Taylor Momsen: Gossip Girl Role ‘Killing’ Me During Exit Battle

Taylor Momsen admitted that her role in Gossip Girl had been ‘killing’ her before she exited from the hit teen series. 

The 32-year-old singer – who recently went viral after unveiling her sculpted abs – reflected on her time on the show and its effect on her during Wednesday’s episode of the Call Her Daddy podcast. 

Momsen portrayed the character of Jenny Humphrey in the CW series alongside other cast members such as Blake Lively, Penn Badgley and Leighton Meester. 

However, the actress was later written out of the show after the fourth season as she pursued music full time with her band The Pretty Reckless. But the road to exit the series was far from easy. 

‘Season one’s a whirlwind,’ the Just Tonight hitmaker expressed to host Alex Cooper, before adding that it was around the second season when she wanted to leave Gossip Girl. 

‘I knew I had to leave. But at the same time, leaving a career that is so prosperous was not easy.’ 

The star added, ‘It was an easy decision for me. Sorry – I shouldn’t say not easy. Not easy – in the way of like to actually get out of a contract was not easy.’ 

Momsen further explained how ‘hard’ it was for her to get out of her contract with the series. 

‘So, it started with a “I don’t want to do this anymore,” but you’re in a lock and key contract with CW, Warner Brothers, you know, all of that stuff,’ the singer said.

‘And it came down to – it was a very long battle of me arguing [with] everyone, “Go and get me out of this. I can’t do this anymore. This is killing me.”

‘I have something else I want to do with my life and it has nothing to do with this. And I can’t be stuck here anymore.’ 

Momsen remembered being ‘called ungrateful’ for her desire to leave the CW series. 

‘All the things that come along with “How dare you turn your back on something that’s been so successful for you” was hard.’ 

When Cooper questioned how those comments made her feel at the time, Momsen replied, ‘Oh, I just went f*** you. You don’t know what you’re talking – like you’re not in my shoes so how dare you judge this.’

The star further talked about having difficulties getting out of the contract and decided to go to the writers of the series for help. 

Momsen said she ‘explained the situation. There’s you know, lots of talks about it but they essentially went, “Well, we can’t let you out of the contract because that’s not our job but we can write you out of the show.”‘ 

The How The Grinch Stole Christmas actress recalled being told she couldn’t act in any other project because she was still ‘under contract.’ 

‘And I’m like, “That’s perfectly fine.” I’m trying to get out. Like, it’s not what I want to do anyways. It’s good.’ 

She then referenced to the show writers and added, ‘So, I really have to credit them for doing that for me because they did not have to and they wrote me out of the show so I could go on tour and be in a band.’ 

Momsen revealed that she didn’t inform cast members ahead of time of her exit and admitted that she ‘Irish dipped.’

‘I just wasn’t in the script the next week,’ she told Cooper with a laugh. ‘I mean, they all knew I was making music. They all knew I had a band.

‘I would play them stuff, because I was working on the first record while I was on the show. I would come in and play songs and play music. But I don’t think anyone knew how serious I was at that stage.’ 

Momsen had been 13-years-old when she appeared in the pilot episode of Gossip Girl and she left mid-fourth season in an episode titled Gaslit. 

She returned to the season finale which aired in 2012. 

‘I came back for the very finale. As a fan of television and a fan of the shows I love, when you have the full cast together again… you want to full circle that and round it out.’ 

The star also reflected on her transition from a child star to an actress in her teenage years on a major television series such as Gossip Girl. 

‘And when it got into Gossip Girl and suddenly that was a celebrity show and a tabloid show and New York and paparazzi.’

She added, ‘And suddenly you’re being photographed as a character by paparazzi and put into the tabloids as Taylor and I’m going, “That’s not what I was wearing. That’s not me. That’s a character.”

‘And I’m getting hate from things I did on the show that I have nothing to do with. And I was young. I was 14.’

Momsen continued, ‘So, I think that that started to bother me and that’s where I started to realize like, I’m not good at being someone else’s tool. Like, I need to be my own person.’ 

The singer previously reflected on why she left Gossip Girl as she appeared on her former co-star Penn Badgley’s Podcrushed podcast back in 2023. 

‘I was so much younger than all of you,’ she told the actor before noting that she became friends with her castmate Connor Paolo who was closer to her age. 

‘That’s where music became such a solace for me. It was this place where I could just be, writing songs and emoting how I felt because I was by myself a lot.’ 

She added, ‘I didn’t have my own clique. I didn’t fit in with you guys, I didn’t fit in with Connor’s friends – I was younger than them. I was the new girl. 

‘I was Grinch girl. I was always in this kind of weird, isolated world – partially of my own creating, probably.’ 

Momsen has been keeping busy with her band The Pretty Reckless – and she recently dropped the holiday EP Taylor Momsen’s Pretty Reckless Christmas late last month on October 31. 

The album contains six tracks – including two Christmas classics such as Where Are You Christmas. 

Momsen and her band is also slated to go on tour with ACDC beginning next year on February 24.

‘FOR THOSE ABOUT TO ROCK We will be joining @acdc in North America AND South America for the 2026 #PowerUpTour. tickets on sale Friday Nov 7 at 10am,’ the announcement read in an Instagram post shared on Tuesday.