Trans actress Josie Totah lands lead role in ‘Saved By The Bell’ reboot

Actress Josie Totah has been cast in the lead of the upcoming reboot of 90s teen favourite Saved By The Bell.

Hollywood Reporter has revealed that Totah will play Lexi, “a beautiful sharp-tongued cheerleader and the most popular girl at Bayside High who is both admired and feared by her fellow students.”

Totah first hit screens in Mindy Kaling’s Champions, which began and ended its run in 2018. After the show’s cancellation, Totah penned an emotional essay for TIME, coming out as transgender.

“My pronouns are she, her and hers. I identify as female, specifically as a transgender female. And my name is Josie Totah,” she wrote at the time.

Totah said her identity ‘crystallised’ when she was watching I Am Jazz, A TLC reality series that follows the life of young transgender girl Jazz Jennings.

The reboot will revisit Bayside High over 20 years after fans first met the original gang in 1993, and original stars Mario Lopez and Elizabeth Berkley are set to return as A.C. Slater and Jessie Spano.

The series, coming to NBC upcoming streaming service Peacock, is set to pick up in 2020 where former protagonist Zach Morris (Mark Paul Gosselaar) is now the governor of California and under fire for closing low-income schools and forcing students to move to higher performing institutions.

Piloted by 30 Rock and Great News co-creator and writer Tracey Wigfield, Saved By The Bell‘s new class comes to screens this September.

OIP Staff