Rachel Bilson bribed Adam Brody to come on her 'O.C.' podcast

Rachel Bilson and Adam Brody dated for three years while filming The O.C. from 2003-07, and the only time they had spoken in the nearly 15 years since was during a chance airport encounter in August 2019—until Brody joined the Welcome to the OC, Bitches! podcast this week.

"I was like, there's no way he's going to want to talk about it, there's no way he's going to do it," Bilson, 40, told People, explaining how she convinced Brody, 41, to be a guest on the podcast, which she co-hosts with Melinda Clarke. "A dog that I had when we were on The O.C. recently passed away, so I sent him a text message and I was like, 'Thurman died. You have to say yes.' I basically bribed him with a dead dog."

Bilson later called it "emotional in a really nice way" to reminisce with Brody: "I feel like when you go through something that we did together at that time, it's just always kind of this comfortable, familial feeling. He was just such an important person in my life at such a crazy time that it just felt like I'm seeing someone super dear to me, and it's been so long. It was just catching up with like an old family member."

In The O.C., Bilson and Brody played on-screen teen lovers Summer Roberts and Seth Cohen, respectively. Clarke played Julie Cooper, mother to the late Marissa Cooper (Mischa Barton).

Welcome to the OC is a rewatch podcast that premiered in April. Every episode of the podcast re-examines every episode of the beloved teen soap television series, in order. 

Tuesday's installment found Bilson, Brody and Clarke discussing the first season's penultimate episode "The Strip," which originally aired April 28, 2004. Watch it below.