But while it arguably kickstarted the concept of hate watching (thanks to Danny Drennan’s brilliant bile-ridden blogs), these days 90210 seems almost benign. Clever girls Andrea Zuckerman and Claire Arnold were repeatedly punished by the show gods: the former with the loss of Yale, university pregnancy and the pressures of an unexpected early marriage the latter by having to date Steve Sanders. Of course 90210 was fluff and frequently infuriating fluff at that. Emma Caulfield aka Xander’s demon girlfriend Anya, meanwhile, had a larger role as the somewhat less demonic university newspaper editor Susan Keats. Double Oscar-winner Hilary Swank played single mum and waitress Carly a pre-Friends Matthew Perry played a suicidal teen athlete a young Eva Longoria appeared on the show as did a not-yet-famous Jessica Alba and a pre-Buffy Seth Green.
#BEVERLY HILLS 90210 CAST TV#
While many of the main cast have struggled post-90210 – reduced to battling flying sharks or documenting their lives on reality TV – 90210 features a number of appearances from people who weren’t famous then but are now. Cue a mass protest from her fellow 90210ers and a line that became so famous it appeared on t-shirts and still gets shouted at Tori in the street.
The greatest plot line of all, however, was one of the most straightforward, a very special episode in which Donna, played by Spelling’s daughter Tori with almost winning blankness, fails to graduate after getting drunk at the school prom. This being an Aaron Spelling production, the commitment to realism didn’t last long: there were multiple love triangles, drink and drug addictions, missing mothers, back-from-the-dead fathers and even – in the (generally acknowledged as completely insane) university years – cults, fires and animal rights activists. Donna Martin graduatesĪaron Spelling originally intended 90210 as an answer to Canada’s Degrassi Junior High, which had just seen its characters enter high school and was notorious for tackling issues from bulling and gay rights to teen suicide. Thank goodness then for 17-year-old Brian Austin Green, whose baby-faced, desperate-to-be-cool David Silver might have been intensely irritating but at least looked his age.
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From Steve Sanders’s fast-receding hairline to the lines etched on Dylan McKay’s face – one for every line of second-rate James Dean dialogue Luke Perry was forced to utter – 90210 was stuffed full of male actors who had last been teenagers in the previous decade.
Teen shows now tend to make some attempt at age-appropriate casting but, back in the early 1990s, 90210 pioneered the technique of casting male heart-throbs who looked laughably old. (Who hasn’t felt so passionately about someone at 16 that you’d burn down a school float for them?) She also inspired Canadian poets and became a gay icon. With her heavy boots, short white blonde hair and unfortunate tendency to stalk Brandon – a tendency that infamously led to the burning down of the school parade float – Emily captured the hearts of a generation of awkward teens. Worse girlsīrenda alone would be enough to propel 90210 into the teen hall of fame but, in the show’s second season, Aaron Spelling and co pulled a masterstroke by introducing Emily Valentine into the mix. Despite sterling work from Tiffani Amber Thiessen as newcomer Valerie Malone, the show was never the same once Ms Walsh stropped off to London at the end of season four. Spiky, sulky and prone to both over-the-top declarations of love and bad French accents, Brenda was an inspiration to stroppy door-slamming teenagers everywhere. Here are six reasons why: Bad girlsīeverly Hills 90210 was famously home to the biggest bad girl of them all, teen queen Shannen Doherty, a notorious diva-in-training, whose character Brenda Walsh, twin sister of hockey-loving nominal hero and proto-bro Brandon, inspired internet hate campaigns before the internet was really even a thing.
You never know when, or if, the next one’s coming." Wise words, Jason, and particularly true given that the original 90210 was the ultimate teen hit. In it he has the following advice for young stars: "If you’re lucky enough to be on a hit TV show, don’t leave until they kill you off. F ormer Beverly Hills, 90210 star Jason Priestley has just published his autobiography.