Michelle Trachtenberg, the actress known for her roles in Gossip Girl and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, has passed away at the age of 39.
According to sources cited by the New York Post, Trachtenberg was found by her mother around 8 a.m. on Wednesday, February 26, at One Columbus Place, a luxury high-rise in Manhattan’s Central Park South neighborhood.
Reports indicate that the actress had recently undergone a liver transplant, though her official cause of death has not yet been confirmed.
Born on October 11, 1985, in New York City, Trachtenberg began her acting career at an early age, appearing in commercials as a toddler. Her first television credit came on Nickelodeon’s The Adventures of Pete & Pete in the mid-1990s. At age 10, she landed her first major film role in Harriet the Spy (1996), starring as the titular young detective alongside Rosie O’Donnell and J. Smith-Cameron.
Her breakthrough role came in 2000 when she joined the cast of Buffy the Vampire Slayer as Dawn Summers, the younger sister of Sarah Michelle Gellar’s Buffy. She remained on the series until its conclusion in 2003.
Trachtenberg later gained further recognition for her portrayal of Georgina Sparks, the scheming antagonist in Gossip Girl, which ran from 2007 to 2012.
She also starred in several films throughout the 2000s, including the 2004 teen comedy Eurotrip, known for the hit song Scotty Doesn’t Know, and the 2005 Disney sports drama Ice Princess.
