I work with teen girls and I help provide this space for girls to feel safe and heard and know they’re not alone.. It’s very easy to get in a heightened state where everything seems like life or death. But for impressionable viewers used to watching screwball hijinks, it quickly became obvious the episode was a fascinating outlier. At the end of the day, this is a show about people who care about each other.” Seconds Bario, “The show is beloved because it’s charming and there’s a sweetness to it. Customer Review: I'm So Excited: Runway (Us) See full review. No matter that only 40 episodes were in the cannon. And she became very, very ... excited. Later on, it featured in Hot Shots! “Nobody was, like, blowing menthol into my eyes to get me to cry,” she says. Ahead of the ‘Saved by the Bell’ reboot, the cast and crew behind the scene recall how it came to be. 30 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. Caffeine pills. 4.1 out of 5. It’s three hours from me. I'm so excited! “Even as a child, I knew that shit was getting real,” she recalls, now an Emmy-winner for her writing work on 30 Rock. His cowriter Tom Tenowich hastily suggested an alternative. Customer reviews. A breakdown. It feels like yesterday, Iggy Azalea was shocking the world with the news of her secret pregnancy and now, the proud mother shared that her son, Onyx, is super close to making his very own steps for the first time! Seven episodes were green-lit into production, with story lines befitting a squeaky-clean sitcom. When a teaser for the brand-new Saved by the Bell series on Peacock was unveiled in August, viewers saw a middle-aged Jessie, now a Bayside guidance counselor, slap a bottle of caffeine pills out of a student’s hand and warn them of its dangerous effects. So the acceptance of it was so huge that it overcame all my reluctance. The episode lived on in memory banks and VCR tapes until 1992, when Engel sold the show into syndication for more than $10 million. (The episode’s title and catchphrase: “There’s No Hope With Dope.”) But among the 86 original episodes, “Jessie’s Song” continues to stand out. It’s not like Elizabeth Berkley didn’t enjoy filming the Saved by the Bell episode in which Screech secretly records a slumber party to find out Kelly’s true feelings about Zack. With Tenor, maker of GIF Keyboard, add popular Im So Excited animated GIFs to your conversations. And he gave me the 13 episodes!” The series premiered August 20, 1989. Engel and Co. tackled drug use again in 1991 when the gang discovered that a movie star filming an anti-drug PSA at Bayside was a secret pothead. With Tenor, maker of GIF Keyboard, add popular I'm So Excited animated GIFs to your conversations. And when she, Gosselaar, Thiessen, and Lopez reprised their characters in an iconic sketch with Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show in 2015, she belted out her anthem to rapturous audience cheers. It’s coffee, basically.”, Engel, for one, has no regrets: “I know we’ve taken a few jabs about it, but I liked that parents trusted us. [14] In the clip, the sisters are seen getting ready for a formal party at a high society club. A music video was filmed for the 1982 release of the single, directed by choreographer Kenny Ortega. Before Berkley and Gosselaar filmed the climactic scene—the “I’m so scared!” tag was in the script verbatim—director Don Barnhart instructed the actress to let her emotions guide her in the moment. !Medley "I'm So Excited" Live Engelbert HumperdinckI haven't got the copyright. “We had teens playing teens. Mills stayed in; the rest of the young actors (which also included Jaleel White and Jonathan Brandis) were replaced by new characters, portrayed by Gosselaar, Diamond, and Voorhies. “Let’s just say,” she says, still laughing, “Cha-ching, cha-ching.”. “In 1990, I was a recovering alcoholic and addict myself,” she explains. Sony Pictures Classics . Like, oh wow, we were going to really act this week. “We were going to explore something different on a Saturday morning show and we were going to go deep,” she recalls. (Expanded Edition) is released on Feb 1982 . and Silver Spoons, and Thiessen, a former Junior Miss America and Teen magazine contest winner with no professional acting experience, both vied for the role of Kelly. I’m So Excited Please Tell Me More. I’m Just So Excited. Berkley, an unknown Midwesterner who had appeared on episodes of Gimme a Break! “We really wanted to have fun and give winks to everyone who’s been so loyal over the years,” says Berkley, also a coproducer with Lopez, Thiessen, and Gosselaar. Still, she appreciated what “Jessie’s Song” was trying to accomplish, which is why she signed off on the usage. [citation needed], In March 2001, the song was included in the RIAA and National Endowment for the Arts project Songs of the Century, a list intended to "promote a better understanding of America's musical and cultural heritage. [5], The song was originally recorded for and appeared on the Sisters' 1982 album, So Excited!, and was subsequently released as a single. On the video also appears Dorian Harewood. “And Elizabeth’s performance was so great and so different than anything else I’d see on the show.”. The dancer is a woman with frizzy light blue hair tied in a yellow hair band. [3][4] Billboard named the song number 23 on their list of "100 Greatest Girl Group Songs Of All Time". They are growing up so fast! So I went to Brandon and said, ‘If you don’t give me 13 more episodes, I will lie down in your office right now and you’ll have to call security because this show is a can’t-miss.’ So I lied down! And she was fine with all the girls crushing on a cute substitute teacher at Bayside High School. “I feel like we mentioned caffeine pills like maybe a dozen times throughout the first episode,” says writer and co-executive producer Tracey Wigfield of the series, which premieres November 25. Other than substituting the words “caffeine pills” for “speed,” the shooting script remained intact. I'm So Excited is every frame a Pedro Almodóvar film (Talk to Her, Volver, The Skin I Live In): bizarre characters are painted in warm, luscious hues; politically incorrect dialogue are infused with a hint of cheerful irreverence. “The night we shot it, I knew it would hit a nerve,” says Peter Engel, the 84-year-old TV executive who developed Saved by the Bell and cowrote the episode. The "I'm So Excited" Lip-sync musical number had me tearing up from laughter. “It was pretty outside a normal scene for Saved by the Bell and I know they were close friends so it was heart-wrenching to see them dip into their personal feelings for each other in that moment.”. 1 Day Left. Even if you never watched a single installment of Saved by the Bell when it aired Saturday mornings on NBC from 1989 to 1992, you know the moment. Do I even have to say it? After airing in the Facts of Life time slot in July 1987, the series got bumped to the then-fledgling Disney Channel. A fledgling Bayside girl group. Content ©2020 The Ringer All Rights Reserved, How “I’m So Excited” Became the Most Ridiculous—and Iconic—‘Saved by the Bell’ Moment, The Cheesy, Beloved, Historic ‘Supernatural’ Will Carry On in Our Hearts, How ‘Animaniacs’ Introduced a Generation to Comedy, Peacock Isn’t Revolutionary, but It Is Free. “She goes to extremes.”, The executive admits that he fell into drugs in the 1970s because he felt overworked and overwhelmed, which served as inspiration for the episode. Dec 12, 2020: 29: 22: Share "mirrors for a solar power plant" by langalex, CC BY-SA 2.0. I’m So Scared. It lasted 19 episodes before becoming part of the syndication package. I’m So Excited And I Just Can’t Hide It. But ultimately that wasn’t the point. Then the incredible show and tell from the Long Time Gone Sew-A-Long. It was a hard time but an exciting time to be sober. 'I'm so excited to be a wife': Lily Collins discusses her engagement to fiancé Charlie McDowell as she poses in breathtaking photoshoot for Byrdie. Three new students were added to the mix: the smooth-talking jock, the peppy cheerleader, and the type-A brainiac/budding feminist. The hotel is designed to “offer a refined take on the classic mountain chalet,” so it should blend in nicely with the town’s largely traditional alpine architecture, as you can see in the rendering above. The Hot Sundae factor? She’s a character who just put a lot of pressure on herself.”, Bario says that the emotion was so palpable while shooting that he still tears up thinking about it. “The response from the actors and the audience was unbelievable.”, Though Jessie’s dependency issues were presumably resolved by the next episode—“we had nowhere to go with it and we wanted to get back to the comedy,” Engel says—the legend lives on. Twitter. I find I'm so excited I can barely sit still or hold a thought in my head. The song was featured in the movie Summer Lovers (1982), though it was not included on the movie's soundtrack. “It’s a clip from the very thing we’re about to talk about because we’re all Jessie Spano on Election Day and so excited yet so scared.” The 10-second video has been viewed almost 100,000 times. “I’m so happy.” Torres, a medical assistant at UT Health Austin’s Musculoskeletal Institute, was one … Engel, who also produced California Dreams, Hang Time, and the so-so spinoff Saved by the Bell: The New Class for the reprogrammed Saturday A.M. teen block (“TNBC”) in the 1990s, learned this first-hand when he embarked on the college lecture circuit: “Everywhere I went, I’d mention ‘Jessie’s Song’ because it was my daughter’s favorite episode and the place would go berserk,” he says. Share the best GIFs now >>> 299 customer ratings. “Because of syndication, the show exploded,” Bario says. Once the sisters arrive at the club, they are photographed, attracting the attention of the other party goers. Send MSN Feedback. 46 on the Billboard R&B Singles chart. The show, newly rechristened Saved by the Bell, would air on kid-friendly Saturday mornings, breaking up the wall-to-wall cartoons of The Karate Kid, The Smurfs, Alf Tales, and Alvin & the Chipmunks. 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. Then they did it on the 26th take. “As a young actress, I was finally going to have something juicy. “We just liked the song!” Engel explains. This is an example, and I’m so grateful.” Best of all, Pointer receives a special gift every time Jessie sings her song. How “I’m So Excited” Became the Most Ridiculous—and Iconic—‘Saved by the Bell’ Moment. We Are Going To Have So Much Fun. We … In a new post, the female emcee updated her […] Let's see what happened. But then she read the script for an episode titled “Jessie’s Song.” She knew instantly this one would be different. I Could Pee. “I know that she was supposed to get addicted to something like crack, but I love the fact that they just changed the drug and kept everything else the same,” Wigfield says. The actresses performed snippets of “I’m So Excited!” three times in the episode, not including Jessie’s a cappella bedroom version. I’m So Excited. Elizabeth was amazing. “I didn’t even know what caffeine pills were!” Engel says. directed by Pedro Almodóvar for $12.99. “It evokes a powerful reaction in people,” she says. “I’m so excited because last Super Bowl was in Miami,” Jones said. “I mean, the thing that was so clear to me was that she was someone failing in every category and can’t keep treading water. In 1985 it featured prominently in the opening scene (a lengthy flashback to a yacht party that plays again later) in the miniseries "Deceptions" starring Stefanie Powers. “There’s just something really funny about the fact that she’s acting so wild for such an innocuous substance. The future David Silver was cast as the lead student in Engel’s Saved by the Bell origin series, a treacly NBC sitcom pilot titled Good Morning, Miss Bliss. She also wears a pair of blue shoes and yellow socks with blue stripes as well as a pair of pink lightning bolt earrings. It’s not just who’s going to ask who to the dance.”. For Jessie to not rise to an occasion meant having a breakdown. This year it’s going to be here. [7] The addition of "I'm So Excited" to Break Out necessitated that "Nightline", a track featured on the album in its original format, be deleted from later pressings of the album. And the fact that a few generations love it and the episodes have such visibility can only be a positive.” (Diamond, who wrote a salacious memoir in 2009 for which he has apologized, is persona non grata among the OG cast and crew; nobody interviewed for this story mentions his name in conversation. “I’m so excited, I’m like shaking,” she said. ‎Watch trailers, read customer and critic reviews, and buy I'M So Excited! The cautionary tale of saying yes to everything? “We weren’t even on the air yet but I knew this was magic,” Engel booms in his rat-a-tat New York City–born-and-raised baritone. I'm already a fan, don't show this again. I'm So Excited song from the album So Excited! Fresh installments were pumped out on Saturday mornings as well. It is full of fun drama and antics that will have you laughing so hard in your seat. ), So why is “Jessie’s Song” in a class of its own? So she just kind of had that flip.”, To that end, Berkley would like to reiterate that she and Gosselaar did not play the scene for laughs despite the relatively low stakes: “I’ve done work where you’re clearly in on the joke, but this was not one of those times. Except! As I move around the world, I can see that fans appreciate that.”, And nobody appreciates it more than Pointer. The suits at the network felt differently. [8][9], This time, it peaked at No. And just to be clear, this is not some you-had-to-be-there touchstone in Gen X history. It really is another great Almodovar movie. What she didn’t realize was that “Jessie’s Song”—in which her character, overachiever Jessie Spano, develops an addiction to caffeine pills to keep pace with her hectic schedule—would not only be the series’ signature episode, it would remain seeped into our collective pop-culture consciousness a full 30 years later. Helpful. Billboard named the song number 23 on their list of "100 Greatest Girl Group Songs Of All Time". I'm So Excited: Brazil: Os Amantes Passageiros: Canada (French title) Les amants passagers: Canada (English title) I'm So Excited: Colombia: Los amantes pasajeros: Croatia: Putnici ljubavnici: Denmark: De elskende passagerer: Estonia: Olen nii elevil: Finland: Matkarakastajat: Finland (Swedish title) I'm So Excited! Berkley started doing professional autograph signings and engaging with her fans over social media, acutely aware that her episode was the one constant. So I thought it was a nice stretch that this television series wanted to deal with it.”, And though the name of the song came to fruition after Lawrence asked the sisters what a woman would say when she’s getting ready to go out on the town on a Saturday night, Pointer has her own ’90s interpretation. Noah Smith. All the others felt the same way. So many people will DM me and come up to me and say, ‘I’m so excited, I’m so excited, I’m so scared.’ I think that fans find joy and comfort in it.” She did a jive to “I’m So Excited”—complete with a bedroom scene re-creation—during her 2013 stint on Dancing With the Stars. 4.1 out of 5 stars. I had the BEST weekend ever! [7], Two years later, on the group's RIAA certified multi platinum album Break Out, a slightly remixed and edited version of the song was included and re released as a single. In an alternate TV universe, Berkley could have been pouring out her heart to Brian Austin Green. “He gave us permission to go there as actors,” she says. This song is sung by The Pointer Sisters. I wanted to poke fun at it a little.”. "[10] The song was ranked #264 out of 365 songs.[11]. But the popularity of “Jessie’s Song” expands far beyond the concept of a harmless teen comedy pulling a Very Special Episode. And just to bring it all home to 2020, the three-decades-old episode even applied to Election Day. The show, which had a minuscule budget, went on location to Hawaii for a 1992 TV movie. NBC manager of creative affairs Kevin Reilly called him into a meeting and put the kibosh on letting a teen character on a G-rated show get hooked on a narcotic. Part Deux (1993) and briefly in Eddie Murphy's version of The Nutty Professor (1996). “Jessie’s Song” is more than another episode of the teen classic—it’s a pop cultural phenomenon. Young kids were watching us and you don’t want to kill your farm system. We’ve had some great communications and he is such a special human being." By Sean O'grady For Mailonline. By the video's end, they have the club on its feet jamming to the song. I’m So Excited I Can’t Wait. If the episode didn’t reek of 1990 based on the baggy Z Cavaricci pants and moussed-up hair, the dialogue references to New Kids on the Block and Sinead O’Connor sealed it. tweet; RELATED ARTICLES MORE FROM AUTHOR. “We thought it would be cool if they sang the Pointer Sisters.”, All these years later, Ruth Pointer laughs heartily when asked about the link between her saucy top-10 pop hit—which she cowrote with her sisters, Anita and June, along with Trevor Lawrence—and an earnest installment of a high-school-set sitcom. Aren’t you picturing “I’m so exciiiited, I’m so exciiiited, I’m so (gulp) scared!” right now?! 6 people found this helpful. Mara Reinstein is a New York City–based film critic and entertainment journalist who contributes to Us Weekly, Billboard, The Cut, HuffPost, and Parade. Other films that featured the song include Protocol (1984), Playing for Keeps (1986), Working Girl (1988),[13] Riff-Raff (1991), The Story of Us (1999), Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009), and I'm So Excited (2013) which also takes its name from the song itself. In the form of GIFs and kitschy T-shirts and musicals, for starters. Engel pushed back. Jointly written and composed by the sisters in collaboration with Trevor Lawrence, it was originally released in 1982 (reaching number 30 on the US Billboard Hot 100) and saw a remixed re release in 1984 (reaching number nine on the Billboard Hot 100). “Fans know all sorts of inside bits but it’s become very clear that this is the one that has struck a chord and has had a deep impact. Don’t forget to share your favorite I’m so excited meme to your friends and colleagues! The song was first heard on the adult romance comedy of 1982, The song is also one of the songs available in the popular dancing game, The selection was used in Spanish director, The song was also used for adverts featuring, A clip of the Song was used in an Episode of, This page was last edited on 30 January 2021, at 18:50. Worst-case scenario, Kelly must deal with a zit on her pretty apple-shaped face after she’s named homecoming queen. The special bond on display between platonic pals Zack and Jessie? Is it the impassioned tone? Highly recommend it! Jessie had a problem with something that was altering her behavior. All episodes are available on NBC’s Peacock streaming service, while IFC, the (ahem) Independent Film Channel, as well as Sundance TV continue to carry it on weekends. “I don’t know if you saw my recent Instagram post, but it’s perfect for us,” Berkley mentions about 30 seconds into our phone call. Screech wound up filling in for Jessie. (2013) cast and crew credits, including actors, actresses, directors, writers and more. Jointly written and composed by The Pointer Sisters in collaboration with Trevor Lawrence, it was originally released in 1982 and saw a re-release in 1984. OK - so for those of you who dread Mondays - well, I can't help you! Wonderful, really.”, Berkley, who never did see an iteration of the “Jessie’s doing speed!” script, required extra prep for the episode. “Me and my girlfriends often talk about how certain songs just stand the test of time and make you feel a certain way.