Career: Television > 90210 (2008-?)

Character: Adrianna Duncan Creators: J. Judah, G. Sachs & R. THomas Status: Hiatus Realese: 2008 Genre: Comedy | Drama | Music

Useful Links: Images Videos IMDb Official Site

Synopsis: New Drama. Same Zip Code.

First appearance: September 2, 2008 (“We’re Not in Kansas Anymore”)
Occupation: Student at West Beverly Hills High, actress, singer
Children: Maisie (daughter, with Ty; given up for adoption)

Storyline:
Season1: At the opening of the series, Adrianna is an aspiring actress and Naomi Clark’s best friend. She is often known to whistle while working. She suffers from a serious drug addiction and is pressured by her mother, Constance, to support the family financially with her acting career. In order to afford her drug addiction, Adrianna steals money from her affluent best friend, Naomi. When the school undergoes a drug search, Naomi attempts to protect Adrianna by flushing her drugs down the toilet, but is caught and arrested. Even though she promises she will turn herself in in order to clear Naomi of the charges, Adrianna overdoses before she can. Her Mother checks her into a drug rehabilitation clinic, paid for by classmate Navid Shirazi. As a result, Navid and Adrianna grow closer. During one of his visits to the clinic, Navid helps her reconnect with Naomi by driving to the Homecoming dance, where the two friends reconcile. As a result of his kindness, Adrianna discovers that he has been in love with her since they were children and they begin a relationship.

After discovering one of her ex-boyfriends, Hank, has relapsed after finding out he was HIV positive, Adrianna takes an HIV-test. While she is negative for HIV, the results do reveal she is pregnant but the paternity is still unknown. Adrianna is unsure of the paternity, as her memories of recent sexual experiences have been clouded by her drug addiction. She does, however, know that the child is not Navid’s, as they have not yet had sex. She and Navid break up as she reveals that she is pregnant because he doesn’t believe that he can deal with her being pregnant with someone else’s child. Eventually it is revealed that the baby’s father is not Hank (whom she had slept with a few times when she was on drugs), but Ty Collins, her co-star in the school production of Spring Awakening. Naomi’s opinion is that she should get an abortion, while Kelly Taylor thinks she should raise it or give it up for adoption. She drives all night and ends up at a clinic, where they tell her she’s too far along to get an abortion. Naomi convinces Adrianna to tell Ty, and he tells his parents. Ty’s parents tell Adrianna that they will pay for the doctor and anything else she needs. They also say that when she starts to show, they will send her to a retreat in New Mexico, so that nobody finds out, to which she readily agrees. Bolstered by the Collins’ support, Adrianna becomes more confident in her ability to deal with her situation. Later, Ty gives Adrianna a contract which states that Adrianna must keep the whole pregnancy a secret and she realizes that their support hides the reality that they are ashamed of her and her unborn child. Adrianna is unwilling to tell her mother about her pregnancy, as she thinks that Constance will throw her out. Naomi convinces Adrianna to call Ty, as she thinks that the contract is unfair. Adrianna does so, and Ty’s mother comes over to Adrianna’s house to discuss the baby with Adrianna’s mother. Ty’s mother and Adrianna sit down to talk and Constance, Adrianna’s mother, finds out about the pregnancy. Ty’s mother gets kicked out of the house due to her arrogance and Constance talks to Adrianna and apologizes for putting so much pressure on her and they reconcile.

Adrianna goes to school and decides to tell everyone her ‘secret’, so she gets help from Navid to announce through the school’s video system that she is pregnant and that there is no father. Abandoning his date at the Homecoming dance, Navid shows up at Adrianna’s house and asks her to be his Valentine and she accepts. A short while later, Navid proposes and she says yes. After Navid’s mother approaches Adrianna and tells her that she thinks she should give the baby up, Adrianna takes prescription drugs to combat the stress. After this, she tells Navid that she knows she has to give the baby away. Later, at the prom, Navid and Ty scuffle when Navid becomes irate about Ty ignoring Adrianna and Adrianna subsequently goes into labor. She has a daughter whom she gives up for adoption and the foster parents name her Maisie.

Season 2: It is revealed that Adrianna and Silver have grown closer during the summer through their mutual friendships with Naomi. Naomi and Silver have been in summer school due to Annie busting Naomi’s post-Prom party. Navid and Adrianna’s relationship has been progressing slowly, and while he is ready to take it to the next level, even going as far as to rent a cabana, she isn’t, and still wants to wait. Meanwhile, Adrianna runs into her childhood boyfriend, Teddy, causing jealousy in Navid, due to their close relationship and Naomi, who has taken a liking to Teddy. The end of the first episode shows Adrianna and Naomi comforting Silver over her issues with Dixon and beginning their first day back at school, with Naomi proclaiming that this was going to be “their” year. Adrianna and Teddy kiss on his father’s yacht. Adrianna felt bad and went back and slept with Navid. They later kiss again. Adrianna tells him that he shouldn’t have done that and walks away. Adrianna receives her 6 month chip for sobriety at a meeting, and has also been in contact with Silver’s mom. In “Wild Alaskan Salmon” she breaks up with Navid for Teddy and she said to Teddy she liked their relationship but he says he didn’t want a relationship and she walks away confused. Then she goes to Navid telling him she wanted to get back together but he says no and he says he knew about her and Teddy and then he says it wasn’t Silver that told him it was Teddy that told him. Later in “Unmasked” she begins to avoid Teddy because of what he did to her. In “Women’s Intution” Adrianna fails at winning Navid back, and thus, begins another downward spiral when she witnesses Navid flirting with other girls, and Teddy flirting with Silver. She purchases drugs from Jasper, the boyfriend of her old friend Annie. Navid later sees Adrianna buying drugs from Jasper at school. He confronts her about it but she angrily denies it. Naomi later finds her drugs at her house and leaves angry at her for lying.

When Adrianna finds out about the death of Silver’s mother and Navid’s injury, she decides to make a change for the better. She gets rid of all her drugs and tells Navid that she plans on working on herself, because she realized that even though during the previous year when she was off drugs she had been acting like an addict, as in, extremely dependent on him. Then, at the Winter Wonderland dance, she sees Jasper with Annie. During an intervention for Annie, Adrianna comes clean and tells her that she purchased the drugs from him and that she’s willing to come forward if she has too. Navid tells her that she shouldn’t because she’ll get expelled. Adrianna’s strength and selflessness helps her begin to mend friendships with Silver and Naomi. The three also befriend Annie once they learn the truth about Jen. Adrianna also finds companionship in Gia, fellow West Bev Blazer and former addict. They become close, helping each other out during troubled times. Adrianna helps Gia move on from her ex. Gia convinces Ade to audition to be in an all-girl band, and when Gia confesses to Adrianna that she has feelings for her, Adrianna herself begins to question if their friendship could turn into something more. After a heart-to-heart with Gia, Adrianna comes to the realisation that she reciprocates Gia’s feelings and the two then embark on a relationship. During the early stages of the relationship, Adrianna is reluctant to be public with their relationship much to Gia’s dismay but after Adrianna performs live with ‘The Glorious Steinems’ she walks up to Gia to kiss her in front of the audience, after realising that it shouldn’t matter what others think.

Adrianna is then approached by Ivy’s mother, Laurel, who hopes to sign her as a solo singer. Put in the awkward situation of having to choose between staying in the band or going solo she talks to Navid and comes to the conclusion that she should go with the latter. Adrianna then has a heated argument with Gia due to the fact that Adrianna chose to speak with Navid about her doubts rather than Gia and causes Gia to walk out. While at a party, Adrianna and Laurel have a talk and Laurel tells Adrianna to follow her heart and leave the party to find Gia. Adrianna takes this advice and arrives at Gia’s place only to walk in on Gia with her ex, causing Adrianna to leave.

As Adrianna’s music career begins to take off, Laurel has her write a song which turns into a duet between her and famous singer Javier. The two feel an instant connection and things heat up fast while Navid realizes that he still has feelings for her and decides that he’s going to do what he can to win her back. Adrianna gives up on Navid because she thinks he doesn’t like her anymore. Navid leaves a bracelet for Adrianna and a note saying “Meet me on the Roof.” After Adrianna performs, she is offered a trip to New York to sing with Javier, before she can see the bracelet. Navid sees them leave and thinks that Adrianna chose Javier. Then Javier pretends the bracelet is from him. However when shooting a live segment for The Blaze, Navid sees the bracelet and asks to speak with Adrianna alone. They fight about the bracelet and Adrianna realizes that it was from Navid because all her favourite things are on there, including the date they first kissed. Adrianna and Navid get back together but Javier offers Adrianna a chance open for Javier’s tour, which is all year long.

Season 3: Adrianna’s music career will reach new heights but much of the season is supposedly going to go back and explore a bit of her past, including her childhood and dealing with an absent father and giving up a baby for adoption.

Development:
The character of Adrianna was originally scripted as a guest spot in the series’ pilot. When Lowndes was cast, she only knew that her character was a singer in the school musical, and as a singer herself, she was excited to sing on television. However, Lowndes was surprised when “they chopped my hair off, and wrote this amazing material for me in which I had a drug addiction and I was dying. I honestly didn’t know where it was going.” The day after she filmed the drug overdose scene, Lowndes was offered series-regular status

When Lowndes realized her character was a drug addict, she did a lot of research and talked to real recovering addicts in Vancouver and over the phone. She did not “want to make light of it since I didn’t have those experiences myself”. Upon revelation of Adrianna’s pregnancy in the series, Lowndes said that the fate of the baby was still undecided. The actress also explained that Ty and Adrianna had been together before that night at the hotel, as shown in episode “Wide Awake and Dreaming”.

To create Adrianna’s “rough” look during her drug addiction, Lowndes had to sit through “an hour of intense white makeup on my face and red and gray under my eyes to create broken capillaries”. For her character’s pregnancy, Lowndes said she couldn’t wait to wear a heavy pregnancy belly. The actress said that “by the end of the day my back and feet are killing, so I feel like a real pregnant lady”.

Since the beginning of season 2, the character of Adrianna has become one of the central characters of the show, having ties to many of the other storylines involving her friendships with Naomi and Silver as well as her connection to Annie’s storyline. Many critics have praised Lowndes for taking on issues in society that play into her characters such as HIV, teen pregnancy, drug addiction, recovery, and sexuality. In addition, season 2 brought on a musical plot which Lowndes was excited about as she is a singer in real life. Two of her songs have since been featured on the show.

Reception:
Jessica acknowledged that initial response to her character was “a little negative — people loved to hate me, and my haircut”. However, she felt that reception became more positive afterward, and recovering addicts told her that she depicted it in a real way. Jessica thought that people could related that what she was going through, and that people are “going to like her even more as we go on”.