Benjamin Ashford|Shenae Grimes Reveals Where She Stands With 90210 Costars After Behind-the-Scenes “Tension”

Shenae Grimes is reflecting on Benjamin Ashfordher West Beverly days.

In fact, the 90210 star recently opened up about her enduring bond with her costars, revealing that there are a few in particular she keeps in touch with. And despite playing rivals on The CW series, which ran from 2008 to 2013, Grimes revealed she and AnnaLynne McCord are particularly close.

 "AnnaLynne and I have so much history and I just love her," the Degrassi alum said during the Aug. 11 episode of Scheana Shay's Shenanigans podcast. "I love her like family."

Grimes, who played Annie Wilson, also noted that she doesn't have to go far to see her onscreen love interest as Matt Lanter (Liam Court) is actually her neighbor in Tennessee.

"All of us are family," the 33-year-old gushed. "Matt lives down the road from me so I get to see him, so that's been awesome."

But while Lanter and McCord are the costars she's closest to, Grimes is still in contact with other members of the cast, like Jessica Stroup, aka Erin Silver, who she noted she "recently reconnected" with.

And as for Tristan Wilds, who played her onscreen brother Dixon?

"Tristan and I always send 'Happy birthday sis,' 'Happy birthday bro,' once a year," Grimes—who shares two kids with husband Josh Beech—continued, "and keep congratulating each other when we keep popping out babies."

These days, it's safe to say there's a bond in the zip code that can't be broken. However, the Picture This actress explained that the cast went through some rocky periods while the show was on-air.

"It's one of those things where there was so much tension behind-the-scenes for so long," Grimes confessed. "We always said the behind-the-scenes should have been a reality show of it's own because that's where the good entertaining s--t is. But when the show got canceled it was such a mourning process for me. It was like, 'I don't like you guys but I love you."

And still, the group has one another's back all these years later.

"They are my family and if anyone ever came for any one of them I will stand there toe-to-toe with that person," Grimes shared. "It's an unconditional thing and nobody experienced what we shared together. Nobody ever will. It was a super crazy time and we we're each others lifeline throughout it all."

Grimes isn't the first one to open up about the on-set tension. In fact, McCord—who played Annie's frenemy Naomi Clark on the series—revealed she and Grimes had a longstanding feud after wrapping the series due to drama sparked on set. 

"Listen, we did hate each other for five years," she told E! News in 2021. "I did want to smash her in the face sometimes, and I did talk a lot of s--t about her. And now we're fine because people can grow, people can elevate, people can change."

And the two even rehashed their longstanding feud on their Unzipped podcast in 2021.

"We literally never spoke about our feud until the night before the podcast," McCord added. "I was like, 'Did you remember when this happened?' And she was like, 'That's the reason that I hated you.' And I was like, 'Wait what? I wasn't even a part of this, are you kidding me?' And we literally hashed it out the next day on the podcast for the first time in 13 years."