Saved by the Bell is an American television sitcom that paved the way for future 90s television shows who followed its precedent. Its first episode was on August 20 1989, and lasted until May 22, 1993, and most people believe that it ended too soon.
This teen sitcom originated as an NBC pilot entitled, Good Morning, Miss Bliss, but it wasn’t picked up by NBC and was eventually aired by the Disney Channel. This show focused on the teacher, Miss Bliss (Hayley Mills), but it obviously didn’t have a big enough following and was dropped by Disney after one season. The rights were then reacquired by NBC and took in in a different direction, focusing on the students.
Zach Morris (Mark-Paul Gosselaar), Samuel “Screech” Powers (Dustin Diamond), Lisa Turtle (Lark Voorhies), and Mr. Richard Belding (Dennis Haskins) were all introduced in Good Morning, Miss Bliss and reappeared in Saved by the Bell. The new show took place in the fictional “Bayside High School” in Palisades, CA. The rest of the main cast (not on Good Morning, Miss Bliss) was Kelly Kapowski (Tiffini Thiessen) and Jessie Spano (Elizabeth Berkley) and A.C. Slater (Mario Lopez). Kapowski and Spano were portrayed as longtime friends of the original three members and Slater was a transfer student that rounded out the group.
While this show was mainly a light-hearted sitcom, it did delve into darker issues such as drug use, driving under the influence, homelessness, divorce, environmental issues and death.
The show gained instant popularity, becoming the highest-rated program on Saturday mornings. This led to NBC shift from airing cartoons on Saturday mornings and show more teen-oriented sitcoms instead.
The show’s popularity resulted in two spinoff shows, Saved by the Bell: The College Years and Saved by the Bell: The New Class. Unfortunately none of the actors in the original show really soared to superstardom, with the most famous being Mario Lopez, who is more of a television personality than an accredited actor.
Cast
Mark-Paul Gosselaar
Mario Lopez
Dustin Diamond
Lark Voorhies
Elizabeth Berkley
Tiffani Thiessen
Dennis Haskins
Photos
Videos
featured image via http://www.huffingtonpost.com