Things from Secret Life's Ben & Adrian **HUGE SPOILER**

by Amy K. Bredemeyer

Last week The Talking Box took part in a Q&A with Francia Raisa and Ken Baumann, who respectively play Adrian & Ben on The Secret Life of the American Teenager. As with our other interviews, lots of great things came up, and we've been teasing on Twitter that we'd share some tidbits for a few days now. Well, today's the day! Luckily, it fell on a Wednesday, so our planned list got bumped back and we'll look at some of the highlights of the Q&A in list form.

Before you read any further, know that we have some HUGE SPOILERS below, so flip over to another post if you want to avoid knowing some upcoming show plots!! And, as a quick note, there were some technical difficulties so we received more details from Francia than from Ken (though we personally had some good questions for him!).

- [First, some non-spoiler things, in case you are the type who starts skimming before seeing big bold letters, LoL.] Francia is obsessed with Grey's Anatomy and also enjoys Desperate Housewives. Ken prefers Breaking Bad, though he was a fan of Jersey Shore for a couple seasons. 

- Francia says that she's like Adrian in that they both are sassy and good students, though Francia says she's not the "bad girl" that Adrian is, and that she didn't grow up in a broken home like Adrian. Similarly, Ken relates to the confident Ben rather than the shy Ben.

- Neither actor had any specific advice that they'd want to go back and tell themselves when The Secret Life of the American Teenager began, though Francia did note that she'd want to prepare for all of the emotional drama that would come. Francia feels that being a few years older than her character helps in understanding a lot of the situations, as she's in the adult world and is more open-minded than she was as a high schooler. 

- In case you didn't see our news post yesterday, the BIG SPOILER is that Ben and Adrian's baby is stillborn. And, that episode will air next Monday, June 6th. Prior to this story, the most difficult part of Adrian's life for Francia to play was the search for and rejection from her father. While not personally familiar with that sort of thing, Francia did recognize that is can be very difficult and had a tough time trying to imagine herself in that position.

- Both Francia and Ken felt that the stillborn baby storyline really challenged them as actors. Ken noted that television does not often feature such plots, so it was quite the opportunity to be able to portray all of the emotions that come up in the loss of a child.

- When asked what Francia did to prepare for performing a character who has lost a child, she said that she watched some youtube videos of stillbirths. She saw the happiness of a pregnant couple followed by them holding a dead baby. The song that plays in the background of the video reminds her of the baby, so she added it to her iPod and listened to it over and over. [It may be this video, though that's just my best guess based on the way Francia described it.]

- Francia had fun with the pregnancy padding and seeing what she'd look like pregnant, but it was hot and tight at times. She'd go out and talk about being pregnant and act like it, even though she wasn't in real life.

- A big topic was how the other characters respond to Ben & Adrian's loss. It seems that the tragedy causes everyone to come together, but Adrian wants to deal with the pain alone, and old feelings come up all around. Adrian and Amy continue to be frenemies, and over the next few episodes, Ben begins to show desire for Amy once again!

- Francia was excited when she found out her character was going to be pregnant. She was excited about the pregnancy padding, and she really enjoys children. So, she was devastated when she read the script and found out that there would be no baby. Still, Francia was very excited to do such a tough role.

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Overall, some great insight into the characters was given, and we certainly look forward to seeing how everything turns out next week and the episodes that follow. It was a great time with Francia & Ken, and we're grateful to ABCFamily for letting us take part in the Q&A!

Do you remember when we talked with India Eisley, who plays Ashley on Secret Life? That post can be found here. 

Additionally, we did a Q&A with Vanessa Marano this morning, so if you're getting excited about ABCFamily's Switched at Birth, keep checking back to see what she shared with us!