[*Shannon*]

If anyone here has seen The O.C., it's impossible to miss Benjamin McKenzie, who plays the outsider Ryan Atwood, the boy from the wrong side of the tracks who dives into The O.C., meets the Cohens, befriends their son Seth, and falls for the girl-next-door, Marissa.

Anyway, he's adorable, and he's so popular at The O.C. board I figured I might as well open up a new thread. Anyone like him? I'll find some pics later. [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

[poetrytoprose]

Yes Benji is absolutley adorable. He seems like a sweetheart too. [img]smilies/love.gif[/img] How can anyone NOT like him?

[Tuesday]

YAY! I love him too. He is so cute. Hopefully this thread will grow into a Benji board! [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

[*Shannon*]

Yay! Fans!! Gahh, I'm having a hard time loading pics up today. My comp is strange. [img]smilies/look.gif[/img]

Yeah, so brief background info: Benji was born in Austin, Texas, and went to UVA. He graduated, then moved to L.A., then boom, gets a TV show. Now that is the life. [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img] [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

[- Nae -]

I absolutely love Benji [img]smilies/in_love.gif[/img]. I hope we end up getting a board too! *crosses fingers*

[*Stacy*]

Great thread Shannon. [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

I am from Austin, just moved a few months ago, and today I was talking to a friend online and OC came up. I told her how I thought he was cute and she said he was her fave too. Then she told me a story about him. He played football in high school at a very nice school in Austin. She said the other night on the news, they were talking about him and showed a clip of him playing football on the news. Just thought it was so cute. [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

[*Shannon*]

Awww, Stacy that's so cool!

Hmmmm....he should play some football on the show...with no shirt on....oooh [img]smilies/blush.gif[/img]

[.one.ray.of.sunlight.]

[~justanother~]

E! online's site has a feature on Benjamin here:

Who the Hell is This?

Yay! more press for him!

[*Stacy*]

Thanks for the info and the pic. He looks great there! [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

[*Shannon*]

Great stuff! [img]smilies/glow.gif[/img] Yay, new episode of OC tomorrow, and the encore is tonight! [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

Here's an article I think a lot of people have seen, but it talks about Benji, so I'm posting it:

'The O.C.' Moves to a New Teen Drama Zip Code
By John Crook

Newcomer Benjamin McKenzie says he has a big ace in the hole when it comes to playing an outsider on "The O.C.," the new FOX teen drama premiering Tuesday, Aug. 5.
"I'm sort of learning and understanding about television as I go along," the 24-year-old actor says of his high-profile TV series debut, "but that feeling of being an outsider actually helps me with this character. I feel a little bit distanced from all this process going on around me, all the hype surrounding the show. Beyond that, Ryan and I have almost nothing in common as far as the worlds we come from."

McKenzie, a Texan with a strong East Coast theater background, may not have a lot of life history in common with Ryan Atwood, the troubled Southern California teenager he plays in "The O.C.," but he does share the character's obvious intelligence, a quality that moves sympathetic public defender Sandy Cohen (Peter Gallagher) to invite the boy to crash at his home in tony Newport Beach, Calif. Similarly, "O.C." series creator Josh Schwartz says he knew McKenzie was the right guy to play this hard-to-cast role as soon as the actor auditioned.

"We may have had sort of a different idea in mind for Ryan at first, but Ben came in and opened his mouth and we just fell out of our chairs," Schwartz says. "He already had the character, and he was so soulful. He seemed to have the intelligence that was so crucial. Ryan has had a rough life, but he has to have a special quality to him that Sandy can see almost at first glance, and Ben has that. And finding an actor who you can just tell is smart is a really rare thing."

The basic premise of the show 00 a teenager from a very modest background is suddenly thrust into the world of rich, privileged peers -- understandably has had some TV columnists dismissing the new series as "90210 Too," just a knockoff of the long-running FOX drama "Beverly Hills, 90210."

Both Schwartz and McKenzie acknowledge that the broad premise may be familiar, but they hope the new show has some surprises for viewers.

"Obviously, teenage dramas have been done successfully before by other shows, including the young rebel in the leather jacket, so the trap I faced with Ryan is to go too far, to play him too tough," McKenzie says.

"Certainly Ryan has seen a lot, probably more than any of the other characters, yet he is just as scared and nervous and insecure as any of the rest of them. Ryan just covers it better, and he sees through the bull a little more quickly, perhaps. Certainly he's had to take some rough knocks, but he's not so tough that he doesn't observe and understand a lot about the people around him."

"The idea behind the show is that this is an ultimate insider community where everyone is trying to keep up with the Joneses, and yet all of the major characters feel like outsiders in some way," Schwartz explains. "It's told from the point of view of Sandy, Peter Gallagher's character -- who is an outsider, because he doesn't come from this community -- and Ryan, this kid he brings into this world from the outside."

A Rhode Island native, Schwartz combines that outsider's perspective with the insider's insights he gained while he was a student at the University of Southern California.

"A lot of these Newport kids are bred to attend USC, and their world is fascinating to me," Schwartz says. "In its own way, this is Cheever country, but it's on the West Coast. You find the same issues percolating here that you find in short stories by John Cheever or John Updike or Philip Roth -- just everyone is a lot healthier-looking and it's a lot, uh, warmer," he adds, laughing.

Ryan's new world throws him into close contact with Sandy's own teenage son, Seth (Adam Brody, "Gilmore Girls"), a puppylike nerd who immediately bonds with Ryan, and radiant girl-next-door Marissa Cooper (Mischa Barton, "Once and Again"), who drinks a lot. Make that "a whole lot."

Each of these three teens comes from a distinct world of his or her own, yet by the time the first episode is over, Ryan, Marissa and Seth all seem to be at least subconsciously aware of the latent bond they share.

Thanks in part to shrewd casting, this trio is quirky and unpredictable enough to reward repeat visits to "The O.C." Brody deftly walks a fine line that allows Seth to be both hilariously dorky yet somehow endearing, while Barton has been crowned by several magazines as the TV season's new "It" girl even before the FOX series premieres.

"Mischa was already on our radar, because she already has done great work," Schwartz says. "Marissa has to be the kind of extraordinary girl who would make Ryan realize he has stumbled into a different world the minute he sees her, and Mischa has that quality, plus a lot of authenticity and sweetness. She's also only 17 in real life, so everything she does looks and feels very real.

"I think we got really lucky. I think we wound up with a young Russell Crowe, a young Tom Hanks and a young Audrey Hepburn with these three kids. Each one just brings such a reality to the role."

[ScorpioGrl]

ooo i am so happy there is a thread of him on male celebrities. [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img] YAYAYAYAYAY!!!

[*Shannon*]

I know, exciting!

5 more hours until the next OC episode starring Benji... [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

[HamScout's Honor]

I love Benjamin Mackenzie he is going to be the next big thing for sure. I love him on the OC and I hope we get to see him there for a long time to come.

[~*~Isabel~*~]

BenBen graduated from my high school! I went to the library a few months ago and looked at some old pics of him in the yearbooks- omigosh what a cuuuuutie pie! [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img] i LOVE ben!