BREAKING NEWS: Ashlee Simpson Killed Off Of Melrose Place
Oct. 22 2009, Published 10:29 a.m. ET
The end of 2009 has been a tough one for the Simpson sisters. With Jessica now on the singles market, happily mothered and married younger sister Ashlee has hit a career bump: the CW recently announced they would be killing her character off the show.
According to executive producer Todd Slavkin, Simpson was always set to leave after the twelfth episode. "We felt that once the murder mystery was resolved, the tone of the show was going to shift into a much more fun, romantic, sexy upbeat kind of show, and her character would move on," he told Entertainment Weekly. Colin Egglesfield, who plays the alcoholic / aspiring chef Auggie, also got canned.
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While the move may have been in the cards awhile ago, a source tells RadarOnline.com that Simpson just wasn't appealing to the audience. “Ashlee wasn’t popular with viewers. The CW wants the show to do well so they listened to the audience and the audience didn’t really like her or the character, so they made the decision to get rid of her for the sake of the show,” the source said.
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"They’re total professionals and they took it like professionals," Slavkin added about the two stars. "When you go into a show you never know what’s going to evolve and what the possibilities are. But because they knew ahead of time that leaving was a possibility, it wasn’t a complete shock."
It seems Simpson is letting it roll off of her back. On her Twitter Tuesday night she was still excited about being on the set, raving about co-stars Heather Locklear and Brooke Burns.
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"On set with Heather Locklear and Brooke Burns- these ladies are freakin awesome," she wrote. "Such a fun day!