'Saved By the Bell's Mario Lopez and Elizabeth Berkley Lauren Talk 'Bittersweet' Dustin Diamond Tribute (Exclusive)

Returning to Bayside for the second season of Peacock's Saved By the Bell reboot was a particularly emotional experience for original cast members Mario Lopez and Elizabeth Berkley Lauren after the death of their former co-star, Dustin Diamond, in February 2021. Diamond, who played Screech on the original teen sitcom, passed away at only 44 after a battle with lung cancer, and it was important for everyone on the reboot to pay tribute to his legacy, both Lopez and Berkley Lauren told PopCulture.com ahead of the Nov. 24 Season 2 premiere. 

Bringing together the original cast, including Mark-Paul Gosselaar, Tiffani Thiessen and Lark Voorhies, at the end of the Season 2 premiere for a special moment was "bittersweet" for Lopez due to the "incredibly sad" circumstances surrounding his former co-star's passing. 

When it came to honoring Diamond and his character of Screech on the new season, Lopez said, "I thought we handled it in a classy, tasteful way." Having been "lucky enough" to speak with Diamond before his passing, Lopez was "so glad" the show decided to address the tragedy so quickly. "Again, [it's] just very sad," he shared. "But I'm glad we got to celebrate him at least in the first episode."

Berkley Lauren shared that leading up to filming the tribute, there was a lot of thought that went into how best to address Diamond's passing in the show. "We had a lot of obviously meaningful conversations and delicate conversations about how best to do this," she told PopCulture. "There's no right way, it's just a lot of communication about what felt right."

Crediting showrunner Tracey Wigfield's "beautiful heart," sensitivity and "brilliant mind" with striking the "delicate" balance required of the tribute, Berkley Lauren shared, "She knew how important it was to do it right for the fans and to honor him as a human being and an artist. So I hope that we really captured that. ...I am proud and hope that people feel the same that it's something to be proud of and a true tribute to him."

Wigfield also opened up to PopCulture.com about planning the tribute, saying it was important for her as a fan of the original series to make sure it was "sensitive and appropriate and meaningful to the people who did know him." She continued, "We wanted to do something more than just put up a card about him at the end. He was a huge part of this franchise, and also everyone has had such a hard, hard, dark past year that it felt like everyone understood the feeling coming into the first episode that this year has been hard. There's a lot of people we've lost that we'll never see again, and so we sort of did an episode where our characters are dealing with that." Saved By the Bell returns with a new season to Peacock on Nov. 24.