Producers conducted hours of brand-new interviews for their teleplay.
Fans of the 90’s Saturday morning sitcom, Saved by the Bell, are about to learn a whole lot more about Zack, Slater, Screech and the rest of the gang at Bayside High School. Lifetime Television has greenlit a made-for-TV movie chronicling the off-camera exploits of the cast.
According to Dustin Diamond, the actor who played Screech, there was no shortage of drugs, sex, and abusive behavior, much of which he detailed in his tell-all memoir, titled Behind the Bell, in 2009. But, he has since claimed the book was ghostwritten and has little basis in fact.
The producers of the TV movie, The Unauthorized Saved by the Bell Story, claim they are not using any of Diamond’s book for material, but instead, conducted hours of brand-new interviews for their teleplay, written by Ron McGee, best known for his work on ABC Family’s The Nine Lives of Chloe King. The show’s original casting director, Robin Lippin, was hired to find actors and actresses to play Mark-Paul Gosselaar, Mario Lopez, Elizabeth Berkeley and the rest of the cast in the new film. Those names were announced earlier this week, many of them newcomers and unknowns, including Dylan Everett as Gosselaar, Julian Works as Lopez, and Alyssa Lynch as Tiffani-Amber Thiessen.
So far, there has been no response from the cast of the TV show about the upcoming film or the young stars who will be portraying them.
The Unauthorized Saved by the Bell Story is set to air on Lifetime on September 1 at 9 p.m.
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