‘One Tree Hill’ Star Hilarie Burton Morgan Holds Back Tears As She Gushes Over The Late Willie Garson On ‘The View’: “Oh, I’m Gonna Cry”

Hilarie Burton Morgan struggled to hold back tears as she talked about the late Willie Garson on this morning’s episode of The View. While chatting with the co-hosts, the One Tree Hill alum opened up about why she decided to write about grief in her new book Grimoire Girl.

As Sunny Hostin noted, Morgan and Garson — who famously played Stanford on Sex and the City — became close friends on the set of White Collar and remained that way until his death in September 2021. According to Morgan, who has a 13-year-old son and a 5-year-old daughter, Garson taught her a lot about being a parent.

“When I met Willie, my son was three months old. I got a job with him and he had just adopted his son so we were new parents together,” she told the panel. “I had just come back to Manhattan. So as new parents, we would go out in the city together and just like be each other’s comfort zone.”

The actress became choked up while she dished on the impact of Garson’s friendship.

“He taught me so much and was always my biggest cheerleader — oh, I’m gonna cry,” she said as tears filled her eyes and her voice cracked. “So honoring him in this felt really important.”

She continued, “Obviously, when I started writing the book, I didn’t know we were gonna lose him. But being able to honor him in this way felt really important because he’s written on the pages of my grimoire. I am different because of that influence.”

While chatting with People not long after Garson died of pancreatic cancer, Morgan recalled meeting him shortly after leaving the “toxic” environment of One Tree Hill, where she played Peyton Sawyer for the show’s first six seasons.

“Willie was the person who took me under his wing and had lunch with me and took me out to dinner,” she said. “He saw the version of me that I wasn’t yet, but that I was working toward.”

Before Garson’s death, Morgan even got a tattoo in honor of her friend that read, “Calm down.”

“He would pay you the biggest compliment in the world, and the second you’d start to get bashful about it, he’d be like ‘Calm down, calm down,’ ” she explained to People. “It was his way of forcing you to accept the compliment, because he would diffuse it, which was a lovely habit.”

The View airs on weekdays at 11/10c on ABC.