Michelle Trachtenberg said that Joss Whedon wasn't allowed to be alone with her on the set of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer." But what actually happened, and where did her career go after her time on that show?
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00:00Michelle Trachtenberg said that Joss Whedon wasn't allowed to be alone with her on the
00:04set of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. But what actually happened? And where did her career
00:07go after her time on that show?
00:10Following her 2000-2003 run on Buffy, Trachtenberg didn't want to get stuck playing just one
00:14character for an indefinite period of time. Though she took on film roles and occasional
00:18guest spots on TV shows like Six Feet Under, she told Entertainment Weekly that she needed
00:22a break from the TV grind.
00:24Honestly, when I left Buffy, I never thought I'd go back to TV, because I've done it. I'm
00:28not a person to repeat myself creativity-wise, and I found TV to be rather stifling, especially
00:33Buffy. Three years as one character, where they're not changing the character and your
00:36abilities aren't being tested or challenged, gets very repetitive."
00:40She eventually changed her mind, though, joining the cast of Gossip Girl in 2008 for a six-season
00:44run, as well as the NBC medical drama Mercy in 2009, which ran for just one season before
00:49cancellation despite Trachtenberg's enthusiasm for the project.
00:53It's really a wonderful, like, woman, like, girl power-based show, and we basically try
00:58to save lives every day."
01:01Trachtenberg's work in Buffy the Vampire Slayer directly led to offers of significant roles
01:04in major motion pictures. But the show's intensive shooting schedule unfortunately prevented
01:08Trachtenberg from accepting some roles, such as the lead part in the 2003 drama 13, which
01:14instead was played by Evan Rachel Wood. Trachtenberg told Us Weekly,
01:17"...I was actually supposed to star in that, but I was on Buffy at the time."
01:21When 13 director Catherine Hardwicke landed the job helming the film adaptation of the
01:25mega-best-selling teen vampire novel Twilight, she once again approached Trachtenberg. But
01:30when production on the movie began, Trachtenberg again couldn't find the time due to other
01:33commitments. Still, she said she didn't necessarily regret passing on the role.
01:38"...There was definitely interest here and there because there's only so few pale girls
01:41in Hollywood. I already have Buffy. I've already done the vampire thing."
01:45In 2010, while Trachtenberg was playing Georgina Sparks on the teen soap Gossip Girl, show's
01:50creators Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage announced that they were in the process of
01:53building a show around Trachtenberg where she would play a budding criminologist. The
01:57show never happened. Four years later, Trachtenberg had another chance at TV stardom when she
02:01was cast in Save the Date, a sitcom starring psych veteran Maggie Lawson as a woman who
02:05had to find a groom after drunkenly booking a wedding venue. The series went to pilot,
02:09with Trachtenberg cast as her straight-laced sister. Unfortunately, though, Save the Date
02:13wasn't picked up to series either.
02:16Director Ray Fisher publicly called out his Justice League director Joss Whedon in 2020
02:20for abusive, unprofessional, and completely unacceptable behavior. Numerous actors who
02:24had worked with Whedon on Buffy the Vampire Slayer detailed Whedon's toxic presence. Charisma
02:28Carpenter wrote,
02:29"[Joss Whedon abused his power on numerous occasions. It only served to intensify my
02:33performance anxiety, disempower me, and alienate me from my peers."
02:37Responding to series star Sarah Michelle Gellar posting on Instagram that she no longer wanted
02:41to be associated with Whedon, Trachtenberg revealed that following an incident on set,
02:45a rule was implemented where Whedon was no longer allowed to be alone with her. She wrote,
02:50"[This must be known. As a teenager, with his not-appropriate behavior — very not-appropriate.
02:55So now, people know what Joss did."
02:59Trachtenberg made a move into full-length films in the 2010s. Unfortunately, none of
03:02them panned out. Filmed in 2007 but shelved until 2011, Trachtenberg's 80s-set comedy
03:08Take Me Home Tonight made a paltry $7.5 million at the box office. The 2010 action-comedy
03:13cop-out, in which Trachtenberg had a not-widely-publicized supporting role, earned a respectable $55
03:18million but a lowly 18% score on Rotten Tomatoes. At least those films made it to theaters,
03:24though. The romantic revenge drama Sexy Evil Genius went straight to DVD in 2013, as did
03:30the 2014 sci-fi thriller The Scribbler. The murder mystery Sister Cities also couldn't
03:34muster a theatrical release and aired on TV in 2016, following Trachtenberg's 2015 Lifetime
03:40original The Christmas Gift.
03:42The explosion of streaming television series ushered in a new era of prestige television,
03:47leading to career revivals for many stars who landed shows on Netflix, Hulu, or Prime
03:51Video. Trachtenberg also hopped aboard the trend, but unfortunately, her shows were buried
03:55on platforms that failed to take off.
03:57Released in 2015, the first season of Guidance starred Trachtenberg as a counselor working
04:01with a teenage student to cope with an illicit photo leak. The series aired on Go90, a youth-oriented
04:06mobile TV service operated by communications giant Verizon, which shuttered in 2018 after
04:12losing millions of dollars. Also in 2018, Trachtenberg voiced Judy Riley in the Facebook
04:16Watch animated comedy Human Kind Of for 21 episodes. The show didn't receive a second
04:21season, and then-parent company Meta closed down its Facebook Watch Originals brand altogether.
04:27Human Kind Of isn't the only voice acting role Trachtenberg has taken on. Though she
04:30hasn't found a lot of success in front of the camera recently, other than reprising
04:34her role as Georgina Sparks in the 2021 Gossip Girl revival, she's been keeping busy behind
04:38the camera.
04:39In 2008, she voiced Tika in Dragonlance, Dragons of Autumn Twilight, and her other voice credits
04:44include work on the Adult Swim series Supermansion, DC Showcase Jonah Hex, and Marvel's The Superhero
04:50Squad show. And she's also voiced characters in six episodes of Robot Chicken alongside
04:54Buffy the Vampire Slayer co-star Seth Green.
04:57And she's also had some success as a writer. Back in 2008, she successfully sold a script
05:01about a serial murderer, which helped her land a membership in the Writers Guild of
05:04America. And she's also written other projects, including a television pilot about a magazine
05:09editor who wants to be a writer, and a sprawling historical drama. She told Entertainment Weekly
05:13that her love of writing came from her childhood role in Harriet the Spy.
05:16I still have her yellow plastic binoculars that say Harriet the Spy on my library console
05:20with different books and memories. I also have the original book by Louise Fitzhugh
05:24on my desk to always inspire me. My love of writing came from reading and being Harriet
05:29the Spy. Writing changes people's worlds.
05:31She also told HuffPost Live that she learned a lot about writing from being on Buffy the
05:35Vampire Slayer.
05:36It was the school of Buffy. I think that's what helped structure me as a writer today.
05:43Trachtenberg began working as a professional actor at the age of 3, and managed to avoid
05:47many of the troubles that often befall child actors. Trachtenberg told HuffPost Live,
05:52I'm very lucky I didn't really have pitfalls. I was raised in a very loving and strict way.
05:56My mom was really adamant. You ever do a drug in your life, I'll kill you with my bare hands.
06:01That tough love guided Trachtenberg, who later said,
06:03I've never done a drug in my life. I value and appreciate my career so much, and this
06:07is the rest of my life. This is how I make a living. This is how I pay my bills. This
06:11is what I hope to be doing for the next 50 years in longevity. Why would I want to do
06:15something to mess it up, to take it all away?
06:17And there's something else she hasn't done — plastic surgery. In 2024, rumors swirled
06:22that Trachtenberg, like many of her peers, had sought out cosmetic surgery in an attempt
06:25to stay relevant and employable. But she shot down the talk, posting on Instagram,
06:30I've received several comments recently about my appearance. I've never had plastic surgery.
06:34I am happy and healthy. Check yourself, haters.
06:36The following day, she clarified further, posting again on Instagram to explain that
06:40contrary to rumors that she might be dealing with an eating disorder, she was simply aging naturally.
06:45Fun fact, this is my face. No malnutrition, no problems. Why do you have to hate? Get a calendar.
06:50Basically, I'm nine seventeen thousand eighteen hundred and twelve years old.