On Valentine’s Day, Dennis Haskins, better known as Mr. Belding from ‘Saved By The Bell,’ sat down with Flavor and talked to us about ‘The Dukes of Hazzard,’ college speaking tours and of course, ‘Saved By The Bell.’ To read the entire interview, go to www.northernstar.info/flavor and check out what else your favorite principal had to say.

Flavor: So it’s Valentine’s Day, did you do anything special?

Dennis Haskins: You know what. I called my mom and wished my mom happy Valentine’s Day. And I also took one of my favorite agents to lunch. We had a nice Valentine’s lunch. We went in and I had some chicken, but they had on the plate, they had a thing of beets, but they had it cut in the shape of a heart, for a heart beat… get it?

F: Well, that’s almost romantic.

DH: It was a cute idea at the restaurant.

F: Where was the restaurant?

DH: It was a restaurant in Burbank [Calif.].

F: Isn’t that where you are located?

DH: I live in the general area.

F: What’s the weather out there like?

DH: Beautiful weather out here today. Seventy-five degrees. High sky. I know it’s a lot of tough weather in other parts of the country.

F: Yeah it’s a little better than here. It’s probably about thirty degrees.

DH: Wow.

F: Yeah I think you have it a little better than I do today.

DH: Yeah, I was in Mississippi over the weekend at a friends wedding. It was in the 40s. I’m going to Boston, Saturday. So I’m going into snow country.

F: It’s supposed to be a pretty big mess out there.

DH: Friday I’m going to Louisiana. I’m really excited about this. I’m going to be the grand marshal of the first Mardi Gras of the season for the Krewe of Hercules. It’s in Houma, Louisiana. I’m also not just excited to do this for myself. It’s kind of a celebration for the all the people in Louisiana and a way for them to say, ‘Yeah where back, yeah we’re still here and yeah we’re going to survive this and beat it with the whole Katrina disaster.’ I love the fact that I get to go down and hang out with all the people who may it through some incredibly tough times.

F: It sounds like it’s going to be a good thing. It sounds like the movie industry is going back down there and shooting again.

DH: They were up in the Baton Rouge-Freeport area, from shoots they were doing in the New Orleans. Yeah you are right, they have moved back down there. There are some areas that aren’t doing okay. I was just in Mississippi. I was with a guy who had just got back into his house after four and a half months. You know Mississippi got hit harder by the hurricane than Louisiana. You know the water killed New Orleans, but the winds really destroyed other places.

F: What do you think about the government’s reaction to all of this?

DH: Oh, I don’t want to get into the whole politics of the thing. I just want to wish everyone the best and hope they do better. I will say that my dad, he’s been retired for a long time, he does do FEMA work and he spent six months down there trying to get grants and things to help them rebuild after they got it straightened out. So I do have some personal experience. But politically it’s none of my business.

F: But it sounds like it’s a pretty big honor for you, going down there.

DH: That’s exactly how I’m taking it. I am honored… that they chose me. That they think people would enjoy I would be there. I’m just going to try to have the best time I possibly can and have a celebration of all the people down there and what their future is.

F: I was looking up information on you and it seems one of the first times you were on screen was on a show called “Archie Bunker’s Place.”

DH: I was on Archie Bunker’s Place with Celeste Holm. That was my third job in Los Angeles. It was actually my second job in Los Angeles. My first prime time television job was on The Dukes of Hazzard. I was on the very first Dukes of Hazzard. That was shot in Georgia right outside of Atlanta.

F: What was it like to be on either of those shows?

DH: For Dukes of Hazzard I played a… I was heavier, I had longer hair, I had a mustache and I lost my scraggly beard. So I was their first “bad ass.” And that’s what it said on the script. And really the only thing I did was grab Daisy in the bores nest and give her a hug and a squeeze. And it was fun and for my first experience to be on a show that became so successful I was very pleased.

F: How long did it take you to get into the business?

DH: I was a basketball player at UTC [University Tennessee Chattanooga], my passions where to either play basketball or to act and my coach put me in an acting class. And I realized early on that I was not going to make it as a pro as a basketball player. So I changed my major from phys-ed to theater and speech and from that point on, I did theater in college, dinner theater, local community theater and tried to get as many under my belt and learn from as many people as possible. I went to a thing in Memphis called the Southeastern Theater Conference where they set up auditions for regional theaters from outdoor dramas to summer stock and things like that. And I got a job in a show called “Louisiana Cavalier” in Natchitoches, Louisiana. While I was there, the company went from a non union company to a union company. This means actors equity association. The producer gave me the option because he wanted this one guy to play the lead. I was the second lead and he said that I can play the first lead and he would play my part or he would bring this guy down and make a union production. It’s incredibly difficult to get your equity card and I was very luck that right out of the box to get the card and because of that I was able to join screen actors guild, which allowed me to do Dukes of Hazzard and I was in the union so that allowed me to have other opportunities before I went to California and I didn’t go to California before I was 30. That gives you some idea of the progression of things. You start and you try to do your best and you try to learn and create opportunities and take opportunities of things and good things happen.

F: Well let’s see here… [he starts to talk] um, go ahead.

DH: I’m on my way to Boston Sunday. I’m one of 14 speakers chosen by the National Association of Campus Activities to perform in front of about 500 college buyers. And there are also bands, comedians, magicians and novelty acts. That’s another thing I’ve been doing is going to college campuses is talking about Saved By The Bell and also leadership points and motivational things and taking chances and risks at an age where you can recover. People who watched Saved By The Bell some reason listen to me and I want to support what their hopes and dreams are.

F: You got ahead of me there. I was going to ask you about your college speaking. Is that something you enjoy doing?

DH: I do enjoy it. I get the feedback and the people who loved growing up watching Saved by the Bell. I can see their faces registers with things, you know. I’ve made more mistakes than the people sitting out in front of me, but you can learn from your mistakes, and it’s okay to make mistakes. That’s how you learn. There is no such thing as failure. If you try something, you learn something. I want to go in and support them. I believe you get a little intimated on trying things because the world is a strange place. And uh… I want to tell them it’s okay to take chances and share with them as much as I can and try to help them avoid some of the stuff I had to go through and some others I know had to go through. I know that I don’t have all the answers or much less most of them, but at least I can help them think and go in a positive direction.

F: Do you have a lot of students get tongue tied coming up to you?

DH: There are some people that literally shake. They get so excited and so nervous they literally shake. I want to say to them, hey, I’m a person just like you are. I’m grateful for the attention and what you think, but its okay. They cry or get a little tongue-tied. Then every once in a while there is the one person who wants to show off, but that’s very seldom. Most of its always, ‘Hi Mr. Belding,’ and very respectful. They’re friendly and it’s a lot of fun.

F: I must say growing up watching Saved By The Bell, I never thought I would actually interview you.

DH: Let me just say to you, congratulations on not being limited by thinking you could not do it. You found a way to find me and created the opportunity and it worked out.

F: That’s one of the things we’ve been trying to do [in Flavor] and we got this idea to interview people we grew up watching on television. We’ve interviewed people that were on the shows Salute Your Shorts and The Adventures of Pete and Pete all the shows students like myself grew up watching. And when people read the interview about you, people are going to register with that and I think that’s something positive and I think students will enjoy reading this.

DH: Well you can tell them I know that each and every one of them are our future. They are our next teachers, lawyers, doctors, coaches, parents, principals (laughs) you know, in their city, state, whatever. Who knows? Maybe there is a future Senator or President amongst all of them. I want them to know each and everyone of them is important and to believe in themselves and to know I believe in them.

F: That’s good advice. I also saw you were a music manager at one time.

DH: Back in the 70s. I was the entertainment chairman at my university for three years. That led me to meet and work with a lot of people in the music business. I started out as a promoter of concerts, risking money and making money. I promoted people like Leon Russell, The James gang, Ike and Tina Turner, Blood Sweat and Tears, etc. Then I managed a band that did really well in the southeast region called Overland Express; while I was doing that a friend of mine in Florida who owns Native Tan Suntan Lotion called me and said hey, ‘Greg Allman wants to go back out and perform again, he’s a friend of mine. Can you help me?’ So I did. We did 30 shows and at the end of it the Allman brothers reunited again; it was an amazing time. After that I pursued my dream to go out and act. I didn’t know if I could do it or make it. But I knew I wanted it bad enough to try and figure it out. The music was fun and all of that, but what I really wanted to do was act. So in 1980, I came out here.

F: You were also on the television show, Scrabble. Did you do that at one point to?

DH: When I got out here, one of the ways you could make money just to survive was to be a contestant on a game show. So I got on two. I got on Scrabble, which by the way was on stage 3 at NBC studios. I won $5000, and I lost getting to go on by a tenth of a second. But that $5,000 really came in handy. When we did the very first, not Good Morning Miss Bliss, but the very first Saved By The Bell. It was on stage 3, at NBC, in Burbank, and the dressing room I had was Chuck Woolery’s dressing room, the host of Scrabble. How’s that for coming full circle? Isn’t that pretty cool?

F: Since you’ve been on Saved By the Bell, do you feel you’ve been typecast?

DH: Nah, listen, when you set out to do a good job, you want to do the very best you can. And as people get to know you in that role, people will only think of you that way. The more you play something, the more people think that’s who he is. Yes for awhile, that has effected me. That’s all turned around. I’ve been getting other roles everything from JAG to the movie Red Water with Lou Diamond Phillips to the West Wing to a couple movies I just did. Yeah, you want to have an identity, but once you get it, you got to deal with it. So you can either solve your problem or worry about it.

F: Do you ever look at message boards about yourself online?

DH: You know, I was told there are seven or eight people that say they are me on MySpace, but that’s just not true.

F: So you officially don’t own a MySpace account?

DH: I do not. I am not on MySpace.

F: That’s probably a good thing. It’s a little addicting. But message boards in general, do you ever read anything about yourself? www.imdb.com is a pretty good example.

DH: IMDB [Internet Movie Data Base] is not really a message board. It’s more of a place for people, as I understand it, for people to see your credits, well, your history as an actor, your resume basically. There aren’t really postings of what you did or how you did it as far as I know.

F: Well on the bottom there is, on Saved By The Bell, you can look and it says, this is my favorite episode.

DH: I haven’t seen that. No, I don’t’ really go and deal with all that stuff.

F: One of the postings says, well, the weirdest post I found on there says you had died six years ago.

DH: Really?

F: Yeah, one of the posts claims you died six years ago.

DH: Well, I feel pretty good for having died six years ago.

F: Yeah, you sound pretty good for having died six years ago.

DH: You know that stuff started with Mark Paul [Zack Morris]. When we were doing the show, they had said Mark Paul had died. We had to, way back before where the technology is now, we had to have a picture made with the current date on it and all that stuff. Then people thought Screech [Dustin Diamond] had died. I guess it’s my turn and it will make its way around to everybody.

F: When I was looking around, I found a picture of you karaoke-ing. What’s your favorite song to sing?

DH: Oh I have a bunch. I started going to this place in Burbank called Dimples. I saw a friend of mine outside one night, I went to say hi to him, and turns out this place was a karaoke bar. And I was doing musicals before I did Saved By The Bell, and I thought here’s a chance to get up and sing and keep your chops up and have a good time. And now I get up and do a lot of different things from Billy Joel to Garth Brooks to Louie Armstrong to Harry Connick Jr. I mean there are a lot of different songs I like to sing. But everyone’s at karaoke to have fun not to be the best singer. I use it to have fun and as an opportunity to keep my chops up.

F: You also grew up in Tennessee.

DH: Chattanooga, Tennessee, is my home.

F: How was growing up there?

DH: Wonderful. It’s a great place to be from; it’s where I got all my basic values, my basic rights and wrongs. It’s where most of my friends live. It’s where my family lives. It’s a terrific town with a lot of terrific people.

F: Do you still keep in touch with everyone from the show [Saved By The Bell]?

DH: No. I talk to Mario [Lopez] occasionally, Elizabeth [Berkley] occasionally. I did speak to Mark Paul [Gosslaar] a couple of months ago, but no that’s it.

F: That’s it?

DH: Well when you think about it, you do a show and obviously, when you are all together you are staying in touch. But the last time I worked with the original group was back in ’93 I think, ’92 or 93′, somewhere in there. It’s been, what, 14 years since then. They’ve grown up. They’ve gone on to get married, have kids. Have their own lives. It’s just, you’re put together because of the show, not because you knew each other before and yeah you try to maintain some kind of relation or friendship, but it’s not a natural situation to maintain.

F: What other things have you done besides the show? Did you write a book?

DH: I wrote a book before I did the show called “Rating the Agents.” I took my knowledge of music business and thought, there aren’t really any good factual ways of looking at who the good agents are out here. So I literally recorded every name on television for about eight weeks, whether it was guest star, regular, co-star or feature. I scored it, based on who their agents were. It makes sense to me that this person has this many people on this many shows they are probably good at getting you guest star work. Or this agency has most of the series regulars so you might want to talk to them. It was a common sense guide to the business of acting was what it was. It kept me busy at a time when I was slow as far as acting opportunities. I think career energy gets career things so that helped back then. As a result of having been on Saved By The Bell, I’ve gotten to do two USO tours, I’ve been over to Kosovo, Macedonia and Bosnia on one trip and also to Afghanistan and Pakistan and when you get to do things like that you can’t put a price tag on it. I’ve been to the White House with Screech, which was interesting. I’ve done golf tournaments. Charles Barkley has become a good friend of mine. I’ve played in Michael Jordan’s golf tournament. I’ve done things with Alice Cooper. Vince Neil’s become a friend of mine of Motley Crue. All because I’ve watched them, they’ve watched me, we have something in common and we’ve did events together. A lot of these events are an opportunity for us to come together and support in a day or a weekend, what other people are trying to make better for people’s lives all year round. Like cystic fibrosis research or cancer, cures for cancer or Ronald McDonald houses, things like that.

F: I’m sure everyone appreciates you coming out to though.

DH: Well again, we get to have fun and it does generate some energy and activity, but I try not to lose sight of the fact that there are people working year round on this stuff and we’re there for a moment to help them and we’re not the be-all end-all, we’re just there help them have a good time.

F: When you went to visited the White House, who was President at the time?

DH: It was President Clinton.

F: Clinton?

DH: And it was an unbelievable experience. We got to go as part of an NBC group for Children of Family Programming. One of the things we got to do was have a tour of the White House when no one else was in the White House. It was a private tour. As we went through and saw the different places, one of the most amazing things I saw that the tour lady showed us was down in the basement there is still the original foundation for when … a lot of the White House has been replaced because it was crumbling and falling apart or whatever. On some of the bricks you can see the scorch marks where the British tried to burn it down. In the Oval Office at the time, we went in there, President Clinton was using President Kennedy’s desk the one where John had crawled through. When you stand there, it’s not about politics, it’s about history. You are overwhelmed by the fact that Jefferson and Roosevelt and all these people have stood there in the very same space you are standing in.

F: Were you able to meet with Clinton that day?

DH: No, but President Clinton did do a PSA for us, for Saved By The Bell. I do believe it was the only one that he did. I think it was about not smoking and things. It was pretty cool. I sent him a note because his secretary was very nice to us and let us come into the Oval Office and I hadn’t met Chelsea so I sent pictures to Chelsea. And he sent me a letter back. I have a letter signed by President Clinton. It was something that … it was amazing. You write the President and he writes back.

F: Did you keep the letter?

DH: Oh yeah. I’ve got it framed. It’s an amazing experience and it’s very humbling.

F: What would have been your favorite episode?

DH: I have several. One of them is the graduation of the original class because I got to say goodbye to our cast as a principal handing out diplomas for all of you, for everybody that watched and for myself. They were going on to prime time. We were all going to split up and I was going to stay with the Saturday morning show. One of my favorite episodes is the rafting episode where my brother came to the school to be a substitute teacher. Not my real brother, but character brother.

F: Rod Belding?

DH: Yeah, Rod Belding. The kids really attached to him and I was a little jealous for a while. He comes to me and says, “Hey Richie, I’m going to spend a weekend with Olga” or whatever … one of the flight attendants … and I said, “Man, you got to get out of my school because you’re not treating the kids right. Then Mr. Belding then goes to the students and says, “Listen, Rod can’t take you, but if it’s okay I will.” He didn’t bust him. He didn’t say he was bailing out on them. But what he didn’t know was Zack was listening in the hallway the whole time. He did what was right for the students of the school and I think that’s a very important episode.

F: Let me end with a couple of things here. This something we do with most everybody. It’s called a lightning round. I’m going to ask you some quick questions here and you answer them as quick as you can.

DH: Okay.

F: Can you tell me your favorite Supreme Court Justice?

DH: Sandra Day O’Connor. She just left.

F: Square root of 64.

DH: That’s eight, isn’t it?

F: Yup. What color does yellow and blue make?

DH: Purple. Give me something hard.

F: Can you tell me …

DH: Or is it green?

F: It is green, actually.

DH: You did give me something hard.

F: Can you tell me the words to the first chorus of the Brady Bunch song?

DH: Uh… (Sings) Here’s the story about some kind of family… (Hums). I can tell you the words to first verse of the Saved By The Bell song.

F: Go ahead and tell me that then.

DH: (Sings) “When I wake up in the morning and the alarm gives out a warning and I don’t think I ever make it on time. By the time I grab my books and I give myself a look I’m at the corner just in time to see the bus fly by. It’s alright ‘coz I’m saved by the bell.” There you go.

F: That was the most amazing thing I have ever heard.

DH: (Laughs).

F: Well that’s all the questions I have.

DH: That’s the end of the lightning round?

F: I mean I can come up with a ton more questions if you want.

DH: Give me two more.

F: Two more? Um … what’s your favorite food?

DH: Fried okra.

F: If a plane crashes on the border of the United States and Canada, where do they bury the survivors?

DH: The survivors don’t get buried, you knucklehead.

F: I asked the guy who played Donkey Lips that question and he told me Canada.

DH: What’s he from?

F: Salute Your Shorts. You’re a little smarter than he is.