Dexter Darden is 29-years-old but still has a baby face, young enough, in fact, to play someone in high school. That youthful look helped him land a coveted spot in the new Peacock revival of “Saved by the Bell” featuring a blend of new generation kids and some original cast members that arrived Wednesday, Nov. 25.
The concept of the reboot: Zack Morris (Mark-Paul Gosselaar) becomes governor, guts the education system, forcing school closures. He decides to bring some students from a poorer closed school to the privileged world of Bayside High School, his alma mater. (It’s a modern-day twist on 1960s-era busing desegregation.)
This new “Saved by the Bell” mildly mocks the tenets and conceits of the often silly original series while maintaining some level of grounded reality.
Darden, a New Jersey native with a lot of family members in Atlanta, plays one of those bused-in students, Devante, who arrives at Bayside very skeptical of the people there but also aware that it’s an opportunity for him to reinvent himself. And he doesn’t mince words. In the opening episode, A.C. Slater (Mario Lopez) — now Bayside’s hapless football coach — tries to buddy up to Devante, who marvels sarcastically that he has never seen anybody sit down with a chair backwards “in real life.”
“It may seem like I’m a hot, happenin’ guy who’s got it all together,” Slater says to Devante.
Devante immediately corrects him: “You’re a gym teacher, and I saw you drinking soup out of your car.”
Slater: “That was melted ice cream!”
Darden, whose resumé includes parts in the films “The Maze Runner” and “Joyful Noise,” said Devante’s situation is similar to his own life growing up in Camden, New Jersey, while attending a private school. He himself was a fan of the show back in the day.
“It was part of my morning routine watching cartoons, then waiting to see what Zack and Lisa and the others were up to,” he said. Bayside was nothing like reality, but he said he was enchanted by the “mystique behind it, the fashion, the friendship and the things they participated in. I always wanted to be part of it. It gave you that little quick escape.”
He had no idea back then he’d end up playing opposite the likes of original cast members Slater and Jessie (Elizabeth Berkley), now a Bayside school counselor.
Better yet, this is not 1990 anymore. This modern-day version of “Saved by the Bell” reveals the “dichotomy of what it’s like at Bayside and what it’s like in the rest of the world,” Darden said. Devante, Aisha and Daisy are the three main characters who represent the outsiders. And the reboot reframes the show through the eyes of Daisy, who breaks the fourth wall instead of Zack or his equally vapid son Mac, who now attends Bayside.
The reboot isn’t afraid to crack wise about subject matters like racism, sexism, gentrification, white privilege and income inequality.
Darden, at age 29, was the oldest actor among the younger generation, playing someone about 13 years younger than his actual age. Josie Tota, who plays a transgender cheerleader and is 19 in real life, called him “dad” on the set, he said.
So much time has passed, he said social media really wasn’t a thing when he was in high school.
“I don’t know if I had been able to survive now,” Darden said. “Instagram. TikTok. Snapchat. How many likes you can get from a photo? All these distractions. It’s fascinating playing 16 right now.”
Darden also plays the late civil rights legend John Lewis in an upcoming Spike Lee film “Son of the South” about Bob Zellner (played by Marietta’s Lucas Till), the grandson of a Klansman who comes of age in the deep south and eventually joins the civil rights movement in the early 1960s.
He said when they shot the film last year in Montgomery, Alabama, Lee had Lewis watch Darden’s audition tape and received the legend’s approval. Darden said he was deeply flattered but never had an opportunity to meet Lewis, who was battling stage 4 prostate cancer while they were working on the film.
“We knew he was ill,” Darden said. “That’s why he couldn’t make it on set.”
When he heard the news of Lewis’ death over the summer, he had mixed feelings. “I was sad because you never want to see a pioneer go like that,” Darden said. “And he never got to see his character come to life in the movie. On the flip side, I was happy to see an African American man leave behind a legacy the way he did. To me, that is what made me feel more at peace. He did so many great things, and he will continue to leave a legacy behind him for people to blaze their own trail.”
“Son of the South” does not have a release date yet.
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