show. Here’s a lacy black dress she wore to the Marc Jacobs show during Fashion Week. She dressed differently for the Fashion Week closing party.
At The Beautiful Life premiere party, Mischa was pretty in pink, as Ashton Kutcher, wife Demi Moore and the rest of the cast were on hand.
In mid-September, Mischa appeared on It’s On with Alexa Chung show for MTV. This was a really fun interview.
On September 16, The Beautiful Life premiered on The CW. Some of the TBL cast Tweeted during the broadcast.
The CW released TBL cast interviews for its website in celebration of the new show.
Mischa was spotted with one of her favorite designers Zac Posen at the opening night of the opera. Posen made a guest appearance in the first TBL episode.
The second episode “The Beautiful Aftermath” aired on September 23.
Unfortunately, The Beautiful Life was canceled two days after the second episode aired for low ratings. The cast was actually on set when they learned the news. I’m sure they were upset as many cast members have said future episodes were pretty juicy. I was upset because I was having fun covering Mischa’s return to TV. It was a whirlwind that ended too soon.
Besides a few photos here and there of Mischa at various events, from this point on, photographers rarely caught Mischa in film through the end of the year. Occasionally she would be spotted walking her dogs.
Assassination of a High School President featuring Mischa was released on DVD on Oct. 6. Mischa was event featured on Mr. Skin’s list.
At the Sony-Vaio launch in early October, Mischa did make a splash.
In mid-October, she was seen on the red carpet at the 2009 Whitney Museum Gala. She told media she would probably pass on TV roles in the future. Of course, she was fresh from the cancellation, so I don’t blame her.
In late October, Mischa made an appearance at a Gucci event. She also looked beautiful at the Georgina Chapman for Gerrard Collection launch.
In November, Mischa looked sexy at the Mr. Chow celebration. At this event, Mischa told US magazine she was disappointed that the show was canceled because they had a lot of upcoming storylines that were really good. Mischa also said she was “figuring out her next move” and TV and movies were options once again.
Mischa was spotted out and about in LA in November and early December and appears to have a new hairdo and possibly a new puppy.
In early December, it was announced that The Beautiful Life episodes – including episodes that did not air – would be available to watch on YouTube on Dec. 17.
In December, UK magazine Heat released an issue featuring Mischa, who talked about a lot of things in her interview, including her hospitalization. She also talked about her breakdown in UK’s OK! magazine.
On Dec. 17, Ashton Kutcher and iJustine made a YouTube announcement about the launch of the TBL YouTube Channel, where you can view five episodes of The Beautiful Life. This is pretty cool. I don’t think this has happened before to a canceled show where they put the unaired episodes on YouTube!
As part of the YouTube launch with HP’s Create Change campaign, Mischa announced her “Beautiful Change for 2010.”
Mischa’s last sighting in 2009 was on Dec. 28 where she was spotted dining. Later, she was photographed leaving a movie theater.
Due to the economy punching the movie industry pretty hard, some of Mischa’s independent movies made before 2009 didn’t have much movement in the past year. Her 2008 movie You and I has yet to be released. Don’t Fade Away, a movie she made with True Blood star Ryan Kwanten, hasn’t been released either. Homecoming was supposed to be available on DVD in December, but it’s not available anywhere yet. A release date for the 2009 movie Bhopal: A Prayer for Rain has yet to be released as well.
Don’t forget to review Mischa Barton: 2009 in Review, Part I. Mischa had a very eventful, roller coaster year but it was fun going on the ride.
Images: INF