Chad Michael Murray, 38, just wished his former One Tree Hill co-star Hilarie Burton, 38, a happy birthday — and fans are dying! The actress, who portrayed Peyton Sawyer on the beloved early 2000s show, celebrated her birthday in quarantine on July 1. She received plenty of love from friends and fans alike on social media, including a sweet tribute from her on-screen husband. Chad’s character Lucas Scott tied the knot with Hilarie’s character during the series’ sixth season — and he wrote her a very heartfelt message.
“Happy Birthday to this mega talented, heart warming, always giving SUPER HUMAN that I’m blessed to call a friend- @hilarieburton We’re slowly but surly watching each other grow up,” Chad captioned his Instagram post, alongside a collage of pics of the pair from over the years. “Keep making this world a better place! Love to the whole Morgan clan. From – ‘The Murray’s.'” Fans went wild for the post, with one commenting, “I miss One Tree Hill and this couple,” while another wrote, “AWWWW I LOVE YOU BOTH SM.”
The show may have premiered well over a decade ago, but the pair have remained close over the years, and reunited with their One Tree Hill cast mates on many occasions. When HollywoodLife spoke to Hilarie in Nov. 2019 about her role in Lifetime’s flick A Christmas Wish, she said getting th OTH alums together for a reunion was never hard.
“We seriously just sit on our phone and go through and see like who is up for it,” Hilarie said. “At one point, there was a part [in A Christmas Wish] that still hadn’t been cast. She and I were just sitting in our cast chairs just texting actors we knew and saying like, ‘Hey! You want to come out to Louisiana next week and just be in this movie?’” She added that logistics sometimes got in the way, but many of her former co-stars were always up to work together again. “What’s nice is that everybody wanted to do it. It just became a matter of like, ‘Oh, I’m shooting this other thing.’”