‘Saved by the Bell’ Revival Casts Kids Of The Original Characters (L to R: Mitchell Hoog, Alycia Pascual-Pena, Haskiri Velazquez, Belmont Cameli)
The ‘Saved by the Bell’ revival will not only include guest spots from some of the original cast members, but also feature their offspring, as Peacock, the new NBCUniversal streaming service, rounds out the cast for the show.
The premise for the show sees Mark-Paul Gosselaar return in a guest-star role as Zack Morris, who is now California governor! When he gets into hot water for closing too many low-income high schools, Morris proposes they send the affected students to the highest performing schools in the state, including Bayside High. The influx of new students gives the overprivileged Bayside kids a much needed and hilarious dose of reality.
Along with Gosselaar, returning cast includes Mario Lopez as A.C. Slater and Elizabeth Berkley as Jessie Spano. Tiffani Thiessen, who played Kelly Kapowski, is not confirmed yet, but expected to appear in “some capacity”.
New cast announced includes Mitchell Hoog, who plays Mac Morris, the handsome, charming, privileged son of Governor Zack Morris. Hoog has popped up in tv shows ‘Roswell, New Mexico’ and ‘Daybreak’, along with the movies ‘Harriet’ and ‘Richard Jewell’, and is next due to appear in ‘The Conjuring 3’. Joining him as another original character’s child is Belmont Cameli, who plays Jamie Spano, the captain of the Bayside football team and Jessie’s sensitive man-child son. He recently appeared in the indie movie ‘Most Guys Are Losers’ starring Mira Sorvino and Andy Buckley, and had a guest spot on ‘Empire’.
Other new cast includes Haskiri Velazquez (‘The Birch’) who plays Daisy, a smart, ambitious sophomore who is excited at the prospect of attending Bayside High after her local school gets shut down; And Alycia Pascual-Pena (‘Chase’) who plays Aisha, Daisy’s fun-loving, but ultra-competitive best friend. She grew up playing on boys’ sports teams and causes a stir when she tries to play football at Bayside.
These four join the previously announced Josie Totah (‘Spider-Man: Homecoming’, ‘No Good Nick’) as Lexi, a beautiful, sharp-tongued cheerleader and the most popular girl at Bayside High who is both admired and feared by her fellow students; And John Michael Higgins (‘Pitch Perfect’), who plays Principal Toddman, a man who is constantly being pranked by his privileged students and yelled at by their entitled parents, but the influx of new, low-income students gives him a second chance to really make a difference.
The original show ran from 1989 to 1993, spawning 2 spinoffs, ‘Saved by the Bell: The College Years’ and ‘Saved by the Bell: The New Class’, along with a couple of tv movies. Tracy Wigfield (‘Good News’) serves as a writer and executive producer on this new iteration, alongside Peter Egel, who developed the original series, Franco Bario, Gosselaar, Lopez, and Berkley.
The new ‘Saved by the Bell’ will air on streaming service Peacock, which launches stateside in April 2020. We don’t yet know when or where it will air in the UK, however, given it is NBCUniversal, who are now part of the Sky family, there is a good chance we will see it on a Sky channel at some point. We’ll let you know when we hear more.
