Episode 25: Jessie's Song
Zack to the Future- 1,371 views
- 10 Feb 2021
On today’s show, Elizabeth Berkley Lauren joins Mark-Paul and Dashiell to re-visit the iconic episode when Jessie gets hooked on caffeine pills.
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Hello, listeners, the following episode was recorded before the sudden and sad passing of Dustin Diamond. We're still processing last week's news, but please know we'll spend some dedicated time to talk about Dustin in the future. So now, as we conclude season one of this podcast, we hope you, the fans, enjoy this special episode and look forward to kicking off Season two, remembering the life and legacy of Dustin Diamond. Welcome to To the Future. I'm your co-host, Daniel Driscoll, joined today by the creative visionary behind Hot Sun, Mark Goslar.
Hello, Mark. Oh, hello, Daniel. I am so thrilled and so jubilant. Jubilant to introduce. I got it to Saurus, our very special guest, Elizabeth Berkley. Lauren. And we need to insert a sound of clapping.
I'm clapping for real. No clapping as I said it.
I am.
And you guys, I am so extraordinarily thrilled. Like, are we not allowed to use the word this whole. Let's just use it.
We can it'll it'll it would be we will. Look, we everyone knows we're trying maybe not to, but we will. And that's that's part of it. Listen, if you didn't catch the show last week, someone had pointed out that Daniel has a lack of a better word. Well, he has a lack of better words to be used for lack of a better word than the word fun. Like, if you listen to our shows in the past, Daniel tends to use that word freely to describe our show.
And last week, he really tried to use other words because a Twitter follower had said to Daniel, who is a writer, by the way, that he needs to and he needs to invest in a thesaurus.
So wouldn't you say in particular, this particular show that we're about to break down? There's one word it's overused in the culture, in pop culture pertaining to this episode. So we all might be using it a little too much. But I think we're allowed today.
Yeah, I think so. So that brings me to my first question for you. Is that what OK, we're talking about the phrase, I'm so excited. So when you say that you're in real life, do you catch yourself? Do you actually like doing like a verbal grunt or anything every time you say it?
I love that you're asking me because it's one of those that if I'm doing any sort of public type of press situation and I use it, either someone's going to call me out on it immediately or I myself have to kind of have fun and send myself up. Right. But in life, like like if I'm talking to my husband or to you, Mark Pontes, I'm so excited. It's more of an am I like we and that's where I catch myself because I've been reminded for twenty five thirty years of that those three words.
I'm so excited. I've been reminded by fans to a loving, appreciative kind of celebratory way about that particular episode. And so it's just it's a part of my life and I love to have fun with it and play with it. But yes, I am conscious of it when I say I can't help it. It's not neutral. Like if I say I'm delighted or I'm eager or I'm enthusiastic or passionate. No, but I'm so excited. Yes, it has a charge to it.
Yeah. They're not even my words. I didn't even utter them, you know, originally. But when I say them in public, I catch myself and I wonder if.
Yeah, and it's and it's not necessarily the people that I'm talking to, they might understand the reference, but I do end up in the back of my head going, oh God, I probably shouldn't use those three words in that sequence.
You know, it's funny, I was just doing the Today Show to promote the new show. And the one of the the host said we're so excited to have.
And so my first line, I called you Marquel.
I said she said, I'm so excited. And I said, are you?
And you didn't know for a minute what I may not be the co-host said, Oh, she's referring to. Right. So that was the only time I got myself in something where, like, it didn't land.
And you're being overly familiar, like you thought they were in on it. They were just using it. Like most people, people use the word excited to prop up the human experience. We just we said, I'm excited to see you next week. I'm excited like we're no one's really that excited about anything. But it's like a it's a word that gets us through life. So that's why we're just using it. I'm sure they were they were excited, but you know what I mean.
There's a reason it's so commonly used.
But, yeah, she just didn't catch the connection for a minute. And it was the only time I think I've ever used it where I felt like, yeah, that wasn't successful.
It didn't land on the other one saved me. Well, Daniel, I have done my homework and I know that Elizabeth has done her homework. But in case the audience hasn't done their homework, please give us the rundown of this episode. The thing a longer than usual rundown, I might add, because this is such a dense episode. But here we go. You didn't do it, Jesse. Studying for the. Geometry midterm to get into Stanford.
Zack, here's the girl saying and offers to manage them, Screech secretly recorded them singing in the locker room to send to Zack's dad Zach's dad's record industry contact. Slater discovers Jesse is using caffeine pills. She promises to stop but doesn't. Instead of studying, Jesse records a music video with Lisa and Kelly for Hot Sun. There are group Slater learns Jesse still using pills. He tries to tell Zach, who is only focused on the record execs coming to see Hot Sun at the max.
When Zach gets Jesse for the show, she's disoriented and strung out on caffeine pills. She has a breakdown. Hot Sun performs with Screech subbing in and the gang comforts. Jesse, who is going to seek help for her new problem. Wow. A lot happens in that episode. That's that's Jesse song. So Marcoule Elizabeth, what about this episode, do you think? Really Deja Vu is like why do you think it stood out as so iconic and and so well remembered among fans?
You know, it's really stood the test of time 30 years later.
It's really interesting because I've never really thought about why it has had this impact in the way that it has, and especially because it's really now because of social media, you see clips and pieces of either the extraordinary kind of heightened moment that has become kind of famous and memes have been made of it. There's there's so many things having to do with that little piece. But there are, like you said, there's so many layers to this. And I I wonder if you agree and if being that this was season three and people were so invested in us by then, people had been seeing it and kind of falling in love with these characters and starting to care about us in a way where they felt like we were their own friends.
It kind of caught you. It was I think it caught people off guard because we had never kind of gone there with any theme that was really deeper than who was going to ask to the dance know. It's like this one really does it. So I feel like this one went really deep in the way that as deep as a Saturday morning show could go in terms of the subject matter. And I think seeing the characters that they've seen in this kind of funny kind of joyful way, do you have any vulnerability really for the first time for all of us?
I think as actors, we even got to show a lot more range in this episode. But I'm so curious what you think.
Yeah, I'm still trying to figure it out. I mean, I guess it's it's catchy, right? I mean, it's a we've talked about the phrase, I'm so excited. That is an easy thing to grasp. And you could take away from an episode. And that's what I going into doing my homework for this show, for this particular episode, I thought that that's all we had to work on was that iconic scene between Jesse and Zach. But there's so much more I mean, there's there's a lot going on in this episode.
And I had no I had forgotten the reason why you were taking caffeine pills. Like, I thought it was like, oh, Jesse just being Jesse. She's, you know, she's studying for something. But I never knew the importance of how how important it was for you to go to Stanford and how much pressure you're putting on yourself and how you were feeling like you couldn't be you couldn't be everything for everyone. No, you're right.
I mean, it's and it's such a you know, as someone who works with teen girls, it's a big part of my life facilitating self-esteem programs in schools as a volunteer when I have that kind of understanding of that teenage adolescent experience, especially now. I mean, you know, as a dad like that age right now, the pressure to be good at everything, the category of the criteria that was going on, then maybe it's even intensified more now, but especially for, you know, she just see what had a singular focus and a singular goal and anything else to take her off that track created anxiety.
It was not something you really talked about much back then, you know, anxiety or perfectionism or any of those things. And that was really the first show that kind of dealt with it.
Yeah, it's interesting. While we were shooting it, too, you know, there was another there was another show in the air that that dealt with teen issues and that was nine to one oh nine to one being a prime time show was able to, you know, that they were they were drinking and abusing other drugs besides caffeine pills.
I say this because it's interesting. You know, when when we got the script, it wasn't like, oh, we're doing a lame show about caffeine pills.
I look at it. I look at it. I would look at it that way now. But back then we took it as, oh, wow, this is interesting. This is actually a show about your. Use of a substance, and we took it seriously, and we we we didn't see the campy nature of it, that you can look through our eyes now. And that, I think, is a reason why it came off with a level of yeah, we didn't take it lightly.
And I know, but you see that on the screen.
Kids didn't take it lightly either, for whatever that's worth. I mean, as a child watching a like you don't I think the reason it's sort of been repackaged by the Internet and now it's like that there's a comedy there of this is all over caffeine pills is all over a couple of cups of coffee, essentially. That's funny. But as a child, you see like, oh, my God, they're losing their friend. They're losing their friend to something.
And it's a secret and it's it's has real consequences. That's a that's a real story to tell kids, even though it's a it's a Saturday morning version. But that's a that's a real serious thing and a very big departure from the government thinks screeches an alien or we forgot someone's birthday or like this is a big, big I mean, I don't know what season, like, already died, the lizard, the chameleon or lizard that was like where we dealt with death or grief.
Right. But no, this theme was it's interesting when you're in something, because I have a few friends who are actors who've been in things that affected me, like, let's say, Flashdance. My girlfriend, Jennifer Beals was in that movie. I wasn't friends with her when she made it. I was a child in Michigan practicing tap in my basement when I watched that movie. But it's a really interesting thing because when you're in something I've said to her, you'll never know the impact of that movie actually had on me and how it changed me.
The it showed me things were possible, like my dreams were possible living in this small town in Michigan. And a lot of people have said that this episode shook them up like what you said, like it it affected kids who are watching it at that time. And. Yes. And then what it's become is a different thing. And the perspective of my colleague, you said, is adults that we have. But we we did like when we got that script, we definitely played it for real, like we weren't we weren't playing.
There was no joke like that week. I do remember it was more and everyone in our cast had acting chops like there was no one in it that. We had strong actors, so when when we were given something like this, I think we were excited to kind of take it. And I mean, I look at some of those scenes. You were so present as my dear friends to know it like really like when you want to get ahead of everything.
But like, when you hugged me to to comfort me when I watched it, I was like, oh, my God, these I think that like something that resonates that you can't fake is the connection we all had, particularly in certain friendships and dynamics. You can be a great actor, but if there's not that true caring that and that kind of. Support for each other authentically then then that wouldn't have resonated. I don't think it's so funny that you say that, Elizabeth, because I have in my notes and we'll get to that.
It's in Jesse's room entitled I'm so excited in our notes. But I have written in my notes that I wish I could redo my performance, my acting in that scene. Oh, yeah.
Oh, you know how I am, though. Yeah, I know that that's that's been the hallmark of this. It's just me. But I looked at it and I was like you said, I was so present and I was like, I could have been more present. The fact that and it's just I'll I'll point it out to you like what my thoughts are when we get there. But it's just so funny. Like, I looked at that.
I was like, Elizabeth was so good and I wasn't I wasn't connecting with her. I wasn't so funny. That's so funny.
I didn't I didn't see it that way at all. You know, you guys. And we're in act one at the max. Yeah.
And I just want to point out that the extra who bumps into me right at the top, he was never seen again after this.
Oh, that was his last and only true. He went to the bus station after that back to wherever that was from.
Yeah, pretty much. If you want to watch it again, he accidentally, like, moves into me.
I'm like, hey, and then yeah, we're going to work in this town again. Yeah. Yeah he is, he is writing parking tickets on Western right now. That guy never worked a day in his life again in Hollywood. That's how it works though. You never, ever, however, touch no one through six on the call sheet.
You'll have a beverage. You got a beverage in your hand. Oh, my God. What do you think? We just have Quicksilver shirts line around this set that gets Pepsi on it. We're going to no double. That's it. That's a wrap, by the way. I had no idea.
I did not realize Tomjanovich wrote this one for some reason. I thought Bennet Tramer, I don't know why this is this is a Tom Ten, which is it? Ten a week or ten. Which you would. I don't I who knows. I wouldn't be saying it.
Ten of which for thirty years.
But like you I might look he but he can't correct you at this point. So I'm going to go your way. It's Tomjanovich and Peter Pietrangelo co-wrote this one. Wow. Peter Angle and Tom co-wrote this in a day and a half. Folks, that's the story. They knocked this one out real quick.
It just blow dried out. It just the muse was in the room that day, I guess. Elizabeth Smart. Paul, were you at the time Jesse's coffee cup very prominently featured here in the scene where you guys coffee drinkers then just to kind of give a reference of, like, did you know what caf what coffee was, I guess, like personally?
Well, I should hope we knew what coffee was a coffee lake effect snow. I know. I personally still and maybe maybe it's from this episode. I don't know. Actually, I'm realizing that now. No, I have never actually had a cup of coffee in my life. Is that insane? Well, you look you look shocked. Well, I think you've never had a sip of coffee. You've never tried. I have tried. You have tried it.
And you've made a decision that it's not for you. I mean, I just have never literally I know it's a ritual for people like Sweeten. It might my husband likes light and sweet until you have your coffee.
That's your thing. Yeah, that's the whole thing. I know some people anyway.
It's just not part of my ritual. I so no caffeine.
I mean, Moccia, I'll do Moccia, but no, but not hardcore coffee. So you weren't like kids on set hitting the craft services table like because I mean, I feel like coffee now is it's more and more regular, younger and younger. I think with Starbucks on the scene in the 90s, there were more like middle ground versions of what a cup of coffee is and a milkshake is. There's like a lot of stuff in between that. But yet it wasn't part of your guy's life then?
No, no, it wasn't. And I am a coffee drinker now. I have roughly about two cups of coffee a day. I consider myself to be a bit of a coffee snob in the sense that I just like black coffee. Like, don't put any sugar in it. Don't put any milk. You know, I appreciate, like, a good cup of coffee. I've tried it all. I've tried the grounding of the coffee. I've tried the the slow drip, the, the drip, the pour over the you name it the the French press and a couple of other things.
Like I have a friend who actually roasts his own beans and I'm not down that road, but I do appreciate a really good cup of coffee. But back then, no, I don't think I drink coffee. I think I was drinking alcohol before I was drinking coffee, to be honest with you.
No, no, I was pretty close, Liz. Pretty close.
I mean, yeah, I mean, I definitely was. I think out of the entire cast, I was the one that was experimenting a little bit more with, like alcohol and some other things around that time. Yeah, I did not know.
OK, yeah but coffee wasn't the thing t t I like tea now. My, my, my wife being born in England, we drink a lot of tea and that I will put Milkin into my tea. But no but ok, just give you guys some insight into coffee and we're going to be talking about like caffeine and things like that. The FDA has cited that the average amount that you should have a day if you'd like to and, you know, imbibe in caffeine is about four hundred milligrams a day, which is roughly about four to five cups of coffee.
Coke has thirty four milligrams per 12 ounce can diet has forty six milligrams. Normal coffee if you did 12 ounces of coffee, has one hundred and forty milligrams. So coffee is definitely a good way to get caffeine into your system if that's what you want. Espresso has less than drip, but things like volume. Yeah. Yeah. By volume redbull. I had it in my notes. Red Bull has somewhere like eighty four milligrams. Still has less caffeine than coffee.
Rebel has taurine. Right. I don't know why I'm turning into a chemist all of a sudden. It's not like the active like any Red Bull has some other stuff in addition to the caffeine. Is that what gives you wings is the thing. That's what that's how your flying is is trying to have a e to work with a guy who'd come in at nine thirty in the morning, drink two Red Bulls, scariest kind of person having an office like, oh just please sir, drink coffee instead of the thing that caffeine doesn't really work on me.
Like I don't use it to wake up. I it's definitely a ritual. Like it's the first thing I like to do in the morning is have a cup of coffee. I will wake up, you know, well before the time I have to leave to go to work just to have that ritual of making a coffee, sitting there reading the news kind of thing, looking all the time, it sets the tone.
So it's not really like the caffeine isn't what draws me to it. It's more the ritual. But caffeine, if I need caffeine, like I have an RV and I've driven all over the the the country and sometimes I have to do these long stints behind the wheel, five hour energy actually works and five hour energy. I did a little bit of research on that has about two hundred and forty two milligrams of caffeine, so a little bit more than a cup of coffee.
But whatever is in there is like rocket fuel like it.
It's an extra kick. It will keep you up.
And this isn't a you know, it's not one of our sponsor, not a sponsor. They're just they just do good work. They have more money. But if they maybe next year if they want to, Dashiell and I will take, you know, five hour energy, drive a U-Haul with a bunch of Captain Crunch in the back of it. And and, you know, Bob's your uncle. Well, but yeah. Yeah, five hour energy.
I have almost had a heart attack somewhere in the desert of Nevada on that one. An endorsement? Yeah.
I mean, I literally had to pull over. So we didn't kill you. I drove I drove through the night.
I used to do this with my my two older kids who were of, you know, years ago were six and four. And I would put them in the back of my minivan at the time and I would drive from seven thirty at night to Idaho through the night with them sleeping so that they could, you know, you know, it's like a six hour trip, 14 hours, 16 hour trip. And I would do that so they wouldn't have to, you know, be bored and look out the window.
But at a cost of my lack of. I would have to take this five hour energy somewhere around 1:00 or 2:00 a.m. to stay awake to make the my God. Well, I would take that. And there was one time where I actually had to pull over because I thought, oh, my God, I'm going to have a heart attack with this stuff pulled over with my two young kids in the car. And I thought, this is not the way that I wanted to go.
This is this is stupid. I didn't see it. I didn't see I didn't see it in the cards playing out this way.
But it does work. That is my endorsement, is that I made it to Idaho safely, my dad. But there was a moment there where, you know, things could have gone horribly wrong. Did you wake up the kids for a very special lesson on no gas station beverages? No. Daddy's about to have a heart attack on the front seat. That's for the best. Yeah, that'll be an expensive therapy, though.
Later, in case you were wondering, that coffee was not in that mug.
OK, well, all right. Nothing, it looks like, is in that soda or I don't think anything was in that mug water maybe.
But you put sugar in it and then it looks like you're not gossiping. I don't know. I, I would say that there's really nothing in that cup. You're just really doing a good job of acting. Think it's good.
That's good. Just come back. Jesse here wants to go to Stanford. That college will later become Stansberry. I'm guessing NBC got a letter. Jesse goes to Stansberry later right now at Stanford. That's just a fun thing. I thought slaters position of guys are really good at math is like a that's of all the like the slaters sexism stuff that gets the worst. I've never heard the guy. Every guy I know is terrible at math. Everyone I maybe I just don't hang out with mathematicians bashing everyone I know is bad at math.
I know you're saying I saw it. I saw it in your notes. I did a quick Google search and that is Google claims that that is a true statement, that that men boys are about it, are are more proficient at math high.
Maybe this is a bigger conversation about STEM education and the toys we give our kids. And maybe maybe there's more here that we can uncover. I'm not qualified to be close to Wendy. Danica McKellar, OK, I'd be we would be close for some point. We'll ask her. She has a lot of math books for the kids to so. Sure. Get her on.
And we'd love to hear the Jesse and me doesn't agree with Google.
Yeah, I would say there's something just seemed off about that stat to me. But what do I know and I'm so excited the song that really carries the episode, I mean, I'm so excited to become a meme. But let's not forget, the reason Jessie's belting it out is because of this song originally released in eighty two by the Pointer Sisters. It was remixed in nineteen eighty four. That's the one you hear at weddings and stuff if you're going to hear it.
Elizabeth IMDB credits you three is singing this song. I mean you guys actually saying this version of I'm so excited. Yeah. What was that recording like.
I mean you have to go to a professional studio or like what was it, fun facts. OK, and it was something I once in a while battled with Peter Ingle about. So I am a singer and I am a dancer as well. And whenever there'd be an episode where we sang, they would typically send us a track to learn to lip sync like the Cleopatra Halloween episode where I was singing in the gym with Marriott that was lip synching and it I was hurt by it.
I'm just telling you, like as someone who was trained and I was a teacher, I remember sitting with him in his office. I don't understand when these things come up, I can sing it. I think they they just want it to move quickly. They it didn't that we were already doing school and filming. They didn't have time for us to be learning the tracks and laying them down. But this episode, finally we got to sing. The three of us went into a studio and recorded it and it was so much fun.
It was like a fantasy. It is elder. Yeah, I'm sure Skoko was there. Yes, he's got to be there, right. That's his whole that's a a to. Yes, but we had the we were excited for that. And I you know, I think each of us kind of had the fantasy to do that. And luckily, we could all sing.
Yeah, it sounds good. It does sound good. I'm I think it's worth pointing out, though, Daniel, that in the last episode, Miss Bayside, our friend Kelly Karpovsky was singing Blue Moon Off-Key Genuity.
Oh, my God. I didn't I forgot all about that. But now just last episode. That was last episode. Wow. She's one of the three singers and Hot Sun.
Go figure. Yeah. I mean, there's a lesson there about the music industry, perhaps the like. Maybe there's going to be one like someone in the group is not pulling all their weight, but she sounds good. So maybe she got I don't know.
But the thing you were talking about with consistency, as we know at this point, like the joke was that it was things were never explained. I'm sure you I know you guys have spoken to this a million times, but Tori is the best example of that.
Yeah, yeah. We will certainly get to the top of it all at one point before we get there. Ruth Poynter, one of the Pointer Sisters, she actually agreed to, let's say we've talked about a lot about like how does the music wind up and saved by the bell? There's been the Beach Boys and some really expensive tickets. Ruth Poinar signed off on her song being in this episode because in nineteen ninety she was a recovering addict. She was in recovery for alcohol addiction.
And she said, oh, this is like a good there's like a story here behind why this song was allowed in. And ultimately, without Ruth's signature, we don't get I'm so excited in the bedroom at the end of the episode. So I thought that was a neat detail. Definitely. Definitely.
So she she approved it with this narrative?
Yeah, absolutely. She was like a story for kids about addiction, but that speaks to me and that's important. And she gets paid every single time the episode airs. So good decision. Yes. Yeah, she should.
Why not some India Zaca Zachs. Like, I love this. Like my dad knows a guy in the music industry and I'm going to make you famous and we're all going to get rich. It's like, whoa, he was ready. He was ready for that opportunity.
Well, last week he wanted to help Kelly, you know, in the pageant, sort of be her manager for that. Now he's looking to be a music manager for the girls here. He just he just you know, he's just he's an entrepreneur. He's trying to find his Grutness.
Yeah. Trying to I mean, this is also a symptom of a bunch of writers in a room being like, you know, who doesn't do anything. Are frickin managers like we're going to we're going to throw the whole management teams under the bus. That's how that's how it read to me anyway. Like Zach is like lecherous manager trying to get after the money. Daniel, it's twenty twenty one, how exciting it is, twenty twenty one, and that means a brand new year and a whole bunch of opportunities to better yourself, if that's what you want to do.
And if you would like to do that. May I be so bold as to suggest Skillshare? Skillshare has a variety of classes you can take online to either pursue a new passion or maybe just get better at something you're already really interested in. Things like photography, creative writing, graphic design, marketing. There are so many options for great classes you can take.
Is there a specific class to use other words, rather than fun all the time to improve your vocabulary? Yeah, there it is. There are certainly plenty of creative writing options. There was one I saw that was all about being more disciplined as a writer, something I think every writer could probably take. Skillshare is an online learning community that offers membership with meaning, with so much to explore, real projects to create and the support of fellow creatives. Skillshare empowers you to accomplish real growth.
And I'm reading right here. But Skillshare is also incredibly affordable. An annual subscription is less than ten dollars a month. Oh, my God. That's that's a lot less when you compare it to in-person classes or workshops. So if you'd like to get started today, explore your creativity at Skillshare Dotcom, slash Zach and get a free trial of premium membership that Skillshare Dotcom Zach. We're in the classroom at Bayside for Mr. Dewey, obviously, we love Mr.
Dewey, one of the more I'm using the word iconic lot this episode. Give me one of the more iconic say by the Bell teachers. He's in the twenty 20 version, the reimagining.
And by the way, looks the same. The same. And by the way, it's like, yeah, it's like, well, what does that mean?
It was very, very cool and thrilling for me as a fan to and a writer on the reimagining to like oh my God, there's Elizabeth and Mario and Mark, Paul and like you guys are here. This is happening.
When Mr. Dewey walked in, I was legitimately it was a different feeling. I was like, that's now. That's crazy now.
And I have to admit for myself, when I because when I saw him on the call sheet and then we were about to do a scene because he looked the same, it was a very surreal moment, like I was there speaking to him as a grown up. But I felt some people, those people that you feel like take you back to what you were, you know, just kind of have that. I felt like a child again in his presence, even though seeing him as a grown up.
Just to blow your mind, Elizabeth. I believe that Mr. Dewey. What's Mr. do his real name? Patrick.
It is Patrick.
Let's let's pull it on up. Yeah, but he he is, I believe, six to seven years younger than I am right now while he's filming this episode. Wow. That's that. And by the way, see, Mr. Belding and him, Dennis Haskins and him are roughly about the same age. So they were six or seven years younger than I am right now while they were filming this. That's how crazy this.
OK, that that's crazy. Yeah. That's Thomas O'Brien, by the way. Patrick Thomas O'Brien. What a name. That is a lot of name there. We had another American Gladiators joke in this scene. If you're keeping track, folks, a lot of a lot of American Gladiators references in the early seasons of, say, by the Bell. And Elizabeth, I'm sorry, just to backtrack a second here, my notes. So we've talked a little bit about Jesse's like personality and her singular focus on academics.
I'm wondering how close that perfectionist sort of attitude is to you personally as a as a human, we've learned a lot of like the character traits of the actors got incorporated into the characters. And I'm wondering if that was true for you as a you know, that's true for you. Interesting.
Yeah. I mean, I know our writers were smart to as long as they got to know us as we went along, they would observe, you know, they would observe our dynamics. And I mean, I definitely definitely. This is extreme, but I definitely have been someone who's always been extremely hyper focused on my goals and visions I held for myself, I would never have come out to even do the show if I didn't have that in my embedded in my DNA coming where I came from.
I didn't have any connections in Hollywood. And so that singular focus of 17 dance lessons a week and acting class and singing lessons and being an A student in school and all of those, that definitely was something I could draw upon and was, I'm sure, something that they maybe picked up on. I wasn't as extreme as Jesse or maybe unless Marco maybe has some thought on it, but I don't think I. You know, and I certainly I kind of kept it within, it was just my own quiet drive, but I was I've always been extremely passionate about the things I care about so that that side of me.
But it is true, has always been there and it is true to Jesse and to you to me, you know, I think it was I'm not sure if it was on the nefarious podcast you just did or if I caught it somewhere else. But the the Norman Lear story that you wrote a letter to Norman Lear is a child basic decision to be on TV and that it wasn't overnight, but it was a you knew what you wanted at a very, very young age and pursued it from from the get go.
There was I mean, really, since I can remember remembering there was nothing else, I wanted more as a child then than what I manifested with the incredible support of my my great parents, who, by the way, had nothing to do with the industry whatsoever. Like my parents, none of our parents were industry people or had connections to industry people. We all either you know, we all seem to have a love for what we were doing. For me, it was like it was just a matter of when am I getting there to Hollywood?
You know, when I was nine and wrote that letter, it was because I was watching The Jeffersons and all the shows that that Norman Lear produced. I would see his name at the end. And I knew if I could get a hold of him in my mind, then it could all happen. And so I wrote this letter. My mom sent it, as you heard, and Mark Hirshfield, who was kind of casting at the time, responded, and that was nine.
And when I was 12, we came out here for a family vacation, contacted him. He was still working at the desk and put us there where he remembered it. And then he set me up with my agent I was with from 12 to 18, a children's manager and children's agent. But then and then we moved out at 15 when I was 15 and saved by the bell was the first big I had done commuting from 12 to 15. And then we moved out at 15.
I started school in Calabasas, auditioned for Saved by the Bell. McCall, as you know, Artie was on Miss Bliss and then pilot season we start that first year I moved here. I got saved by the bell.
Unreal. I don't I mean, maybe people do realize that's a that's a phenomenally thin chance of what you're describing is to write someone a letter basically being like, hey, let me in to Hollywood. And they say, sure, kid, if you're ever out here, then you're out here and I'm out here for your work.
I'm taking you up on that. Years later, they still have the same job, still at the same address. But that's incredible. So I guess in some ways, yeah, it sounds like you and Jesse, there's some real drive determination overlap there.
Definitely that that piece for sure. Yeah. I mean, but it wasn't just like a little girl Dreamer wrote a letter. I was literally doing the work necessary around the craft, you know, doing theater equity in SAG already and modeling in New York and doing all these things that you're doing. We yeah, yeah, yeah. We would never we would never assume you just said please.
Yeah, yeah. No, it wasn't just handed, you know. But Marco to Marco Polo has, you know, as a kid works harder than just about anyone I know.
And yeah. But I didn't know that I was a care. But, you know, I didn't write any letters to any producers on on on TV or film. Yeah. I don't know. I just happened my way into the into the industry, you know, because like you said, our parents weren't in the industry. My my mom had a friend who was a model and at a very young age, this woman said, oh, my God, your son is so I mean, you know, the horrible, horrible, I guess, gorgeous and so talented.
And all those are too adorable then. Yeah, gorgeous. But sure. Whatever. Yeah. I mean, your parents weren't like, get the hell away from you. I know.
But, you know, I was just a smiley little kid and I was she just said like he should be in front of a camera and my mom had no idea what she was doing.
She just went to she just went along with it. And then before, you know what I was just doing, like print ads for my company and Sears and, you know, Wonder Ru's underwear and things like that. And then and then I found myself in front of a camera years later. But no, I never had that vision like you like I hear those stories. I'm like, you know, I'm currently watching the Tiger documentary. And it's the same thing, right?
Like at a very young age, he was like, I'm going to be a golfer. And his father was like, you are going to be the best golfer and you're going to make an imprint on the world. I never had that. I kind of just went along with things. And, you know, I had dreams and hopes of what I would become. But an actor wasn't in that at a young age, was it was interesting. I didn't need to perform in front of people.
That wasn't my thing. Like I by the way, I love it. We do I love that we get to do the characters, we get to play in places we get to travel to and the people we get to work with. And I love the collaboration. And, you know, like all that hard work goes into this and then the finished product, it's it's it's unreal. Like, it's magic in a way. But it's still like I would I would I don't know if I would do it now if I didn't get paid.
And that's being completely honest. I don't you know, like there's certain times where I get lost in the work and I really like you. Just you you don't even know where you are. You're just so wrapped up into it. But there's a lot of time.
And that's that's where the magic is and I think keeps us in it. Right. The moments that are not so pleasurable feeling, but we're seeking that thing. You just said no. Right? Yeah.
Yeah. But also, like a lot of people say, well, how come you don't remember, you know, specific episodes on on Saved by the Bell? Because at a certain point it became work for us. Right. Like when we were first there. Oh, my God, we're doing something that's new to us and everything we had hoped for. And it was what you dreamed about when you wrote a letter to the casting director about it's where you found yourself on.
But after like you're two, you're three. A lot of it becomes wrote. It becomes, you know, like this thing that you show up to work and you break your clock and you and then you start not remembering the work as much as the experiences. Like I remember our private moments together. I remember, you know, are like talks or our emotions that we like, things like that. But yeah.
And then, you know, yes, it's like that with us.
But I think those moments that you're talking about, those are the human moments. Those are those are the. Like more than any episode, the moments in between the human moments of that rite of passage of being an adolescent and how we change and grow. Yeah, those are what stayed with me as well. And those kind of interactions more than the narrative of a given episode, you know what it's like, especially because we it was so rare that we got to be with peers going through the same thing at the same time, so many other friends of mine who started working at that age, they were the sole kid on a grown show.
But like we as everyone knows, we literally were in high school. We were not 20 something playing kids. We were off screen going through those very same rites of passage that our characters were, but obviously authentic for us.
And just to clarify what I said about you doing a job, sometimes just for like monetary reasons or things like that, I'm trying to think I don't think I think it's relative to what other people who aren't actors go through as well. Like, you land that job you always wanted, and when you're in it for a while, it just lose. You lose like you may be grateful for the opportunity, but it sort of evolves now. You're grateful that you actually can go to work every day and make a paycheck and provide for your family and you start raising like that.
Oh my God, I actually got the job and then it evolves into something more. I think that that's what happens for us as actors, especially television actors, because we're not on a project for a month or three months or sometimes six months for films or even a play.
Like I remember when I did my play, which you came to and I did amazing in that that was an experience like I wish I could relive again, because I loved that.
I loved that because I was in control of myself as an actor. But I will say by, you know, show numbers. Sixty five. Yes. You start going, oh my God, I just want to get through this and it starts losing that magic that, you know, you you remember from the initial stages or even or even in the wanting of it.
I think there's something in the interesting like I cannot tell you that. While I also still love doing what we do and I've experienced many, many of the greatest highs in every platform like you, more like Broadway, TV, film, you name it, I'm extremely grateful for all of it. But I think in my twenties, just going through certain things that. That kind of wide eyed innocence to the industry and the dream. For me, certain things kind of, and I don't mean this in a negative way, I think this is great in a great way certain of those, because they got realized and and some of them because they were tough, let's say, showgirls, or when something like that happens, certain aspects of the purity of it get a little shattered.
But I don't mean that in a bad way. I think it's much more grounded and rooted in something real. Like you're saying, it's a job, it's work. It's so the fantasy of it, of what I. Thought it could be or do and all those things kind of got replaced by a more grounded reality, but I still even within that, there's no bitterness or anything like that. That's not what I mean. I just mean as you grow up, even some of your big dreams, when they happen, you have a different relationship to it.
And for me personally, it wasn't as wide eyed, like, oh, my God, when this happened. But but I'm but make no mistake, when certain really exciting opportunities come along or working with certain actors, let's say Al Pacino or different people, I still get that like that really amazing little flutter or nerves, which mean you still care and love it and are lit up by it.
Well, I'm mostly nerves and I mostly love everything, so it's good to know that'll fade. But I know the butterflies will go away.
No, no, no.
The butterflies, they're just they're the more sporadic. They're sporadic butterflies, a whimsical combination of words.
I just think that the the job or the getting of it doesn't make me or break me as a human. I know who I am now. That childlike thing of, oh, my God, if I get that, then I am you know, I'm a mom. I'm a wife. I'm I'm a dimensional human being. I haven't just let the industry be the thing that gives me my value.
And I think that's important because then your work is different when you're coming from that place.
And listen more as a as an actor, we go in. And we more than likely will fail or not get the job. And that's just the thing. Like you go in for an audition, it's a job interview. The chances that you will actually succeed are not very good. There's the fear for no other reason. You may not just be right for it, like you may be the best actor in the room, but maybe you don't have to look, maybe don't pair up well with the parent if they want to pair you up.
Well, with I, I remember being shattered for a commercial. I was cast for a commercial, I think it was for wammo and I was cast in the number two spot for some reason. I don't know why they did this, but I was cast in the number two spot. The number one spot went to Paul Walker, who we were good friends at the time. And when I got to set for some, I don't know why this was the case, but for some reason they said, yeah, we're not going to use you today.
We're we're going with Paul. And I remember you're on set and they say this I had to be under. And how old are you?
I was probably eight years old, seven, eight, nine. My consolation prize was that I got a box full of wammo toys.
Oh, I still remember this. I still remember it didn't make up for the feeling. So, OK, no toys for now.
And I was like, fuck, what a break for like eight year old child to process all this. Like here are the toys.
We don't want you. I remember, you know, and I'm sure Elizabeth too. I had to audition after school. I mean, it was like, you know, this is this was our Little League. This was our you know, this is going to gymnastics class. This was our after school thing that we did. So I would go to an audition. I remember I was in middle school, junior high, junior high, and I was going to audition for an Alan Arkin film that his wife had written.
It was called Necessary Parties. I actually got the job.
And you get that you the I got that job, but I had two the sides that I had to read after school where that my parents were getting divorced had to be very emotional. So all day leading up to that, I prepared at school like I remember sitting by myself under this tree by, you know, like a..
But yeah. But like the field somewhere away from all my classmates going over the dialogue and, you know, trying to tap into this emotion so that I could have that for the audition. And thankfully, that worked out like I got the job. But there's many, many times where you go through that whole process and then you don't get the job. Now I'm like, I don't fucking care. Like, I'm at the point now where, yes, I really want that job.
I'd really like to work with that person. But I'm also I'm at the point where I'm like, OK, I didn't get it. I'm grounded enough to say I didn't get it for many reasons that are just not in my control beyond. Yeah, and you just move on.
But at that age, for us, it really I mean, we put a lot of pressure on ourselves to get it and then to have to deal with all the the rejection, rejection, the negative responses.
I mean, that's hard for kids to deal with. So you can understand how some of our peers without a strong support system would kind of go in the different direction.
It could be destructive. It could be could be destructive. Yeah, no, we luckily had it could be a child star, could be destructive. But that's a true statement.
No, but I know and one of the things that I really respect and admire about you, Michael, is an end up about you now. But also back then is we literally had a strong work ethic. Nobody was phoning anything in. That's right. We we rehearsed. We had school like it was not a joke. And we brought for whatever we knew to bring our A game. So it's not even that it was said. It just that's what you did.
And so I think, you know, I know that Mark Paul brings that to everything he does. So even if even if those whatever jobs that we do want. I know like I know this, but Mark, if he's going into meet with people, he's bringing is a game and then at that and just like I am.
But at that point, if if they're going to go another way, we can't control that exactly. Like you said, look at where we're at at this point of life. It doesn't mean it doesn't hurt sometimes because you really creatively want to collaborate with those people or, wow, that character would be so juicy and so much fun or that would be inspiring or whatever or is a strategy that could be a good career wise, you know, whatever the different criteria is.
But it's not everything. But I but I still have deep love for the doing of it. Yeah.
It still hurts. I remember. Years and years later, I had been on set by the bell and some other things and went in to audition for Pleasantville, and there he was, my good friend Paul Walker, who actually I hadn't seen in a long time because he took some time off from the industry. He just went back to, you know, just being a normal kid and served and and did his thing. And we were in the audition room like, Hey, Paul, good to see you again.
And you know what's been going on, you know, shooting the shit kind of thing. Yeah, he ended up getting that job and I did. So again, Paul got another job. I was like, damn, that guy, he's just too good.
You him racing cars. You were like, that's my whole thing. Yeah. So, I mean, he was such a talented dude.
It's such a shame that he's no longer with us, but such a sweet guy. And we were actually friends like his his mom and my mom were friends, you know, because there was a small community back then being in the being a child actor, we we kind of knew everyone, you know, and because it was before know, before everyone hit 18 from all across the country where they're coming here.
Yeah. It was the pool of people who were locals, not everyone and their mother the minute they graduate. Right. So it is this pool that you get. You get to know people. Where can you shop, Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Rolex and more iconic luxury brands, up to 90 percent off retail, the real real, the real real.
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Wasn't that good, Elizabeth. We do a lot of really smooth sideways. Right.
I love it. Thank you. I love it. Yeah. It's just you. Did it happen. You Sinead O'Connor, by the way, I love that name.
When we talk about this episode and why it's so iconic. It is. It is jam packed. Like this is screech in a disguise infiltrating the girls locker room. Last time he did that, what was the Zack tapes? He was Barbara Bush. So that's like a trope of screech in disguise. And like, there's so much that happens. Ultranet O'Connor reference, like a dated pop culture music star, know that that's not aided by the way. You know that what's dated is this Pointer Sisters song.
I'm so excited because that's what the girls play on their on their tape recorder when they decide to sing.
They could have picked any song from the 1990s. Chinato O'Connor Nothing Compares to You was one of the top songs in nineteen ninety, by the way, they could have picked Bel Biv Devoe poison. They couldn't make Madonna. Bogg Yeah. Poisons are good. Poisons good because it's poison. Actually, again, I, I'm, I'm pulling some notes from a Ringer article about this episode. These were some of my quotes are coming from according to Peter Engle, he just they just liked the Pointer Sisters.
So it was they thought to be on TV. They just like picked it out of energy. But yeah, I mean, sure, poison would have been on the money for for the subject matter. And yet, you know, screeches the if you thought that Segway was smooth, you're going to love this microphone.
Work on the mom. It was like duct tape to the top. Is that what it was?
We're still in school and he comes up with this elaborate cost and just be laying around and then this elaborate setup with the recording.
I mean, where do we get this stuff? My God, I don't know. I mean, even what he's stuffing his shirt with, like, those aren't basketballs. Like, I don't you would have to imagine that Zach has like a separate locker full of costumes. That's canonically what I have come to me.
He was very funny in this scene. You got to sit like very, very funny.
Look, it's a little like that's like half of his cast.
Yeah. One is up. One is down. I mean, he's not only is he a woman janitor who they've never seen before, he's also like a mess. That's great. And here we go with the we're in Jesse's room. Slater is is helping Jesse with his man brain for math that is apparently very, very built for for knowledge.
This was our actual MacBook. Oh, just hops through the window. Marquel just popping through. I just saw you. Just those are good little jump. What did you have, like a little mini rebounder outside that window where you just climbed it and catapulted off the couch?
No, I think I actually don't remember where I was standing out there, but there is like a tree limb. But I'm sure it was like apple boxes or some other thing that could actually come down very easily. None of that would happen nowadays. We've talked about this in previous episodes, like we would have to be on a cable with a stunt coordinator behind making sure that had, you know.
Yeah, yeah. Ferne iPads and iPhones and iPads, iPads and a and an armadillo on my back in case I can't, you know, landed on my back.
I just want to point out, though, that you guys are talking about this book.
They've been studying for four hours and Jesse still can't get any of this.
But, you know, Slater has this book and he has some hefty math lingo. I am almost certainly positive. I'm almost positively certain. Positively that's us.
I mean, sure, why not? The one I'm I'm nearly Porres. I don't know. I don't know.
What are we where's that thesaurus we need that have. I don't know. But I'm almost pretty sure that he wrote his line inside that book. That is a actor trait. That is an actor's secret. Sorry, it's not a trade. It's it's a little industry secret trick, as they say. Huh. But usually when we have lingo like that, we usually write them in in the prop that we're essentially like a metaphor, like a medical thing or.
Well, you've you've played you've played that right. I mean, have you ever written lines?
And seriously, the the craziest one that you just made me crack up and I know you didn't you recently work with checklists, Michael? No, I haven't worked with Michael.
Yeah. He played my father in this movie where we were Russian and I had to learn Russian phonetically. So half of it was with subtitles and half was in English. We lived in Brighton Beach, but there was a scene that we end. When you memorized a line, you memorized it like it was. I don't know the language. Right.
So there was a scene in the. The hospital and he's been injured and I placed a piece of paper on his chest so that when I went down to him, you know, in case I needed to just take it off the page, so to speak, anyway, right before shooting it, they did they realized that they gave us a line wrong. So I had to write it out like there wasn't even a choice to say, like put the money in my bed whenever I had to say in Russian, like I had memorized, like, a song.
And so I had literally had to write that up. But yes, I have been known, by the way, that was just a whole ridiculous story.
But I have been known to write to write them out.
Like, let's say when you're giving a speech at a podium or things like that, you can kind of put the pages on, but you have to know it well enough to be able to kind of take it, take it off the page when you're giving a speech. Right?
Well, you know, I'm I'm I never did this, but I know of actors on NYPD Blue and one in particular that, you know, as a detective, we have those pads, those notepads. When you roll up to a scene like a crime scene and you take your notes. Well, this particular actor's notepad, that's all it ever was, was their lines. And they just you're walking up to a scene, you look at your notes, but that person was actually just reading their lines.
Wow. And you wonder how the magic gets sucked out of the craft.
You're looking at your dying, dead Russian father just reading when I got to get a hold.
Was he I just I just assumed he was language.
Right. So that one.
That one, I'm sure. Sure. I'm sure. That's how I look. I get I study for a bar mitzvah. I didn't know what I was doing. I get it. Uh, Jesse has Greenpeace posters and the Cure posters. I love what you guys how you're decorated. That's just that's just the choices they made for everyone's room.
But, yeah. Did did you have any input to have, like, the Cure poster or Depeche like Depeche Mode, The Cure. They seem like the same band. I appreciate them now. I really wasn't into those two bands at that time. I was more like into do you remember when I went through, like, the public enemy phase, like where I wore the the Pittsburgh Pirates? Yes. And I sort of had like the the the beads around my neck and Tribe Called Quest, those things.
And then I was like into Guns and Roses and Nirvana. But what were you into at that time? Do you remember this is so bad.
I don't remember who I was loving. I don't think I don't think we were thirty years ago. It's not bad.
I mean, I was just honestly like. Wrapped up in what we were doing and my dance classes, like I lived and breathed, that that was my obsession.
So if it was dance class, though, is it like I would just this is meet my own, like, brain of like Paula Abdul or Madonna or like I would just imagine a tumultuous time for dance music. Janet Jackson. Yeah. Perhaps some of the 90s continue. I mean, who among us didn't have an base? Definitely Madonna, of course. Definitely. Yeah. It was a whole mix, though. A little wham thrown in. Sure.
Why not? It's the it's the 90s. It's fun. And keep alert, which is. Well first of all we get Zakk popping in to like Chessie now that the recording guy could somehow pick out her voice of the three. That's that seems like a good managerial massage. The facts and he gets. I thought it's funny, Elizabeth, you noticed Zach's entrance. I thought his exit was very cavalier, too, like Marc Paul, you have like half a foot on a tree branch.
You seem like you just feel like, again, these are all safety things that were not. I noticed that.
Oh, like it's kind of like. It's just like. Right.
It's very I'd be stressed if it is just a nightmare. Like I. I feel like what. Yeah, it's yeah. It's a real creep. Like the Saved by the Bell set. Dec team had a real passion for teenagers having dolls. I mean it's not I think if by fifteen, sixteen you've outgrown a semi life sized doll in your room. But they were pushing it on you guys and it pays off for me at least the doll watches you take the pills.
You see, I thought it was odd that the dolls in the background, how about those creepy masks, butterflies on their face?
I saw those two. What is there? Just like is the butterfly the man?
This one is like the eyes and it's like, I don't get crazy stuff.
Yeah. Jesse was into a lot of that's you know, you shoot into a lot. She was throwing everything at the wall, see what sticks, keep alert, which seems like a substitute for NoDoz here. It's worth pointing out, I think this is common knowledge. But in case you didn't know, it was originally speed in the episode, folks, this was originally on script as written by Peter and Tom as speed. But standards and practices said this is too much and not good for Saturday morning.
So Tomjanovich suggested the replacement of caffeine pills. Peter Engle said, I don't even know what those are. I just would like this meeting to be over. And the standards and practices said yes, and that's how it became. Keibler So there's there's a story. And Peter Angle also is cited as saying he's struggled with his own relationship with drugs in the 70s and thought this episode could be like a good thing to show kids that dealing with addiction. He was trying to tell a real story adults in the room at the time.
The only time you really saw that. I mean, now you see it, of course. And like you said, no to a.. But other than that, it was after school specials. Yeah, that's it. That dealt with it. Or teen movies of the week, like nighttime movies of the week. So to see it in this kind of. Show is what I think it really, really caught people off guard, but also really shook them up a bit.
Yeah, Tracy Winkfield, be my boss and the the showrunner of the reimagining.
She talks about this episode and says when she was a kid seeing it, it was like a whoa, like this is this is a real I get like it like hit a nerve with her, too, as a child of like this says, you know, this is also an episode that advances later in Jesse's relationship.
I mean, their romantic relationship is solidified and they just took the initiative to kiss them.
Did you check that out?
No, she's no, Jessie Spano is not waiting for that kiss. She's making her move. And then she said in the bills she's sitting at her desk, do wolf down. Some of these keep flirts with that doll in the background. Just who knows, maybe the doll whispers in her ear. Judging the judging is, is the D.A. used to play with me. Now you play with drugs. That's what the doll's thinking.
Certainly.
But you guys, I do I do love the relationship with Zack. And Jessie was consistent throughout the show, like. Yeah. So some of the dynamics would kind of like this episode brought Slater and Jesse together, but then suddenly it never makes sense. Suddenly, the next episode he and Zach are fighting over who's going to take Kelly to the dance. It was with us. It was consistent, except for some Snow White and the seven dorks. We did kiss.
We did spoiler alert. Mark Paul, you guys do kiss in a Snow White musical rap episode. Do you remember that? Not. Oh, my God, I didn't make an impact like you could.
You could have lied. But that's that's why he's honest. That didn't make an impact. Not that kiss. OK, OK. All right. Well, perhaps for another podcast, because we could be here all day on that one, folks.
You could take what you want from there. But Elizabeth is smiling. I'm smiling and all is good. We know we I'm frowning.
It is a family show and we're in it to again it was it was a feels uncomfortable.
What does that mean? That we're kissing listeners. Elizabeth has pulled up on her phone a still image of her kissing Marple for truth. It happened a thing you certainly know if you're listening to this podcast. But but going to Elizabeth said about us being all professional and showing up for work. Sure. The one time we were sat down by the producers. Do you remember this, Liz? We're sat down because I don't remember what season it was. But at some point, all of us had been like, you know, you make alliances with maybe it's Elizabeth and I and then we're sort of against, you know, Tiffany and Mario.
And Lark was like kind of like trying to be a satellite of who who's sort of, you know, group she's going to be in. We had to be sat down, sat down by the the producers and told guys, knock it off. You have a job to do. Yeah. Yeah. You know, this is this has got to stop.
But but both all it was, was just hormones going through this and so natural like just think about just in regular high school, those, those dynamics occur. There's just more people. We have six. Six. Yeah. And you know what, it's funny. I even hear with some of the teen girls I work with because I've been zooming with them during this time. A lot of them who are in pods, these learning pods like it. It's not easy when there's just five, six people you see every day, every single day.
And then when there are sparks between two, but there's nowhere really to hide. You know, that's the group. Yeah.
Energy about energy needs to bounce off of things. And when you have what I would, you know, you have a group of five, six kids and the energy only has so many places to go. So, yeah, I would imagine that would that would lead to trouble.
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I don't think I cannot remember other times of man eating. He looks like he's having a full day. Yeah, like not a burger, a plate with beans and potatoes, maybe a meatloaf. I also don't know.
It looks like it. His lunch having many one on one scenes with him like. And by the way, I, Dennis and I always have had such a really sweet, kind relationship, like he was good to us when we were kids, like when I think about it, just that he was the only one with all these kids. He was a lot, but I don't remember. I remember being often in Belding's office with other kids, but this was like a one on one.
It was a moment where we were confiding you would get roped into Belding's office, usually being on the good scheme opposite like everyone else, being the troublemakers as that would that would that checks out to me.
I like how building is keeping in line with previous episodes where you remember the last episode is like, ah, the one with my dad was like, look, he's not going to remember this school stuff. It's OK. Don't put too much pressure on him. And he's doing the same thing with Jesse. I mean, he's like, yeah, hey, Jesse, calm down. If you don't get into Stanford, it's not a big deal. Like, I'll get you into another college.
I'll write you a good letter. I mean, he's kind of like you wouldn't expect that from a you you would hope to get that from a principal like it.
But, yeah, it is a it's a healthy thing to be like don't the weight of the world isn't on your shoulders if you don't get into one school.
But I don't get the sense that he's one hundred percent behind Jesse's ambitions. Like if she says she wants to get into Stanford and that's the school she wants to go to. All right. Let's let's do everything we can to get you into that school. If it doesn't work out, Jesse, then we'll look for other options. But he's taken the different approach, like, look, I just want to get through this meal.
Could you just shut the fuck up and let me I mean, if she's bothering him at lunch, I can't. She can't. Maybe that's the thing.
She needs to bug him during office hours if she wants the full principal package. Instead, she's bothering him to eat. Now, this got touched on as we started the episode. But again, like this is an episode about addiction. It's an episode about Pietrangelo says this is an episode about peer pressure.
Um, to me, what re watching it, it's like, no, this this is really about the pressures of getting into college. I mean, and of being like, perfect.
Yeah. The pressures of being perfect and excellence that's expected. And I mean, it's it's in our culture for for young men and young women, but I mean, especially with social media. Now, that would be like if this show is made now like this and well, let's see if there was social media back then, you would have to deal with the pressures of like the branding of cells that go along with social media that the girls have pressure with.
But just in that bubble alone of just academically, socially goal setting, it was on high, especially for that held her held herself in. You never saw anyone put pressure on her, by the way, because much like the peanuts, we rarely, rarely saw the parents. Right. It's a lot of want, want, wants. But so it was self generated, I think. But we never understood why she was so driven. We never saw what was she trying to who was she trying to do that for?
Or maybe just herself.
Please, listeners, correct me if I'm wrong. I don't think we see Jesse's parents like we meet Jesse's dad at the wedding in Bright Springs. But I think that's the only time you see Jesse's parents at all, unless I'm I've been wrong a bunch. So excuse me if I am. But I don't I can't recall.
I remember Zach's mom and Zach's parents, but not Jesse's mom.
Yeah, that's that is interesting that you I mean, some of the most motivated from when I was in high school, kids who are like the kind of Jessie spaniels are like, I'm going to this school and I've known it since I was ten years old. A lot of times I feel like that does. Yeah, that can come from me, certainly. So for it to be totally internal, that's that's unique. It feels like to me, hey guys, can we please talk about your French manicured nails?
Because I remember you always having French manicures. Did you like it while we were working? That's what that was like, that I stand there and I remember you were the very first person that I ever knew who had French manicured nails.
And so I always used to like just right. That was your head. If you were clean, clean and shiny and had that white tip. Right.
And just plain shine a real look with the white tip right in front of Mr. Belding. And he doesn't even he doesn't even let me go there and give them the time of day I'm there. What's he going to say? Nice nails, kid. He could instead he's like, he could be lazy. You don't want to go to Stanford. I didn't go to Stanford. Look at me. I turned out fine.
I mean, meatloaf at noon on a Thursday, don't you want? No, but I do remember Liz, like, that was like your thing.
You like your nails. And then I remember there was a certain perfume that you wore a Anestis.
And he said, he's now and he's in his seat.
And people I know they're going to be listening to this because the word is he can remember that shit, but he doesn't remember like scenes very closely sent is a powerful form of memory. Everyone knows.
And by the way, I know I'm sure they all talk. They all talk like that. Like they told me. I'm not that I'm sure they don't.
I'm sure it's a nice, normal person who's asking this question. But I don't know. These are things these are things that you remember like growing up. These are you know, I just remember this about you. I remember your nails. I remember that was very important for you to get your nails done. And it was always a French manicure. You never had them painted.
And I remember that said to my God, that's the sweetest ever. I no, that was that was right. No, but that those are the things, again, that go back to this time where we're just saying may not be things we remember from the episodes, but the real life stuff.
Yeah, that was real life. You actually had French ales and wore that perfume. Yeah. It doesn't seem like Jesse.
That seems maybe more like a I mean clearly it and then that we came Jesse had something before we get into this dream sequence, we had something on set by season two or three. I don't know if Marco remembers it, but it was called Cleavage Patrol. They literally called it that because.
Oh, I'm not aware of that. OK, well, it was something that we talked about Mario's cleavage.
You know, it was well, it was specifically for Jesse because right now I was just noticing I was very buttoned up. And, you know, things happened over the summer when you are this age for real development. And I just remember it was like two seasons where that wasn't an issue with clothing. And then suddenly they started putting fattening me up or this thing called cleavage footwell. That was best we know about our costume designer.
Yeah, I just throwing that out after the mustard colored button down that you decide just realized, oh that must have been either pre that or it was in the make it mean fascist regimes don't happen overnight.
They the cleavage patrol had to be birthed out of a long history of oppression. So I get it there. We're starting. See that's what happens. Folks be vigilant and and we're in the fuzzy pink fantasy. I love Mr. Dewey's performance in this. I think it's epic. It's like such the perfect juxtaposition of Mr. Dewey's monotone voice. And this like what I envisioned high school might be like or something is like it's the beach, but in a classroom, according to say, by the I mean, this is college.
But yeah, it is like surfer super relaxed thing. I loved it.
Just a little fun fact. The girl in the bikini next to Mark Paul is is Mario's sister, huh.
Yeah, Marissa, I have it in my notes because often our siblings, whether it was the beach episodes, my brother Jason was definitely in the beach. You can spot him because he's almost six, seven. All of our siblings kind of made it into the show at some point. And Marissa, there she is. I've got a fun fact about another a subtle little guest star that's coming up later. I will do my it's in my notes. How could I forget?
And now we learn how we learn hero, just how hairy Mr. Belding's legs are. In case the fans were wondering. You can see how much alike it was. Just a hairy dude, though, like I remember that I believe as well, if I remember well, his chest. But not only that, I remember because we would see each other's hands.
And I always remember, like he had hairy knuckles, he had hairy like that makes an impression on a young man because because you see you see what might happen to you. You're like, whoa, that could be my future as a kid, as I mean, dude, you're like, whoa, this is I'm going to grow hair on my hands.
That's freaking wild.
You'll remember that. Did you like doing these these fantasy dream sequences where they are fun to you?
I don't remember doing them as much. I mean, I know that we would pretape them a lot of the times, right. Because. Right.
Yeah, obviously we wouldn't be because then for the studio audience, then it was done and edited for the night.
It was played in watches because obviously we went just like, you know, we start to zone out, then go change and then come back to that scene. The max, we would actually just. This is as a replay for the audience, so it was it was done, done for their benefit, which was kind of cool because for us, I remember the one part I do remember of filming these these fantasy sequences is that we actually got to watch them while we were right backstage.
Backstage. Yeah, I was actually. So it was fun. It was fun. Like that thing with Screech in the locker room that might have been pretaped just because you had to get into a costume. And so you make your act that back and I'm sure we're going to get to it. But the like the music video, obviously that was done. Oh yeah. Possibly on a Thursday you'll have to talk to us through that process.
But those were moments where we got to to watch as an audience member, we got to watch the show and kind of see what the finished product would look like.
Yeah. And any other episode, this fuzzy pink fantasy of like SIRF University would be the zaniest thing we cut away to. But folks, we've still got that hot sun music video coming up. Again, one of the reasons I'm going to keep saying it, this episode is so well regarded as it has everything. Every single thing saved by the Bell ever did is in this one twenty two minute episode. Yeah. Like true in one.
And yeah we got here in the halls of Bayside that this is the peer pressure angle of the friends being like, come on, we need you and the, the walls closing in on Jesse to, to provide for the people around her.
I don't know if it's so much peer pressure or just the bait. You know, what was well done, I thought in this episode is it really shows that you don't really know what's actually going on with your friends sometimes.
So their encouragement and joy and let's do this, they she's either not fully letting them know how unraveled she's feeling, like just with her emotions and desire to keep it all together and navigate that. So I don't feel like it's actual pressure. I feel like they just don't get it. And maybe it's because she's not fully letting them in on how bad it is.
That's a that's a good perspective. Yeah. I mean, a more true peer pressure thing would be like, hey, if you want to if you're having trouble studying, take these pills are like that would be the actual right or a peer pressure for a show like this would have been do this or you're not part of our friend group.
Right. You know. Yeah. There's no space was just like Jesse. Yeah. Yeah. She's loved by them and they the root for each other and they just I think don't know how serious it is at this point.
Any theories on how Zach got the the title Hot Sun for the Band Zero? It is an odd title, right? Because some of the other titles of the girl bands were Buns I online. And what was the other one? Zick Since the ZET thing, I didn't even I didn't even write.
I didn't write it down because it was silly as hell, but I was on the run but I was still like shocked by hot sun like and and Kelly's like Oh yeah, that sounds great. Well Hot Sun is a is a name that evokes it. Does it like. Well it's like does it, it's like hot. I mean hot. Hot is right in there. I don't know, it's like hot and there's sauce out. It's like feels like overtly sexual for children.
I don't know. I mean new kids on the block, those are just some new children who moved in down the street. Hot sun like that. Sounds like a gentlemen's club. A club. Not for a gentleman, by the way, but yeah. Off of Jesse taking these pills in the hallway. I thought this was a cool edit into the music.
Like the drums. Very creative. No cut. That was a poor choice. Very well, then. I would have.
Yeah, no, totally a little more like. Oh, like what's going on here on Saturday. What sort of drum intro. Seemed to me like the B fifty twos love shack. Like the intro to that which was like nineteen eighty nine as well. But I was like wait, I've heard this sort of intro before and then I had to Google it and it popped up and yeah I thought it sounded like a little bit of a love shack.
It all sounds the same because it's all like, you know, keyboards and stuff. There's only a couple little drum doors there.
By the way, that that shot you just froze on a second ago, just alone on the staircase is then they didn't usually do that where someone was just isolated. I don't think there were a lot of shots in our show where someone was ever just alone. They did.
It was like like like trouble or like if they're alone, they're usually in a state of isolation, like, totally. You guys, we're always around each other. And also pretty cavalier there, just just popping pills on the stairs, like in a hotel bathroom right now. What are you new to? Drugs. Just do it somewhere. Daytripper take it.
But yeah, now, now we are in again. Like the the freak out break down at the end is what we remember. But this is the this is nuts. This is like the wildest thing. This is this is so epic and I just can't even explain. First of all, can I just share. I was very excited. To get to have one of my dance teachers choreograph this, we usually had Maria, who was our stage manager, like powerhouse crêpes when Mercanti I did that and other other dance things.
Maria was a dancer and incredible. This one, they needed to bring a choreographer in just because of how much time this took. And she couldn't do that. So we brought in Michael Rooney, who was my dance teacher and still is an incredible choreographer, the son of Mickey Rooney. And we got to actually this was heaven for me to rehearse this. And I mean, come on, it's so cheesy and good that I can't even.
Let me just give you some context, though, because I did my homework on Michael. So Michael, he's won an MTV Video Music Awards for best choreography for for things such as Fatboy Slim's Praise You. He also did one of my favorites, Weapon of Choice, which was with Christopher Walken. That is just an amazing he's a genius video. Gnarls Barkley. He did run. He did Bjork's. Yes. It's so quiet. Fiona Apple's paper bag.
He is. He was amazing.
This music video is two minutes long, like it is a full video. It's a full music video.
It's a total music video, you can tell because we have three different leotards that go up our. But yeah, we do it. We had to do it all the way through many, many, many times in different looks.
OK, so walk us through this one. Did you do this?
I, I don't remember us doing this like in some dance studio. I think I'll remember when we would like, you know, they'd either pull us to go to school. Let's say if you weren't in a scene. I mean, Marco was just about every scene. So that was a lot on him.
Also, just to give our to give our audience some background with school, you need fifteen hours of school a week. So generally you do three hours a day if you're working five days a week. Yes. On Thursdays and Fridays, which are busier days because we do the rehearsal with the cameras on Thursdays and the show on Friday. You can bank time. So on Monday maybe we would do four hours, four and a half. Tuesday we would do another four hours.
So by Friday, all you had to do is one hour of school. Same with Tuesday, maybe two hours of school. And that was just banking time. So that's how we got away with only going to school for one hour on a Friday, because obviously we needed to be working as well.
So anyway, I go back to when it was asking, you just said you think you were pulled away on that Friday.
We were pulled away onto a soundstage with mirrors, like I'm picturing it in my head. But I also know that because it was multicam, right where the sets were already built for that given week, this was already in place. So because it had mirrors, we were able to rehearse in there when people were either on a lunch break or or whatever just to get in the space. But we rehearsed, I think, just on a soundstage nearby. We didn't go to an alternate dance studio.
I know that. So you rehearse during the week like this was one week of rehearsal and you were able to produce this?
It was pretty epic, right? We did. Yeah, we did. We didn't do more. I don't I don't believe we did more than the regular work week. It was like Dancing with the Stars. We we learned it in a few days and we went up, we put it up. But I remember we probably pre taped this. Even you guys like on a Thursday.
Wow.
Is what I'm guessing, because this we had to you know, what I find interesting, though, is that from this, you weren't approach to do more. Right?
Because nowadays you can do this.
People who are on television shows and they sing and they dance, they can see that you do this, your approach to do other things, like you would be in high school musical. Right?
You know what? I think that's the thing that was so odd about like in the moment that we did this and it aired the traction that it got later. As you've talked about you guys on on this podcast, when we did this, the visibility level wasn't what it became. So I, I yeah, I mean, you'd think Broadway would be calling at that time, but no, we we did this. People loved it, but I just the one got it increased just with time and the different generations that it had in syndication.
But you would have thought I mean, we were all and everyone I remember Tiffany and and Lark to everyone had a dance background and, you know, at least singing that, look, we did this song. We did. I'm so excited. It was a really ambitious episode.
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, not just the not just like doing the song. I mean, you get to Marples point of the length. This is a full video with multiple costume changes and a lot of choreography. Peter Peter Angle, Peter Ringel moved from from to California dreams with the thought of I can sell real music with my TV shows. And when I look at this, I'm amazed there wasn't a real conversation around, like we got to put out a Hot Sun album or like we got to put out like, I agree like that.
No, I agree. And I wonder if California Dreams was a product of him saying, like, whoa, I kind of had that taken advantage.
Yeah. We could we could have built that thing for a little more.
Yeah, I think you're right, especially with the three of us, they could have done a lot more.
Also the I mean, we could spend an eternity in that video. So I will just say the costume choices are our otherworldly.
And didn't you say the. I am so glad you didn't go without acknowledging. I couldn't. I mean, it's shocking. It's think about it for such a clean cut show. There's just it's all everybody knows, every single one of us all the way up your butts. And that was the thing at the time.
You wore black leggings with a color like that. But think about I mean, we were 15, 16, 17. Like, that was just crazy, crazy, crazy.
It really was for Saturday morning.
Yeah. I mean, I again, love it also. It's worth just noting. Go for it. Written written by Rich James and Scott Gale, who wrote all the music they wrote Go for it also.
That's one of their stated wow, we should do a redo of that.
But you know us, you know that video.
So that hot sun got uploaded to the I was just I want to do I was curious about how it's been repackaged on the Internet, which we can get into later. This episode has been repackaged eternally over and over. Peacocke uploaded the Hot Sun music video last year as like, you know, content to the Peacock channel.
And it has like like two hundred and fifty thousand views or something since July. Like, people still seek this out and love it.
It's, you know, this was the big thing. I mean, Mark and I, when we get DMS, I don't look at all of them, of course, but the one I saw the most on New Year's was this like two thousand twenty one. Let's go for it.
And this and this became the thing or while we were waiting for election results.
I'm so excited was people do hashad moved to that cliff.
Yeah.
Even the like the anxiety, the three of you doing like that shoulder choreography where it's kind of like every other head is going the other way, like I've seen that repurposed a lot like this episode has been repackaged in these little moments that I think it's very easy to lose sight of the fact that they're all the same episode. Yes. And yeah, that and even that we get that weird little edit wipe out of the music video, too. I love that.
It's like such an 80s, 90s style choice, too. I don't even know what you call that. Wipe it like spins off into a tiny rectangle.
It's a it's another it's not a it's not a design. It is all this. I know what we're I don't know. And of course it's and of course it's set apart in a different way than.
Right. It's not a fantasy sequence.
What do I call fasces, even though a lot of times are like nightmares, but it is like a dream sequence. They are like nightmares, like it's weird things happen. It's never pleasant in those pink zones. Did buddy bands do the same thing?
Do you remember any bands did a similar thing, but yeah, they did a similar like edit out. We know the Ed we should, we should talk to the editor here. She would know this, but yeah it's like a really specific nowadays it would be like played for laughs to use that type of effect. At the time it looked really cool. And yeah, it was a cool use of technology, even the way there's like distortion on your guys is dance moves and there's superimposing your faces.
It's like they threw everything in the trick book at this video and people love it still. I know I do. It's fun to use that. It makes you happy, right? Yeah, I love it. Anyway, we get off of that incredible music video wasn't a fantasy. It really happened later. Slater discovers Jessie's still on the pills. She's still she's still doing those things. He's not happy about it. He really again, he cares about her her well-being.
You know, it's good to have people like that. Your life, for sure. And so do the rest of the gang, they do it just takes them a minute to understand what's really happening, like slaters, slaters, the only which, again, as far as addiction goes and stuff like that's a true story, that there can be someone with more info on the situation. And it not everyone really you never really know what someone else is going through.
So there's a ton of lessons in this thing, you know, exactly as silly as it might feel at times that are real.
I just want to fill you in with those caffeine pills. I don't know if I've I've said this before, but caffeine pills generally have between one hundred and two hundred milligrams of caffeine in them per serving a cup of coffee. It's yeah. It's like having a it's a cup of coffee. Strong cup of coffee. Yeah. It is interesting.
It's why this is so funny. I know that is the funny stuff now is like it is like.
But didn't people use something called NoDoz back in the day. Right. Which I think is a similar, a similar. I mean that's where I grew up knowing like truckers use. No I think five hour energy replaced NoDoz in the marketplace. Yeah. Know I think it's all the same junk. Just get to it almost makes you crash your car with a heart attack with your kids in the back. That's that fun stuff. Who would do something that that reckless who what what Zainy person Zainy and Werneck three.
Jesse is just tweaking out here in the classroom. Just no laugh track by the way. They cut the laugh track like in any other episode. Jesse, doing this motormouth thing would be a laugh, but it's it's not there now. And Mario and his sister are in the same scene together.
She's sitting at the head of the class. How how interesting is that? Yeah.
Worlds colliding. Yeah. They cut out the laugh track, much like in the last episode where Mario came out with his shirt off and kind of did that pose down from his bayside. I told you they took out the laugh track there. They applause the raucous applause, you mean. Yeah, they took that out.
So they they said, I wonder if they actually told the audience, like, you know, don't say a word.
Don't know if he's bad in this scene. He just got framed for hitting a fellow dude because a plot his. But you have a guy in the audience that's the warm up guy. And I don't remember what our guy, his name was, but he was with us for a while. So apologies to our warm up guy that I don't remember, but I don't remember a lot of shit.
But but his job was to keep it going, like his job was to keep these these guys energized and ready to laugh and stuff.
So I'm wondering if he had to say, OK, this is a very this is a very serious scene, guys. So we just want to keep you guys nice and quiet. That's that's actually.
So that's I do remember this was a Casey Kasem.
You almost did a case, you know, slipped into a Casey Kasem. We have we have the screen paused in the classroom here. I just want to notice that on the board it says, project number one, I went to a real school with real boards full of assignments. They would usually just say the assignment. That seems like an oversight, wouldn't you say, like geometry? Why not, say, geometry? They're taking that have it say triangles, it, whatever.
That's nit picky. Who cares for one project? Number one, why not? What are we going to do? Be here all day over that one. Um and yeah, Jesse hands it in and yeah she's, she's struggling, she's on drugs. That's the headline. And when I love that when Slater tries to talk to Zack about it, he says, my girls are singing tonight.
He is just moving at lightning speed with being a music industry manager to say, look, I see the guy right there, the blonde next to you.
He was in almost every episode. I wish I knew his name.
He's one of the more prominent nerds, like a real funny real victim. Yeah, my girls are singing tonight. Sure. We've all been there. That's a classic high school thing to deal with. Uh, and yeah, this is again, talking about how this episode has everything. It also has a Zack and Slater fight. It's short, it's not prolonged, but they fight here. They have a bumping of heads of like my friend's not on drugs.
You're like then they storm off. You know, it's resolved within minutes. But yeah, that's the Slater. Zack tension is here, too.
I see in your notes, Daniel, it says classifying caffeine as, quote, drugs, end quote, may have cut the message in long term. I actually wrote her mine because I had to, you know, add a rebuttal. But caffeine is defined as a drug because it stimulates the central nervous system, causing increased alertness. So the FDA does classify it as a drug in.
Yeah, well, I mean, you know, they knew, they knew, they knew what they were doing when they you the original script said speed, they knew pointing fingers. Now they knew they knew what they were doing. We never read an original version. That said, though, I don't recall that once it got to you didn't it didn't get to you. Yeah, that's ok. OK, yeah. And as I have it here and again citing that Ringler article, that was very good and thorough.
If you want more information on this episode, Franco, who is a producer on the original series, as well as the reimagining, he raised the question, hey, does this undercut the episode? Like, is this a problem now that this was about speed and now it's about coffee? And the general consensus was like, look, Jesse is taking something that changes who she is. It's getting in the way of her friendships. What that is really doesn't matter.
And that's correct. It doesn't. She has a problem. Her friends need to help her. It's only through the lens of the Internet and years later, where it's like laughable that it's caffeine. But they made a choice to tell this story for kids on Saturday morning and see what we get. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I mean, we weren't there was make no mistake, we were not we were full on. It's not it. Yeah. No, we were not in on any joke at all.
It was the real deal. Yeah. For us as actors.
Totally. And I think that comes across. We are just folks. I know it's a long one. Thank you for being with us. I'm Lord knows I'm having fun and I'm excited to use both those words.
And we see like we said in the beginning, it has so many layers, like it's just so much come on. It's so good to so to have this much involved and how the impact of this on them has had some help. Now we're I mean, we're literally still talking about it. We're the max for rehearsal. I think it's very interesting that this very quick clip of the three of the girls here dancing on stools or whatever sure don't want to spend all the energy it gets used in the theme song, in the syndicated theme song.
It's like a very it's it's because it's in the theme song. It's one of the most viewed seconds of Saved by the Bell because it's on every episode. And yet Jesse is like in the throes of addiction. She's in the throes of caffeine pills dancing here. And it it that all gets cut aside. So when we talk about how this episode has been repackaged and repurposed, it's not just the Internet. It's NBC looking at this clip also and being like, what if on two seconds that was issue we ignored it?
Is it is it Franco himself?
Yes. One of the record that's I know you're you you got a little bit of a head, but that's that's OK. No, don't be. Please. No place for Sari's here. He will we will see Franco in just a minute. As one of the industry executives. I'm excited about that. Let me get this straight. We are having rehearsal for Hot Sun. I just love that the that name, great name, great name rehearsal at the max.
We could have had rehearsal anywhere. Where are the paying customers?
Like we we all know that I had that in mind that in my notes to what is going I mean there's a like Max is having real money.
So we had just established that we had to save the max a few episodes ago because he was in debt by ten thousand dollars. Now we have rehearsals and now it's our rehearsal space.
Crazy.
I mean, these are tiny things, but they are things. I mean, and where is Max? They are certainly things now, like when he's nowhere to be seen.
Well, but wasn't he gone by this season or now he's still around. He'll I think Ed is like he's he's around here and there, but he is certainly around less. I mean, if it wasn't Max who bought you a cup of coffee at the beginning, it was just like waitress number three, huh?
Look at you guys are clapping. Oh, look at that. I just saw your bum. Yeah, there's more to that. You are your you must have at some point. Elizabeth, were you like, I need more fabric of my butt in this episode. Like two leotards wasn't enough.
No. What's crazy is that was the look that. Yeah totally.
But it just it was so normal that you were like this is this is just the look and also like your butt is fully covered by pant material. How is that different from right leg.
Yeah, it's just yeah. Look, it's just there's a certain. Yeah.
Everything we do today will look foolish in twenty years. We can all agree on that.
So like nineteen ninety was any different that moment though at the end of rehearsal, you know going back to when you said look they used that clip where I am in full throes of you didn't really know. And she was singing. Right that she was in the midst of like being in that caffeine and do state until the end of the maybe the mania sets in of like.
But I also love that even though Jessie flips out and is having a full blown, like mini meltdown, no one in the group is like, oh, what's going on here? They're just like, oh, she must be hyped up. It's normal.
You guys at six. Big night and, yeah, that that takes us right on into the scene, folks were here, Jesse's room, the scene I'd like to point out when I told Jesse, I'm like, come on, come on. It's like I'm commanding a dog or something. It's the way I kind of, like, push you as well. I don't know. I would have changed that would have.
But we can I tell you, I like that because it gave you somewhere to go and to start to take in like you're you're a Zach. You're still thinking I'm OK. Like there's not a problem. And so I think if you had come in playing it differently, you would have been playing the problem. And in this in this way, it gets to move in on you in a different way, I think. Yeah.
But he also did know, like Slater did tell him, there's a problem. So it's almost like he maybe somewhere should a little bit be. I mean, he's he's too in the mode of being a manager. Look at that shirt and tie combo.
This guy is ready to make sure he's ready. He's ready for that. He's ready. I want that shirt.
I like it. It almost looks like your bedspread, too, like you got. But it's at the same fabric as the Zamora's bedspread.
I want to wear that to a to a premiere. Want to go to premieres again, remember. Twenty twenty four.
Oh God. We're going places and putting on real clothes.
You know it's so funny because during the scene too I'm like Jesse we got to go, we got to go, we got to go. And she's like I can't you know. And then and then I finally like I'm like, yeah, you should go. And part of me was like, if I was Zack when I just said, OK, just take one more round of caffeine one more time. Come on, let's do.
That's one last score we have in the morning and come through and deal with it. Right. I mean, that seems more and less.
That's that's the true story. Yeah. If he was really ready for success, you better be ready to shove some drugs in your artist hand and do the show and deal with rehab in the morning. That's pros do it. See, and I don't remember this episode other than this scene. Like, I remember this scene because this was a this made an impact on me. So while I was watching this in the next scene, when when Dustin walks out as the third member of the group, I let out an audible like, what the fuck?
I was like, I couldn't believe it just keeps going. I couldn't believe that that was the that was the solution to the problem. Like, I would just I would just get screech to to fill in.
Like, why first of all, I thought, get her, get her up, get her on caffeine pills, shove her out the door. You can do this. Come on Jessie. One last score. And then the second one would be just like how about just having the two girls sing and not have a third and kind of make a thing of it and then just to bring attention to the family.
So we're getting ahead of ourselves.
But let's go let's continue with it. You're so right. So I have it here. Please dispute this if this is wrong. According to Peter Engle, you guys shot this twenty five times in a row.
Does that sound correct? Because I was I thought there's no way. That's right. I would be Mark Paul. He has a flair for he's an entertainer. He's a flair for embellishment. So that's the that's that's how it's written. You're saying that's maybe an exaggeration in my mind.
And I could be wrong, but there's about twenty five to me is like not a chance.
No, because I don't think we filmed more than five takes in front of an audience. Right.
And I feel like we did like two passes. And then once they in my mind I could be wrong two passes and then I feel like we were done. Someone said to us, OK, you guys, we've got it. Let it rip like that.
That's usually the way things go. It's like you do, too, where you're not holding back, but you're not really like you're still testing the waters in a way and you're just giving maybe eighty five percent or so. And then it's a you know, they will usually say this guys, we have it. But if you want to try one more and just give it your all and maybe, maybe you'll have something.
And I think that's the one. I think that that's what happened to it.
I kind of remember that as well, because that's that's usually Stata that's usually the way we do things on the set. Right.
And especially Marquart, like doing like especially in a sitcom like this. Obviously if we if this was a single camera then twenty five takes could have somehow made sense if you put all the tapes together. But not, not the way we do that.
It seemed, it seemed like I mean I think I took the the intention of his story to be you shot it several times and then as he says on the twenty six, which let's just call it the fifth or whatever, you guys really let everything out. And it was a as as he writes about it and as Franco is has talked about it too, is a very emotional taping that the audience was tearing up. And it was like a a very powerful moment to capture a.
And the people who witnessed it, you guys were obviously there, you were in the room. What was it like for you to being there, working with each other in the scene? I remember you know, we obviously rehearsed this Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and then we filmed it on Friday. So we had time to kind of get to know, you know, it becomes choreographed in a way. So we kind of know what we're going to do and we kind of know what we're going to say.
And we had our block. Yeah, we had our blocking and stuff like that. But I remember that particular take that we watch here was probably our last take, like we've discussed. And really. Being scared, I remember feeling you and seeing you break down, and it had been something that, you know, it was we had maybe taken it up to a level eight, but that was a level 10, 11. And it kind of scared me.
And I really felt like the emotion coming from you and I didn't know what to do with it. Like it's something new because it's not what we rehearsed that we hadn't done that before. But having that emotion come from you kind of scares you as an actor and scares you as a human being. And you just kind of go with it. You know, like I looked at my reaction in that thing, and it looks like I'm. A smiling, in a way, it looks like I'm kind of like my my reaction and I really wish the camera had stayed on your face and they came to the side profile of us.
And it almost looks like we've talked about this whole and other things that I'm about to break in a way. But that was a real emotion. Like, you know, when someone freaks the fuck out and you don't know what to do and you have a look on your face like, oh, my God. And it's a it's it's yeah, that was a real look on my face. And I remember just sitting there going, you have gone to another level and I don't know how to react to this.
And I'm going to say my lines, but I'm not so sure those lines are what I would say in real life. Like I in real life, I would have just held you and not said a word and not go into a story of us. You know, remember when we were kids and we we we watched and we were scared. But obviously, those are the lines that we have to do our job. But I do remember, like, just being scared and and and feeling the authenticity of what was coming out of you and not knowing how to deal with that.
I, I mean, I think that's why your work in this moment is so right on, like it's when someone is unraveling or is broken in the face of it. I don't think any human knows how to do it right.
So I think all of this all the all the struggle leading up to that, that was all choreographed. We had we had rehearsed that. We had we had been there, you know, where I where I smacked the pillows at your hand and do all that stuff. But this moment here where I'm holding you and you break down and you have the iconic moment. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. That was I in my head. I remember this was another level that you hit.
You didn't take it up to that level previously until that touch.
And the truth is, I felt safe doing that with you. And that was a big part of our connection. I think, like I knew wherever, because you can't do that with a scene partner if you don't feel like they're going to meet it. Absolutely. And I think I always felt that with you. We just never had the opportunity on the show till this kind of a deeper thing.
And I remember not worrying about the cameras or the audience. It was just you and I connected and that was all.
That was in front of me was what you were giving me, and those are the moments, you know, we go back to what we talked about before. Those are the moments that we live for as an actor. These moments here where nothing else matters, you're just connected with the person in front of you.
You took the words out. I was going to say back earlier in this conversation when we said, you know, some of the moments are more technical when you're working or more this. But this this like transcended like, oh, we're on a show. We're on it. Like, we both met each other there in that moment and it was being captured. But yet we were not in our heads at all. It was it was a hard thing.
It's it's really it's so sweet as a fan and as a co-host here and you guys recount this as we watch together. There's there's another thing from from Peter here. And forgive me. Sorry, this is also an embellishment. He said that Mark Paul, you added the repeated use of Jesse in the scene, that that was an improvised thing, not in the script to keep saying Jesse's name as you were holding her and talking to her. He said that they let you go as an actor because it felt like what a friend would do.
It's possible that is true or not. It's possible. Let's let's throw that under the possible category of twenty five is out of the question. Twenty five to six. Well, I mean, it's just a tactic. You know, I was a hostage negotiator and that's just a tactic that we used to just continually say the person's name night.
I don't know what the fuck is he talking about us letting me say, Jesse, we're acting here, for fuck's sake. What are they going to do, like stop us in the middle of the take and say, hey, Mark, Paul, you're using her name too many times. Can we reduce the come on?
I mean, it's like what am I that's that's look, guys, that's just acting.
You say at this point I say people's names all the time at this point, like I said, I wasn't worried about where the cameras were. Usually I'm very aware of my surroundings. I'm I'm aware of things. I'll even go to say that know looking at this again. The fact that Jesse has a shadow on her face while I'm talking to her, exactly, I'm usually aware of shadows on people's faces and I will deliberately move out of the way so that they don't have a shadow.
There's a huge shadow on Jesse's face, on Elizabeth's face. I do nothing about it. So obviously, we were very connected when we were in the lost in the last moment.
You know, the fact that I said her name one hundred times, I don't hey, look, I look.
I'm just I'm just repeating what I read. It's a you know, I'm just just checking out I'm taking it out on you. How dare you please do. Yeah. That's why I'm here.
Know, I have to say, like, when I watched this in in prep for this, I was watching it alone and I got tears in my eyes like I have only really and through these years, seeing that the heightened kind of moment that everybody knows as like whatever. And we've even done a stand up of it on fellin or whatever we've done. But we're even seeing it in within the scene. I definitely like, whoa, it kind of took my breath away for a second.
It's a it's a performance unlike any other in the show up until this point and even after, I cannot place a more like, intense moment. So, yeah, it's it's it's memorable. It's memorable for more reasons than just she's having a disproportionate reaction to caffeine addiction, which is like the joke, the Internet meme version. It's a it's a really powerful, memorable scene.
And I think it was I think it's also. Good that I'm speaking of it with obviously distance, but I think it was good that it happened to Jesse because she was always so together and so like, oh, it was so solution oriented and knew how to fix the problem for others. Had suggestions either she imposed her her ideas or was generous with them. And so I think the impact of it was their dynamic of being as close as they were, like it almost had to happen with those two characters.
In this moment, to make this moment work and I know how safe I felt with Mark Paul as an actor and as a dear friend to be that vulnerable. So I love you.
I love you, too. And I'm just looking at us. I've the freeze-frame that it's on where you're looking at me and I'm looking at you. We locked eyes there and that was like a gent. Like we didn't deviate from that. Like we are locked on to each other and we stayed there. And that's authentic right there, you know. And yeah, watching this episode, it's given me a lot of respect for what we actually did, because, you know, we do talk a lot about, like, how silly things were.
And if you took it, if if you didn't have any context of the scene, it is a silly sort of thing. You know, I'm so excited breaking down over that. We've had a good laugh about certain things, Meems, have been made. We've we've talked about this. But to actually have the context of what actually went down, it means so much and there's so much going on here. And for me to be able to share that with you and go over it, I mean, I never thought that we'd be sitting here doing this together now, but I'm thankful for it and I'm looking at it now.
I'm so thankful to have had that experience and especially with you saying, well, that's that's what smoother Segway than to say now we're going to go to the max for Screech.
So, yeah, we're going to do the last episode jumps in there and I'm like, literally, what the fuck?
I mean, seriously, it is a what what a one to get.
And there is really I mean, I guess did they feel like the the having it had that levity that had to go off this like like just. Yeah. I mean, yeah.
Screech By the way, the last time Screech showed up in the third act to save the day to dance at the max was in dancing to the max. So this isn't even a new way for the episode to resolve. There's a young Franco. Yeah, look at that. Looking sharp. Franco loved to see it and yeah. I mean, I guess if this episode is about a lot of things in the smallest way, it's about the perils of the music industry.
But that's just the teeny tiny glimmer of a lesson.
That is, there's so many other things to learn and the gang is all there for Jesse at the end. You know, it's the yeah. The weight. I feel like other sitcoms would have ended off the I'm so excited. I'm so like I feel like that would have been the end.
There's the freeze-frame but saved by the bell gave the kids in the room a little chance to like processing. Yeah.
It's funny again it ends with Zach being a bad student and and we're all friends together again and and friends forever.
But Jesse's going to rehab Jess. He's going to rehab. So yeah. I mean now we're laughing again because it's come up but it's, it is.
Oh I should go into rehab for addiction or is she going to rehab or perfectionism. Right.
I think it's for addiction. And she should have gone to rehab for. Yeah. Well you said for being a perfectionist, I believe in this society. I think they just subbed out speed with caffeine and then now Jesse is in instead of. Yeah, she's in treatment for caffeine instead of speed. But I will again shout out to the twenty twenty reimagining. It becomes canonical without giving away any spoilers. Jessie Spano is a lifelong caffeine addict in recovery after this.
So it carries. Yes, it wasn't just a blip. It is like taking this seriously. You guys. It's such a silly sidebar thing on this. I remember Alice and Woody are our makeup artists. She was like, I think we should go with, like, no lipstick. No, like like this was my like there was a moment around this time that several big actresses were doing no makeup looks when they had been known to be more glamorous, I can't remember in TV movies.
And so we were like, OK, let's really go more raw here. And I'm laughing that this is the version of Rock, but it's saved by the bell. So, you know, we we still had to, but no lipstick was the big actor choice, by the way.
I think you look really pretty in this scene. I was going to point that out that I love your hair. And I think you look for an addict.
I think you look really healthy. Oh, yeah, that's good. That's a good healthy I might poke at my cobalt blue silk pajamas. I got such a luxurious outfit, by the way. I got to keep those because they are nice. But just, you know that the caffeine pills were either it was it red hot, some Tic Tacs or Paul, do you remember there were red hot.
OK, that's what I thought.
Yeah, I'm I'm telling you, I think addiction does your body good. I think.
Oh my God. If that's what red. You know, caffeine pills due to someone before them, there's the even smaller lesson that sometimes being an addict can make you better looking.
That's that's a teeny tiny lesson just below. Watch out for a shady guy. Yeah. If some guy wants to manage you and your two girlfriends and a music group, be on alert and what could happen.
And yeah, sometimes addiction makes you makes you hotter. Everyone knows that Mike and Slater and Zach are friends again. It's all resolved next week. We'll be right back to the funny stuff. And that's Jesse's song. Wow, that's the episode we got through it, guys. Wow, we did it this season of this podcast. Just so happened to end on the biggest episode in the series. So thank you, Elizabeth, so much for joining us.
I really appreciate it. This was fascinating and so sweet. Thank you.
Thank you for having me for this. I'm just so glad we could do it. Yeah. We had you on the very first episode, which was saving the max, actually have you on the very the finale of our first season book ending. I couldn't yeah. I couldn't have imagined a better combo thinking Mark was keeping you away from me and dancing to the max.
It was a private phone call. He was like, I only know this guy yet. I'm going to keep all my friends at arm's length as he seems like a weirdo. Don't love his voice. But now now you know what it really was, though, Dashiell, at the time I figured out our podcast out. I don't like figuring out that at the time I was living in my RV. Right. We didn't have the means to do what we're doing now.
We're now we're on Zoome. I'm just I'm just I'm I'm. No, I get but I remember that conversation that Elizabeth and I had on the phone. It was like we hadn't spoken in quite a while. And to be able to do that was was such a treat. This is even better. I'm so happy that we were actually going to look at each other. We were able to work with each other in the summer, late summer to finish up the reimagining of Saved by the Bell.
But again, that was through some weird protocols and times that were going. This was where we can't interact with each other.
Of those, though, when I was saying to Mark, like when when we got back to filming in August, which we are so lucky to be able to do that safely, there's certain things on set that are magical that often happen. And in between, I call it kind of the in between, like let's say if you and I were able to go off to get a bottle of water by crafty or sitting in the chairs for a minute, we didn't get those in betweens, really, except for when we were outside by that back to the future clock for that for that scene.
It was a lot of everyone had to just go back to their respective trailers, whatever. So I didn't miss being able to do that with you because I always love our ketchups. But one of the things I was also thinking about is if we didn't have the connection that we have, you and I and Tiffany and Mario as well, if we didn't have the seeds so embedded in this relationship in such a loving way. Also, I don't think that in August, yes, as professionals, we would have done good work.
But the banter and that chemistry that people loved so much about the six of us that the six of us had, it transcends time. Like it's just it really showed me how deep the connection goes with the way we were able to work in such a carefree way during a time that was not.
Well, I'm looking forward to going back, you know, saved by the bell, saved by the bell. The twenty twenty version was picked up. If you haven't seen it yet, it's on Peacocke. Make sure you check it out, because we are going back sometime this summer. A lot of talented writers working on the project. It's a it's a real show.
Yes. A lot of smart, smart, well dressed glass glasses wearing. Thank you. You know. Thank you, guys. There will be a second season of the reimagining and there will be a second season of this podcast as well. So many second seasons. You can keep track of them all. We'll be back in let's just call it later this year, but not too long, about a month or so. We'll see you soon. That kind of thing.
Thank you, listener, so much.
No homework, no more. There's no homework. Yeah, there will be. When we come back, there will be. It's called model students. But do it at your leisure. You have a little bit of a what do we call it. It's not summer break. I don't know. You have some time on a hiatus. Hiatus. That's industry talk. Let's put it in school terms. Winter break. We'll see in about a month.
Thank you, Elizabeth. Again, so much for being part of this. Thank you. Thank you, Mark Paul, for your time and energy, as always. Thank you, the listener, for listening. Cadence thirteen for being so supportive. Our producer, Terence. Oh, my God. We just. Thank you, Daniel. Congrats, you guys. Yeah, congrats. Yeah. And thank you to our audience. We have a great audience.
And then make sure you keep hitting Nashville up on Twitter. Don't let up on my God, please. Do you know. Yeah. Yeah, come on. He loves it. I can take it. Just kidding. I'll be and I'll be in counseling soon. Pragmatism play. Bye guys. See you next time. Zach to the Future is a production of Cames Thirteen. It's executive produced by Michael Goslar myself and Chris Corporate Production and Direction led by Terrence Mangan.
Editing and Mastering by Andy Jenniskens. Engineering and Production Coordination by Sean Cherry. Artwork by Kurt Courtney with illustrations by Jeff MacCarthy. Marketing is led by Josephine Francis with PR by Hillary Shoop. Thanks to the whole team at their 13 and to you for listening.