urssaly leofric ashton
Chanelle Glugla
Before revivals became the hot thing, The CW brought the show back as 90210. This relaunch lasted for five seasons, from 2008 to 2013. Set at the same high school, the new show focused on a new set of teens while some original cast members (Jennie Garth, Shannen Doherty, Tori Spelling) dropping by for cameos.
Queue: What film or TV show made you first fall in love with acting?
Lily Collins: I would have to say that The Breakfast Club was actually the first movie that I watched and thought that I wanted to really be a part of that world and be an actor. I loved that movie so much. I loved any of the John Hughes films, and all the characters that he created, and just how real they felt. I still watch them today and feel the exact same way.
What was your first role, and could you tell us a little bit about that experience?
LC: I used to do musical theater in school, and plays, but my first professional job, ironically, was the reboot of90210.Obviously the original one was a Darren Star show, so little did I know that one day over 10 years later, I would be able to be working with Darren himself.
I was in two episodes. It was the prom episodes, and I played a character named Phoebe. I was someone who was running for prom queen, lost, proceeded to get really drunk, and then in the second episode was throwing up in a toilet, talking to one of the lead characters.
The day that I shot that second scene of throwing up in a toilet, I went back to my trailer and got a phone call saying that I had booked my first movie, which was The Blind Side. That was a week after my 20th birthday, which is really crazy now that I think about it, because I was 20 shooting the new 90210, and then on my 30th birthday, Darren called me to tell me I was Emily. So it was a full 10 years. Maybe at 40 something will happen.
What is one thing that you always bring on set?
LC: I always bring headphones on set because I usually make playlists for every character that I play. If I have a break in the middle of shooting, I like to listen to music, either to get back into that headspace or take a little breather.
Walter passed away in her sleep on Wednesday, bringing an end to a prolific career that lasted decades. I mentioned some of her other series regular roles on television shows just yesterday in my post looking at teen drama stars\u2019 other leading roles. While Walter is best known these days for \u201CArrested Development\u201D and \u201CArcher,\u201D in our teen drama world, we know her as Tabitha Wilson on \u201C90210,\u201D the spinoff of \u201CBeverly Hills, 90210.\u201D
Tabitha, an alcoholic actress, was the mother of Rob Estes\u2019 Harry, mother-in-law of Lori Loughlin\u2019s Debbie, and the grandmother of Shenae Grimes\u2019 Annie and Tristan Wilds\u2019 Dixon. Despite being cast as a series regular for the first season of \u201C90210,\u201D which kicked off with the Wilsons moving to Beverly Hills from Kansas to care for Tabitha, Walter ended up departing the show after just 13 episodes. The explanation given for her character\u2019s disappearance was that she had returned to show business and was off doing various projects. She was mentioned in season 2 but never seen again, despite producers originally claiming the door was open for Walter to appear in more episodes.
It's officially summer: that heinous point in the year when so much good television evaporates and we must crawl into the depths of Netflix and Hulu to survive until winter. It is this level of desperation that recently flung me in the unlikely direction of the first season of Beverly Hills 90210.
I originally decided to revisit Brandon, Brenda, and the gang because I imagined they would unintentionally make me laugh out loud a lot. And they did -- any and all scenes involving surfing or dancing are a guaranteed laugh riot in this thing. Comedy gold also comes in the kinds of scenes that involve Brenda crashing a driver's ed vehicle because she sees Henry Winkler (why him?!), and dialogue that leaps in all kinds of absurd directions on the regular ("Janet Jackson has laryngitis! Kenny is drunk and you have to come and get me!")
I had not, however, anticipated falling into a binge-watch situation, but did because -- surprise! -- Beverly Hills 90210 is, for the most part, entirely un-ironically, a really great TV show. Obviously, we're not talking Breaking Bad levels of excellence or anything, but if we can keep My So-Called Life on a pedestal, the first season of 90210 deserves a place on the podium as well (even if the rich kid characters are inherently less likable than Rickie Vasquez and Rayanne Graff).
90210 was undoubtedly what we looked to in the pre-Kardashian age to find out how rich kids in LA lived, and for millennials, this thing is a goldmine of information about How Teenagers Used to Live. Seeing all of these hot young things trying to organize their lives while tethered to landlines, phone booths, and library desks is moderately heartbreaking in 2017, especially in the episode where the Walsh family's landline breaks and the telephone company tells them they are "lucky to have a number."
The other remarkable thing to note is that, in 1990, photos were literally never taken unless you were (a) working on the school newspaper (those used to exist!), (b) on vacation, or (c) about to go to a dance. And forget about casually making videos -- those puppies required borrowing 25 pounds of equipment. Don't even get me started on the alarm clock situation, or the fact that both men and women felt okay about wearing vests over absolutely anything, on an almost-daily basis.
Despite all of the nonsense that dates the show, 90210 is still masterful at passing on life lessons. There are substance abuse problems (for both parents and teens) peppered throughout the series. Issues of privilege also weave throughout, thanks to Brenda trying to keep up with her super rich friends, and the fact that Andrea is from a poor part of town and committing school district fraud to go to a good high school.
Season 1 also tackles date rape, safe sex, AIDs, cancer scares, drunk driving, single parenting, adoption, virginity loss, and, in two separate episodes ("East Side Story" and "Every Dream Has Its Price Tag"), the issue of underpaid immigrants. Not bad for what could've just been, essentially, a super long advertisement for rampant capitalism.
On the downside, 90210 is consistently an overwhelmingly white prospect. People of color are generally reduced to corridor and crowd scenes and, once you notice, it is an aggravating thing to behold every episode. One of the only occasions that affords black characters the opportunity to speak is in "One On One," an episode that concerns itself with the fact that West Beverly High recruits African American students from outside the school district to populate their basketball team.
The premise is problematic as hell on a plethora of levels, but the episode ultimately succeeds in highlighting still-relevant issues around race, education, and white privilege. Furthermore, because the audience is automatically inclined to sympathize with Brandon and Steve, and both characters reveal themselves to be racist in the episode, it ultimately forces viewers to examine their own prejudices -- which, if you're a teen watching a show this incredibly white, is probably pretty damn necessary.
Ultimately, even if you only come to Beverly Hills 90210 to see men wearing crop-tops, David Austin Green doing Vanilla Ice dancing, Jason Priestley having an affair with paisley shirts, and a bunch of 25-year-olds pretending to be high school students, it's worth sticking around for everything else the show offers. Sure, Beverly Hills 90210 is ridiculous -- but it's also surprisingly underrated.
She arrived to the U.S., and soon learned the truth: hardly anyone has 90210 wealth, and most Americans are struggling. My experience was different. I grew up in the U.S. in poverty, so I knew most people were not wealthy here, But, because I consumed the same media, I thought it was only a matter of time and hard work before I too would move into a mansion and drive a drop-top Jeep. Turns out we were both wrong.
When I came out, I tried so hard to fit in as queer. I tried to wear skinny jeans and leather vests. But, none of those items of clothing affirmed my identity. I felt like a fraud. I felt uncomfortable. I felt like I went out of one closet and into another, and the clothing in the second closet was just hideous. The hard prep style of the characters in The Politician demonstrate that the range of queer style extends beyond bow-ties, suspenders, and asymmetrical haircuts (which are all fab, but just not for everyone). It shows that there is no right way to dress queer, but there are many ways to dress fiercely queer, subverting all clich fashion tropes.
dapperQ is a premier queer style digital magazine that leverages queer fashion as a form of visual activism. Our team produces the largest annual queer fashion show in the U.S. held at Brooklyn Museum during New York Fashion Week and provides an ongoing platform for celebrating queer visibility in fashion, beauty, travel, and more.
The good news is, fans have a few more weeks to binge watch all 114 episodes of 90210 on Netflix. The bad news is that the series, which originally aired on The CW, will be leaving soon. Moments ago, Netflix announced all of the film and TV titles that will be expiring throughout the month of October, such as Bridget Jones's Baby, Eyes Wide Shut, Scream 2 and White Collar.
GQ: You and your co-creator, [former Modern Family producer] Jeffrey Richman, both have long rsums in TV, but you have not worked together before. How did this collaboration happen?
Darren Star: It was like an arranged marriage through our mutual agent Jay Sures, but I knew Jeffrey for years as a friend. I was a big fan of his work. And I had this idea about a romantic comedy about a gay man going through a breakup, and Jeffrey really sparked to it. We both had experienced situations like this, knew people who have been in situations like this, and we just started imagining what this show would be, and how we really had a lot of facility to write this in terms of our own experiences, and just the world that we lived in. For the first time, we really had an opportunity to write a big, broad, mainstream romantic comedy from a gay male perspective.
90f70e40cf