Tiffani Thiessen Makes Blunt Comparison of ‘Saved by the Bell’ & ‘Beverly Hills, 90210’

Michelle Stein November 12, 2026, 11:37 am

What To Know

Tiffani Thiessen said playing Valerie Malone on Beverly Hills, 90210 was different, but not necessarily more fun, than playing Kelly Kapowski on Saved by the Bell.
Thiessen joined the already successful 90210 in its fifth season, marking her first experience working on a show as an independent young adult.
She enjoyed Valerie’s mischievous side, recalling that her character rolled a joint with one hand in her first episode.

Tiffani Thiessen made a blunt comparison of her roles in Saved by the Bell and Beverly Hills, 90210.

In an interview with Tom Papa, published on November 10, the actress who played both Kelly Kapowski and Valerie Malone reflected on her time on the light-hearted ’90s sitcom and the heavier primetime teen drama series.

“Just different — I wouldn’t say more fun,” Thiessen, 52, said, when Papa asked whether playing a villain in 90210 was “more fun” than portraying a good girl in Saved by the Bell.

She explained, “It was my first time being on a show as an adult, you know, as a young adult. So I was going to set on my own. I lived on my own. I was working hours very differently than I did on Saved by the Bell.”

Additionally, Thiessen pointed out that 90210 was “already successful” by the time she joined in Season 5. “So I came into a show, which was also interesting in a way, where I came in to sort of not replace, but take the sort of void from another character that had left.”

Thiessen also said that playing Valerie, who was “a little on the bad side,” was “super fun. She pointed out, “I mean, I got to roll a joint in my first episode. I went from Saved by the Bell to then rolling a joint with one hand, by the way… They actually brought in a double to roll the joint for me because I could not do it.”

She added, “I went from one clean, squeaky show to nighttime. I think I had probably been with the entire male cast by Season 1 on 90210. So very different — very, very different.”

Later in the interview, Thiessen revealed the wild hours she would work for 90210 compared to Saved by the Bell — and that certainly would not fly today.

“Back when I was doing 90210, we were shooting 32 episodes a year, which was lovely for my bank account. But we would do this thing called double-ups, where we would do two episodes at once,” she explained. And us actors were literally taken back and forth. And I remember one Friday night, I had started at like 6 in the morning, and I went for 22 hours straight. You would never be able to do that now.”