They may have been saved by the bell, but that doesn't mean they're being saved by their residual checks. According to Mario Lopez, who played Slater on Saved By The Bell, some of the checks they receive are worth less than postage. His comments came hot on the heels of Tiffani Thiessen's recent claim that some residuals cost more to print than they're worth.
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"It's like, negative now. It costs more to print the check," Thiessen recently told Page Six.
Thiessen, who played heartthrob Kelly Kapowski on the show, noted that "We didn't have pull on that show," she recalled. "We made nothing, and we just did our job. ... When we went primetime for one season, we got a little bit more."
Lopez, when speaking to The Daily Mail, speculated that Saved By The Bell's Saturday morning slot had something to do with the limited pay. He then admitted that not every show from that era of TV sitcoms is making 'Friends' money.
"A lot of people think just 'cause you come out of TV and stuff, you're set," he said. "That's not always the case. Not everybody's making that sort of 'Seinfeld,' 'Friends'-type money from that era."
'Saved by the Bell' Was a Huge Hit During Its Prime
For millions of Millennials, Saved By The Bell is part of their childhood. It was on television constantly. You had reruns, new episodes, and even Saved By The Bell: The College Years. From the outside looking in, it was easy to believe the cast had amassed generational wealth from the show.
Unfortunately, the show is rarely on air anymore, which is undoubtedly having a negative impact on the residual checks being sent out. Nevertheless, if the cast all received bad deals, it probably wouldn't make much of a difference.
"It is what it is. You move on, you learn," Mark-Paul Gosselaar, who played Zack Morris, previously said on Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen.
Fortunately for most of the Saved By The Bell cast, they went on to appear in other things. As such, they've likely built up a comfortable life for themselves. Still, that doesn't take away from the fact that a starring role in a generational show didn't pay them what they deserved. For that, Saved By The Bell will always have an asterisk next to it.
