Jennie Garth has revealed that her former Beverly Hills 90210 co-star Luke Perry was her “first love” when they worked together in the ’90s.
“Yeah, I think he was my first real love,” Garth said in an interview with People magazine published Wednesday while promoting her upcoming memoir, “I Choose Me: Chasing Joy, Finding Purpose, and Embracing Reinvention.”
“I look back now and think, ‘You were just like any other girl in the world,'” she recalled.
In his book, Garth details how he got through his on-screen and off-screen relationships with Perry, stating that he felt jealous of all the guest stars that Perry flirted with.
“Everyone imagined him as their real first love. But it was really confusing. It got a little blurry at times. There were a lot of intimate conversations and moments between these two characters, and I think I allowed myself to get caught up in it and think it was real,” she told the outlet.
“I still believe there was something real there,” she continued. “We had a very special relationship.”
“When Kelly was in love with Dylan, I was in love with Luke,” she writes of their flirtatious relationship, citing famous characters.
But eventually, things became clear for Garth after the two stars moved on with their real-life partners.
“The whole mess stayed with me because he got married and I got married and we became really great friends. And it was just a stupid dream, but as a teenager I really believed it,” she said.
Perry was married to actress Rachel Sharp, with whom he lived from 1993 to 2003. The two had two children together, a son, Jack, and a daughter, Sophie.
After “Beverly Hills, 90210” ended airing, Garth married Peter Facinelli in 2001. The couple had three daughters, Luca (28), Laura (23), and Fiona (19). The project was ultimately canceled and they divorced in 2013.
In her book, Garth also recalls the low point of her divorce. She detailed an incident in which she developed a bloated stomach as a result of ingesting alcohol and pills and ended up in the hospital.
Perry passed away in March 2019 at the age of 52 after suffering a massive stroke.
Garth wrote in his memoirs that his death “shocked me to the core.”
“I was paralyzed, unable or unwilling to speak. It was too big to comprehend and shocking to accept,” she writes.
“I Choose Me: Chasing Joy, Finding Purpose, and Embracing Reinvention” will be released on April 14th.
