Mark-Paul Gosselaar says a 'Saved by the Bell' reboot could only work if it was 'worth everyone's time'
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Mark-Paul Gosselaar addresses a potential 'Saved by the Bell' reboot, tells Fox News he'd 'like to see a version that was worth everyone's time.' (AP)
Could the beloved ‘90s show “Saved by the Bell” one day return to our television screens?
Mark-Paul Gosselaar, who played iconic character Zack Morris on the hit comedy series, is open to the idea of doing a reboot.
“I’d like to see a version that was worth everyone’s time,” Gosselaar told Fox News at the 2018 Television Critic Association’s Summer Press Tour in Beverly Hills, Calif.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}“There’s a lot of versions that we see that don’t do it justice,” he explained of the current reboot trend. “But I’d like to see a version, yeah, I’d like to see a version that we’d all agree on.”
However, the star notes that he has “no idea” where he wants the show, which ran for five seasons and last aired in 1993, to go.
“I haven’t even thought about that,” Gosselaar admitted.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}“I do like what ‘Cobra Kai’ has done. I think that that’s a very interesting way of doing a reboot,” he said of the “Karate Kid” reboot. “I don’t know if whether or not we could do that with our show, but I’d be interested in something that was along the lines of that.”
(From left) Lark Voorhies as Lisa Turtle, Ed Alonzo as Max, Tiffani Thiessen as Kelly Kapowski, Mark-Paul Gosselaar as Zack Morris, Dennis Haskins as Mr. Richard Belding, Elizabeth Berkley as Jessie Myrtle Spano, Dustin Diamond as Screen Powers, and Mario Lopez as A.C. Slater in "Saved by the Bell." (Getty Images)
When the series first premiered Gosselaar was only 15 years old and just starting out in Hollywood, now the star, 44, is a seasoned actor with a long list of projects under his belt including his latest TV show, “The Passage,” which tells the story of a group of death row inmates turned vampires.
Asked if being a dad affects the roles he currently takes on, Gosselaar said “it really doesn’t” but where they film does.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}“In 20 years I’ve never had to leave California for a show that I’ve started, this will be the first time we’re shooting in Atlanta,” the father of four shared. “It’ll will be a whole other obstacle to tackle because I’ve never been away from my wife and kids, we’re going to make it work. But role-wise, no. There isn’t too much because I can separate that. I can say, ‘I’m an actor.’”
As for if his children — sons, Michael, 14, Dekker, 4, and daughters, Lachlyn, 3, Ava, 12 — are interested in following in their father’s entertainment footsteps?
“No. Thank God,” Gosselaar said. “Only for the sake that I just don’t want to drive them to go to auditions.”
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}However, if they did want to act, the former child star says he’d “have a very long conversation to see if it was something that they absolutely wanted to do.”
“But I think there’s opportunities for people who are interested in the art to do it at a later age,” he explained. “My son is very interested in behind the camera, and there’s opportunities that he has in school, and my daughter too she’s a performer, but there’s opportunities in school.
"It hasn’t gotten to the point where they say, ‘I need to be on screen’ — where when I grew up, I wanted to be on screen and I wanted to entertain people.”