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Jason Priestley appeared on the April 30 episode of the podcast I Choose Me with Jennie Garth
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During the episode, he and Garth discussed the deaths of their Beverly Hills, 90210 costars Shannen Doherty and Luke Perry
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Priestley said Doherty’s diagnosis made it so they said “everything that we needed to say to each other” when they spoke before her passing
Jason Priestley is reflecting on the loss of his Beverly Hills, 90210 costars Shannen Doherty and Luke Perry.
Priestley, 55, appeared on the April 30 episode of the I Choose Me with Jennie Garth podcast, and the 90210 alumni reflected on the loss of their castmates. Perry died in 2019 at age 52 after suffering a massive stroke. Doherty died in July 2024 at age 53. She had first been diagnosed with breast cancer almost a decade earlier.
“Can we talk about grief a little bit? Because we’ve both been through it more than once,” Garth, 53, said to Priestley. “We haven’t really sat down and talked about, like, how you dealt with it and how I dealt with it.” She said she feels like she’s “stalled” in her grief process so that she doesn’t “have to accept it.”
“I’m in the acceptance part with both of them,” Priestley said. Perry’s death was “far more shocking,” but Doherty’s illness helped remind him to make the most of their time together. “Whenever I had the chance to spend time with her, I made sure that I said all the things that I wanted to say to her,” he explained. “So when she did pass away, I feel like her and I had said everything that we needed to say to each other, which I think gave me some closure right away, which was good.”
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Jason Priestley (left) and Shannen Doherty in ‘Beverly Hills, 90210’ in the 1990s
On Beverly Hills, 90210, Priestley and Doherty played siblings Brandon and Brenda Walsh. Perry played Dylan McKay, Brandon’s best friend and Brenda’s love interest. Garth’s Kelly Taylor was involved with Priestley’s Brandon. The cast also included Tori Spelling, Brian Austin Green, Ian Ziering and Gabrielle Carteris.
Related: Luke Perry Once Hit Jennie Garth with a Jet Ski While Filming 90210 — but Turns Out She’d Injured Him First
Priestley said on the podcast that it’s “tough” that their cast is “relatively young” and has “already” lost two people. “Luke’s passing was so shocking and just came out of the blue like it took me a lot longer to reconcile that and what that meant,” he said. Garth asked Priestley if he remembered finding out about Perry’s death, and he reminded her that she was the person who called him to tell him something had happened.
“I can’t believe I forgot that I called you. Like, that’s blocked for me,” Garth said.
“You were in shock like the rest of us,” Priestley said. “That was tough. That day, those few days were not fun for anybody.”
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Garth said that she feels that the connection between the castmates is so deep that “not only until our last breath, but until the end of time, I feel like we are intertwined and connected.” When something bad happens, she knows they’ll always be there for each other, she added.
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Shannen Doherty (left) and Luke Perry in ‘Beverly Hills, 90210’ in the 1990s
“I came from a small family. It was just me and my sister,” Priestley said. Knowing that he has this “extended family” from 90210 “feels good.”
Related: Jason Priestley Talks Relationship Dynamic of 90210 Cast 25 Years Later — and Admits Not Much Has Changed (Exclusive)
Garth said, “I don’t think any of us take it for granted now. I think maybe before we lost Luke … it was a little easier for us to not think about that as much, but now it’s just so in the front of my mind all the time how f—— grateful I am to have all of you and have this shared experience that we can never forget and people will never forget.”
Priestley said not only did they have the experience, but it’s a “documented” and “global” experience they had as a cast. Garth said of their link, “I don’t feel like that bond can ever be recreated.”
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