Redeem now - Chris Pine auditioned for the role of Ryan Atwood on Fox's teen drama "The O.C."
- Casting director Patrick Rush said Pine was "really good" but had "really bad skin problems."
- "It was at that point where it looked insurmountable," Rush said.
Chris Pine nearly could have achieved teen-drama fame on "The O.C.," but his acne seemed "insurmountable" at the time, according to the show's casting director.
"We saw Chris Pine, who was really good," Patrick Rush said in the book "Welcome to the O.C.: The Oral History," released Tuesday and written by Alan Sepinwall, "The O.C." creator Josh Schwartz, and executive producer Stephanie Savage.
"I hate saying this, but it's the truth: Chris Pine was at the age where he was experiencing really bad skin problems," Rush continued. "And it was at that point where it looked insurmountable. And as a kid who grew up with horrible skin, it just broke my heart. But Chris Pine's fine now. He's all right."
Nowadays, Pine is known for roles in "The Princess Diaries 2," the "Star Trek" franchise, and the"Wonder Woman" movies. But at the time of auditioning for "The O.C.," which ran for four seasons on Fox between 2003 and 2007, Pine was unknown in Hollywood.
He was looking to play Ryan Atwood, the leading character of "The O.C." who moves from a rough part of Chino, California to the state's opulent Newport Beach, located in Orange County.
Casting the right actor for the character proved to be a bit of a challenge.
Garrett Hedlund and D.J. Cotrona were considered for the part of the 17-year-old outcast. But Ben McKenzie, then 25 and considering leaving LA due to the financial and emotional toll, ultimately got the role after impressing during his audition.
"He was so solid," Rush said. "He was just an actor. He had prepared. He looked like he wanted the part, and he looked right for the part. And I thought he was so, so handsome."
"When he walked in to read, he wasn't what we had imagined for the part," Schwartz recalled. "He felt more thoughtful and more internal, less of an obvious bad boy. He had more of an Ed Norton quality— something more cerebral."
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