PCM’s Allison Ebner got to speak with Mark-Paul Gosselaar, former star of Saved By the Bell and current co-star of TNT’s Franklin & Bash, about the upcoming second season of the show.
In its first season, Franklin & Bash introduced viewers to Jared Franklin (Meyer) and Peter Bash (Gosselaar), two young, fly-by-the-seat-of-their-pants street lawyers who caused a seismic culture clash when they joined a legendary, button-down law firm. Jared loves sticking it to authority every chance he gets. Peter, meanwhile, has a knack for connecting with judge and jury any way he can. Malcolm McDowell plays Renaissance man Stanton Infeld, the brilliant and eccentrically spontaneous patriarch of the law firm. Also starring are Reed Diamond, Dana Davis, Garcelle Beauvais, and Kumail Nanjiani.
As the second season of Franklin & Bash opens, Peter and Jared are forced to tackle a little more responsibility. After being accused of misconduct, they begin to question the loyalty of colleagues, as well as question if they are staying true to who they really are. They now face a number of truly daunting tasks to ensure partner status at Infeld-Daniels and we find out the real reason Infeld hired them.
Q: We saw Franklin and Bash grow over the first season, how can we expect to see the guys change in the second season?
“The writers and producers have given us more responsibility by making theses guys equity partners of Infeld-Daniels which has given them much more responsibility they have to bring in clients, money, there’s much more at stake. Since they’re partners, Karp and Hanna and Infeld are equals in a way; the guys look inside themselves and battle that conflict of staying true tom themselves, so there’s a lot more drama, but on our show when we have more drama we like to have more fun so there’s more comedy as well.”
Q: With all of theses promising story lines on the horizon how do you react when you would first read the scripts?
“Our initial reaction is ‘great, bring it on.’ Breckin and I enjoy theses characters so much; we enjoy the challenges of these characters and we want to see them progress and we never want to see them become stagnant or have anything come in between them. We want to remain Franklin and Bash but with more responsibility. We can go in such different directions with the show, stay true to the show, and still have a lot of fun with it.”
Q: Having spent the whole season with Peter you probably got to know him really well, are there any aspects/characteristics that you were surpirsed to find out about him?
“Yea, we see a bit of why Peter is the way he is. Jane Seymour comes on this season to play my mother and she is very free with herself and we see a side of Peter that we haven’t seen before. Peter has another relationship with a woman for two episodes. Overall I’m really happy with how this season progressed.”
Q: Kat Foster is the love interest in the premiere episode and teh back and forth between you two is great, does that continue in later episodes?
“I think it continues for another episode, but since our show only has 10 episodes its hard to have a longer run of love interests, but I don’t want anything to come in between Franklin and Bash. I think two episodes is great because you see a different side of the boys but for the most part I like to see the relationship between Franklin and Bash.”
Q: I have to mention the ‘Jango and Rossi’ episode just because it’s hysterical and there are so many great guest stars like Cybill Shepard, Seth Green and Eric Mabius, what was it like filming that episode?
“That was an episode that Breckin actually co-wrote with the writers. We’ve always wanted to have Seth on the show and we just had a great time. It’s great to see the guest stars having a great time on set and that translates to the show. Working with talented actors like Seth and Cybill Shepard and Rick Fox, thats a luxury that we’re so fortunate to have on our show.”
Q: Since Breckin is friends with Seth Green, how was the chemistry and rhythm on the set while shooting? Did you all mesh really well?
“Yea, Seth is amazing on the show and we’ve known each other for a few years and he came in there with guns blazing. The thing with us is that we try to create a very loose environment on the show, we try to be really comfortable with the material so everyone knows whats coming ahead and we can have a good time with it.”
Q: The show is so dependent on the relationship between Franklin and Bash, have you and Breckin developed any tricks for helping each other through long days?
“We spend so much time together, it really is like a marriage between the two of us, we have our good days and our bad days and there are times where if I’m not giving Breckin the attention that he wants, he’ll push my buttons. We’re like people who live together; we spend more time with each other when we’re filming our show than we do with our families. It makes it much easier for us though to work together because we enjoy being around each other. That’s one of the reasons why we look like we’re having fun on the show; we are having fun.”
Q: Moving forward in the series if you could give Franklin and Bash a piece of advice, what would it be?
“Its the advice we’re dealing with throughout the years, to stay true to who Franklin and Bash are; to not conform and to remember where they came from. That’s something we dealt with through the whole season; fighting that inner-conflict of becoming equity partners. Never losing that lightness that they have, never losing the ability that they have to see a different approach from everyone else, I think that’s what makes them unique.”
Thanks again to Mark-Paul Gosselaar for taking the time to talk to PCM, you can catch the season premiere of Franklin & Bash on Tuesday, June 5 at 10p.m. on TNT.
