Okay, planets. Why not ?
But Life ? Even planets are likely going to have a hard time not smashing into each other. I really don't see that kind of environment as being anywhere near a place where Life could take hold.
On the other hand, with all the stuff that's in the area, water is likely to be there as well, so those planets could very well have water. If they are massive rocky planets, there could be water deep down, shielded by dozens of meters of rock, where some form of bacterial life could subsist.
Since the idea is that planets form in the accretion disk, they will orbit the black hole and not get sucked in. That means that they'll be around for the next wave of matter that falls in. Except that, if that next wave is in the form of an incoming star, then all bets are off as to the stability of the planets' orbits. They'll either get ejected from the system (at high velocity), or they'll be dragged into the singularity, ripping apart along the way.
Either outcome means the death of any life that may have taken hold.
Not a nice place to be born, to say the least.