FOX CANCELS FORMER HIT THE O.C.

The O.C.," the once-hot teenage soap opera that saw its ratings plummet like a delinquent student's grades, has been cancelled. The final episode of the drama will air 9 p.m. EST Thursday, Feb. 22, Fox TV and Warner Bros. Television Production Inc. said Wednesday. The finale "will deliver real closure to the series, to the story we began telling four years ago," series creator Josh Schwartz said in a statement. "It will be fun and emotional and I think really satisfying. It is the finale we always planned to do." Based in the affluent Orange County, Calif., city of Newport Beach, "The O.C." caught fire in its first season, 2003-04, as the top-rated drama among advertiser-favoured young adults and with a total audience of nearly 10 million. The show's story lines revolved around Ryan (Benjamin McKenzie), an outsider thrust into a heady new world of money and sex, and rich high school kids including Seth Cohen (Adam Brody) and Marissa Cooper (Mischa Barton) and their families.

THE CAST OF THE O.C.