Maxim magazine’s January cover girl Mischa Barton has gon back to her golden locks -THANK GOD – in Belfast, Northern Ireland, on Wednesday. She’s in the Emerald Isle promoting her period drama Closing the Ring.

In her days since playing Marissa on The O.C., Barton says it’s been relatively easy to leave that part of her career behind her.  She told press, “Even if I was a precocious teenager, it’s a New York vs. L.A. thing. I never experienced the ‘anything goes’ chaos we sold on The O.C.  Marissa was a nut case. I didn’t have much in common with her. In New York I’d want to go out at 15 or 16, but I got it out of my system.”

She even helped conjure up the concept for killing off Marissa.  “You have no idea how much fun I had doing that [scene]. I was on the set, yelling, “More blood! More blood!” She needed to go out with a bang.”

Who’s she dating these days?