‘Saved by the Bell’ Reboot: Mark-Paul Gosselaar Reveals Why He and Tiffani Thiessen Weren’t in Trailer

Mark-Paul Gosselaar is preparing to step back into the shoes of his famous character role Zack Morris on the Saved by the Bell reboot. In an interview with Entertainment Tonight, he revealed why he couldn’t just be Zach again without a lot of prep, further adding how he and fellow co-star Tiffani Thiessen weren’t in the trailer, which debuted Wednesday. Gosselaar admitted that while production started in January, he and his co-star, Thiessen have yet to step foot on set due to their busy schedules and since production has been shut down because of the coronavirus pandemic.

“They had been in production since January, but because of my schedule and because of Tiffani Thiessen’s schedule, we could not join the production when it started,” he said. “We had about two weeks left of filming, just Tiffani and my footage, but it’s put on hold. So hopefully we are going to get back to that…whenever we can.”

Even though he plays the older version of himself on the new series, fans can expect his signature look with blonde hair and a clean shaved face. The 46-year-old currently stars on Mixed-ish and rocks a brunette hair color and facial hair, but will get that cleaned up for his role as Morris. “For Mixed-ish, I am a little bit more hippie and facial hair. For Saved by the Bell, I have to be clean-shaved and obviously, my hair is blonde…Thankfully, I didn’t have to dye my hair this time — which I did for six years when I was on the original show.” Click here to watch trailer.

Since Gosselaar hasn’t been on set yet, when the trailer came out, that was all he could go off since he hasn’t seen anything. “I hadn’t been on set, everything for us has just been prep, but watching the trailer and seeing how it’s shot, I think it’s very smart.. it looks amazing and the content is great.”

Gosselaar and Thiessen will be joined by other familiar faces from the original show like Mario Lopez and Elizabeth Berkley. They’ll head back to Bayside with a whole new group of teens. His new role will entail a little bit of controversy involving a decision his character makes. “[He] gets into hot water for closing too many low-income high schools and 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,” he explained.

As for getting back into character, he says that he’s trying to “understand him, because there is a way that he says things and if you say it the wrong way, it can come off very douchey.” He then went on to complement the actor who plays his on-screen son, saying that he was perfectly cast for the role. The Saved by the Bell reboot will air on NBC later this year.