Tyler Hilton‘s character in One Tree Hill, Chris Keller, was the biggest obstacle in Bethany Joy Lenz‘s on-screen relationship with James Lafferty’s Nathan Scott. Chris Keller’s sly attempts to win over Lenz’s Haley James Scott just so happen to mirror the actor’s real-life attempts to date Lenz. However, a force bigger than the two of them stepped in to say “no.”
Tyler Hilton is many things. He’s an actor, an accomplished singer/songwriter, and a previous Taylor Swift interest in one of her debut music videos, “Teardrops on my Guitar.” His most recognizable role was Chris Keller in the drama One Tree Hill. Hilton debuted in season 2, episode 6, “We Might as Well Be Strangers,” where he plays a relatively successful singer who pushes Haley to pursue a music career to the detriment of her relationship with Nathan.
As much as he tried, Hilton’s Chris didn’t get to date Haley. IRL, the actor tried to date the actress, too, which explains their insane chemistry on the show.
Bethany Joy Lenz’s cult stopped Tyler Hilton from dating her
During a concert on Nov. 18 in Portland, Oregon, Hilton opened up about his connection to his former One Tree Hill co-star, Bethany Joy Lenz. He told people he attempted to date her but the “high control group” she was a part of shut it down.
“The book talked a lot about personal stuff and I went through a lot of that with her,” Hilton explained per footage shared via TikTok. “But it was crazy, cause if you guys watched the show, what you may not know is that our characters… Bethany and I weren’t really supposed to be hanging together on the show but off set we became really good friends and started becoming close.”
Similar to their characters, the two bonded over music, and they started spending more time together outside the set. Because real life often imitates fiction, the two started writing songs together after Hilton realized Joy was a “great musician,” which also inspired some of Chris and Haley’s storylines on the show.
“We really fell for each other, we started to catch feelings for real,” he revealed to the audience. “We were hanging out together all the time and the producers on the show were like, ‘We should write this into the show.’ So they started having our characters sing together on the show and stuff.”
Hilton clarified he spoke about it because Joy also wrote about it in her memoir, Dinner for Vampires, “otherwise I wouldn’t.” Continuing, he said, “I started to get the vibe that she was in a cult.” He noted that they used to have “so many beautiful, deep conversations about religion and stuff.”
“Every once and a while I would get cult vibes,” he recalled. “So I was really into her though and I was like, ‘Dude, I’m down with cult, I don’t care about that s***. Yeah, that’s no big deal, I’ve dated tons of girls [in cults], so whatever.’”
Lenz’s cult said Chris Keller’s job there was done, apparently, because Joy previously explained that they had to vet whoever she was dating. “They were like, ‘Yeah, he’s not the vibe.’ And she was like, ‘Yeah the cult said no,’” he laughed. “I didn’t have an answer for that one cause normally you can tell a girl is there something I can do? But if the cult says no, you’re f***ed. I’d never been broken up with by cult before. That was the first time.”
Hilton clarified he wrote a song for her called “You’ll Ask for Me,” which was actually featured on One Tree Hill. The singer noted that it was “20 years ago” and that they’ve been “good friends ever since.” It looks like Tyler Hilton does feel like Chris Keller’s dates sometimes.