Keith Scott (One Tree Hill)

Infobox soap character
colour = #A7B0C1
name = Keith Scott


caption = Craig Sheffer as Keith Scott
first = Pilot
(episode 1.01)
last = All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone
(episode 4.21)
cause = Fatal gun shot
nickname = Boozy
alias =
age =
born = July 26 1970
death = January 23 2006
occupation = Mechanic
title =
siblings = Dan Scott
romances = Emily "Jules" Chambers (ex-girlfriend)
Karen Roe (fiance)
children = Lily Scott (mother is Karen Roe)
relatives = Lucas Scott (nephew)
Nathan Scott (nephew)
James Lucas Scott (great nephew)
May Scott (mother)
Royal Scott (father) Haley James Scott (niece in-law)
episode = 50
portrayer = Craig Sheffer
creator = Mark Schwahn

Keith Alan Scott was a fictional character on the television series "One Tree Hill". He was the older brother of Dan Scott, the uncle of Lucas Scott and Nathan Scott and the father of Lily Roe Scott (by Karen Roe). He was played by Craig Sheffer, who was credited as a regular for the first three seasons, although in the third season he appeared in just 6 episodes.

Fictional character biography

Keith grew up in Tree Hill along with his younger brother Dan. Both brothers played for the Tree Hill Ravens under Coach Whitey Durham, although Whitey said that Keith was the worst basketball player the Ravens ever had. Keith always had a crush on Dan's girlfriend Karen, and when Karen became pregnant and Dan abandoned her, Keith stepped in to help Karen raise her son Lucas. As a result, in later life Keith didn't see much of Dan, Dan's wife Deb, or their son Nathan.

Keith worked as a mechanic and built up his own business, Keith Scott Motors. He planned to open his own car dealership, until Dan stole his idea using Deb's money. Keith then taught Dan everything he knew about cars. According to show creator Mark Schwahn, speaking on the DVD commentary for the pilot, Keith was originally intended to be an alcoholic, but this plotline was later downplayed. However, Keith's drinking comes up on more than one occasion and Dan's nickname for him is 'Boozy'.

eason 1

Keith persuades Whitey to let Lucas join the Ravens, a move Dan is unhappy with. After seeing his father's behaviour first-hand, Lucas contemplates changing his last name, but decides to keep the name Scott as a tribute to Keith. Karen and Keith remain very close friends and the relationship between the two of them begins to show signs that they could get romantically involved. However this is put on hold when Karen is offered the chance of a lifetime to go to Florence on a cooking course. As she leaves for the airport she kisses him, and he believes that when she comes back they will finally be in a relationship together. But on the night she comes back he and Lucas are involved in a car crash, and it turns out that Keith had been drinking. Karen, angry at Keith for being reckless with her son's life, tells him to leave the hospital and their relationship remains fragile. After paying Lucas's medical expenses, Keith is forced to accept Dan's offer to buy Keith's garage. Dan proves unbearable to work for and Keith resigns. Keith becomes friendly with Deb, who wants a divorce from Dan. When Keith suspects that he might lose Karen, after she begins dating Larry Sawyer, he proposes to her, but she says no. Heartbroken he decides to leave Tree Hill, with Lucas accompanying him. He pays Deb a last visit which ends with them sleeping together and Dan walking in on them. Dan disowns Keith as his brother. Keith and Lucas then leave Tree Hill.

eason 2

When Keith and Lucas hear that Dan has had a heart attack, they decide to come back to Tree Hill. To help Dan, Keith takes over running Dan's car dealership, and grows closer to his other nephew Nathan when he offers him a job at the dealership. Keith meets a pretty customer named Jules, and they begin dating. However, it turns out that Dan hired "Jules" to make Keith fall in love with her and then break his heart as revenge for Keith sleeping with Deb. Jules truly falls in love with Keith and they plan to get married.Lucas finds out about Dan's arrangement with Jules and agrees to move in with Dan if Dan leaves Keith and Jules alone. But after Karen confronts her, Jules leaves Keith at the altar.Keith goes to Dan and asks if Dan set him up. Dan tells him he did, and they end up exchanging punches with Keith leaving a broken man. Dan also fires Keith from the dealership.Keith's last words to Dan are "I got nothing left to lose. But you do. Remember that."He also feels betrayed by Lucas and Karen as they knew the truth about Jules and didn't tell him the season finale. Karen thinks she sees Keith on the same day that Dan's dealership is set on fire with Dan inside.

eason 3

Keith does find Jules but Emily Chambers (Jules's real identity) turns out to be very different from the girl he fell in love with. Through a flashback we learn that Keith did come back to Tree Hill on the day of the fire, and planned to kill Dan, but was stopped by Deb, who started the fire herself, although Dan survived. Keith returns to Tree Hill a few months later and when Dan accuses him of trying to kill him, Keith still covers for Deb, even though she has left town. He also resumes his relationship with Karen and Karen asks him to marry her. Keith asks Lucas if he would like Keith to adopt him, and Lucas says yes. When Jimmy Edwards holds some students hostage at gunpoint in Tree Hill High, Keith persuades Dan (who is now the mayor) to let him enter and talk to Jimmy. Keith persuades Jimmy to let Lucas go, but Jimmy then turns the gun on himself. Dan enters the school and finds Keith cradling Jimmy's body. Keith utters his last words: "He's gone, Danny". Dan nods and then picks up the gun and points it at a shocked Keith before pulling the trigger. Dan still thought that Keith was the one who tried to kill him and wanted to settle the score. Karen and Lucas are devastated by Keith's death. Dan becomes haunted by the ghost of Keith as a child, although it is unclear whether it is actually Keith's ghost doing the haunting, or if it is just Dan's guilt having a severe psychological effect on him. At the end of the season Dan learns that it was actually Deb who tried to kill him and that Karen is pregnant with Keith's child. Wracked with guilt, he offers to stand by Karen.

eason 4

Keith continues to have an impact on his nephews from beyond the grave. Nathan is convinced that he saw Keith when he was underwater after diving in to save Cooper and Rachel, who had crashed into the river, and that it was Keith who saved all three of them. When Lucas is unconscious following a heart attack caused by seeing Nathan's wife Haley run over, he sees Keith in a dream in which Keith shows him what life would have been like if Lucas had been less of a person. He tells Lucas that Nathan did save himself, Cooper and Rachel, although he doesn't remember doing it. He also takes Lucas back to the scene of the shooting and hints that Jimmy didn't kill him, although he stops short of telling Lucas that Dan did it. In the same episode, Dan, who is jail after covering for Nathan's beating of the man who ran Haley over, receives a visit from the adult 'ghost' of Keith, who tells him that he forgives Dan for shooting him, but Hell won't. This version of Keith seems more vindictive than the version in Lucas's dream, and it seems likely that both 'Keiths' merely represent Dan and Lucas's subconscious. Thanks to his dream, Lucas remembers seeing someone else there the day of the shooting, and eventually discovers the truth about Dan. When Lucas confronts Dan, the shock causes Karen to collapse. In the finale, an unconscious Karen has a dream of being with Keith and their young daughter, who is picking lilies. Keith and Karen's daughter is delivered by c-section and on waking up Karen names her Lily. Dan finally turns himself in for Keith's murder. The last time Keith is seen is when Dan flashes back to shooting Keith as he tries to hang himself, but fails.

eason 5

Though he does not appear in Season 5, his grave is seen, and is talked about semi-often.

Keith's influence of Lucas

Because he never knew his biological father growing up, and because Keith was always there for him and Karen, Lucas looked to Keith as the father figure in his life, a role Keith embraced. In the first season, when the Ravens have a Father versus Sons basketball game, Lucas asks Keith to play in the game with him, and Keith eagerly accepts. While Dan goades and challenges Nathan, Keith encourages and supports Lucas, and the other boys, in what they are doing. When Lucas considers changing his last name because he does not want to be tied to Dan, he changes his mind when he realizes it is also Keith's name. In his spare time, Lucas often goes to Keith's shop, where he works part time and gets advice from him. When Lucas and Keith are hit by a car, Lucas defends Keith to his mother, saying he only had a small amount to drink, and that Keith was not drunk. Lucas often tells his mother that he would have no problem if she and Keith dated, which later comes to frutition in season 3. When Karen leaves for Italy for cooking school, Keith steps in and looks after Lucas, functioning as his guardian. It is Keith himself who convinces Coach Durham to give Lucas a shot at being on the basketball team. When Keith is about to marry Jules in season 2, he asks Lucas to be his best man, which Lucas accepts. It is out of Loyalty to Keith that Lucas does not tell Keith of Jules' real plan in season 2. Although hurt by this, Keith eventually returns and he and Lucas re-forge their bond. In the third season, when Keith is engaged to Karen, he tells Lucas that he wants to adopt Lucas as his son, should Lucas want it, which Lucas accepts. When Dan says that by killing him, Karen's unborn child (fathered by Keith) will grow up without a father just like Lucas did, Lucas replies "I had Keith!"

Even before Lucas was born, Keith picked his loyalty towards Karen and Lucas over any bond he had with Dan. Karen tells Lucas that the only time she ever saw Keith cry was at the hospital the day Lucas was born. Lucas has numerous pictures of Keith, Karen, and himself as a child through the years. While he largely ignored Dan, Keith often became intensely defensive whenever Dan mistreated Lucas. Keith often threatened Dan with physical violence over Dan's abuse, once telling Dan "If you ever touch Lucas again, you'll wish I had killed you." The father/son bond between Keith and Lucas serves as the final wedge between Dan and Keith, as Dan seems to resent the fact that Keith easily slipped into a fatherly role with Lucas, while Dan struggled with it. In many ways, Keith's paternal role with Lucas is reflective in Nathan and Lucas. While Nathan, under Dan's manipulative eye, grows to be arrogant and resentful (until he breaks free from Dan), Lucas is, by contrast, compassionate and friendly, having grown up with love and affection from Keith and Karen.

ee also

* [http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/One_Tree_Hill Quotes]