Shanola Hampton and Mark-Paul Gosselaar on Their ‘Found’ Dynamic (Exclusive)

Shanola Hampton and Mark-Paul Gosselaar have found themselves in their hit network show.

The two beloved actors lead NBC’s acclaimed procedural drama Found, which premieres its second season on Thursday, Oct. 3.

Created by Nkechi Okoro Carroll, the series follows Gabi Mosely (Shameless breakout Hampton), a public relations specialist and crisis manager leading her own firm of private investigators, tech experts and lawyers. All have dedicated their lives to help bring home the victims police have overlooked in the more than 600,000 cases of people who are reported missing in the U.S. each year.

But there’s a twist. Locked in Hampton’s basement is Gabi’s former high school teacher Hugh “Sir” Evans (Saved by the Bell alum Gosselaar), a serial kidnapper who captured her as a child and is now being held captive to help solve each week’s case.

Season 1 earned praise from critics and audiences alike for its powerhouse performances, surprising storylines and the spotlight it put on missing persons cases across the country. So ahead of the premiere of season 2, PEOPLE caught up with Hampton and Gosselaar for a wide-ranging chat about their characters, the secret to their show’s success and what fans can expect after that finale.

PEOPLE: Congratulations on the success of the show!
HAMPTON: Thank you! We both feel lucky.
GOSSELAAR: Very fortunate.
HAMPTON: And let me just say, hands down, the audience is going to be so satisfied with what we have coming in season 2. Our team has done a magnificent job at creating something that takes what we established in season 1 and really ups the ante.

Well, season 1 left off on quite the captivating cliffhanger! What can you tease for when the show returns?
HAMPTON: We pick up right where we left off — literally a minute after.
GOSSELAAR: Yeah, I believe, the last shot we saw was in Lacey’s apartment, and that’s right where we start. So it’s a continuation from there.
HAMPTON: And that same energy that you felt when the show ended is what you’re going to feel at the first 30 seconds of the second season. And it carries throughout the entire first episode. It has your heart pumping the entire time.
GOSSELAAR: It’s funny because, we’re in [episode] 16 of 22 right now so the premiere feels like a lifetime ago. Which is a good thing to have! I mean, we’re so happy and feel so fortunate to be able to do 22 episodes on a show we really enjoy working on. When you get a gift like 22 episodes in this current landscape we call television, it feels like just the biggest blessing you could possibly have.

Did either of you you have any idea where the story would go when season 1 ended?
HAMPTON: No clue. No clue whatsoever.
GOSSELAAR: Yeah, I didn’t know where we would end up either. That’s really the biggest different between film and television. Film, you know the beginning, middle and end. Television, the first script you see could be in the middle of the story, which is really the case with Found.
HAMPTON: That’s the one great thing that I love about TV, though. I like the surprise. I don’t need to know all of the things. I like to feel what the audience is going to feel, even when I’m filming.
GOSSELAAR: It’s easy to not ask questions because both have so much trust in Nkechi Okoro Carroll (or “NK”), our showrunner, that she is putting us on the right path.
HAMPTON: Oh, NK has these plotted out in her mind. There’s a greater plan, for sure. She’ll share them with us later on, but she didn’t share anything with us at the end of the season last year, for sure.

Much of Found is built around the complicated dynamic between Gabi and Sir. How did you approach that? Did you two discuss it beforehand?
GOSSELAAR: No, not at all.
HAMPTON: I wish I could give this glamorous answer that we as actors got together like, ‘This is how we should approach this.’ But it’s just one of those things that organically happened in a very special way. I wanted to see what Mark-Paul was going to bring as the actor and how he was approaching his character, and then I just responded to that. Sometimes, there is just lightning in the bottle.
GOSSELAAR: And see, I think I responded to Shanola. Shanola is an anomaly. I’ve never worked with someone like her. I was brought on after the show was already cast, so there was no chemistry reads between us or anything before that. And when we were shooting the pilot, she surprised me right off the bat. Our first scene together was in the basement set, and it’s dark — both in lighting and in tone. So I’m in that mindset before the cameras go up and here comes Shanola, walking on set as this bright ball of energy.
HAMPTON: Oh my God… See, truthfully, I could not be on this ride without him. Mark-Paul makes everything better for me, both on and off-screen. He’s one of my dearest friends and it’s been beautiful to share the screen with him. He’s not an overly rehearsed actor who has an idea of how that scene is going to go and can’t penetrate past that. He’s so available and available to play. And I love to play on the playground with him.

Mark-Paul, Sir is different than any character you’ve played before. Were you looking to take a big swing?
GOSSELAAR: Well, I’m never really looking for a specific role but when I read NK’s beautiful pilot script, it really seems like this was going to be a challenge. And as an actor, especially on network television, if you find something that’s going to challenge you, you’re doing well for yourself. So I was enticed by Sir from the get-go and felt that, under NK’s lead and the writers behind us, that I’d be both creatively challenges and safe in the choices I’d be making alongside them.

What’s it been like to take on such a dark role? Is it hard to play someone who isn’t particularly likable?
GOSSELAAR: See, I had never intended to play Sir as someone who’s likable. I noticed certain qualities about Sir in that first script that interested me as an actor. And I asked NK if there was someone I could use as a muse to model Sir after, and she said, ‘Ted Bundy.’ So that instantly unlocked who this is for me. This guy does horrible things, and yet because of the way he looks and the way he presents himself, he’s able to get away with a lot.
HAMPTON: Tell them about what happened at the Olympics.
GOSSELAAR: Shanola and I were at the Olympics in Paris. And I’m not going to say who the person was, but it was a known personality, and she was telling us, ‘Oh, I just adore the show.’ But turned to Shanola and goes, ‘I just don’t understand why do you make him so bad?’ Meaning me — as if Shanola’s character in some way made Sir bad.
HAMPTON: I looked at Mark-Paul and said, ‘We’re going to have a conversation about this.’
GOSSELAAR: The woman meant well, but it’s interesting to see how different individuals respond. It’s almost like a social experiment that we’re playing.

Was there one case from last season that resonated with each of you personally?
HAMPTON: My heart was in was our very first case, where we were found the 14-year-old missing foster child. It was the pilot and because I hadn’t told one of these stories before, it was all so fresh for me. I’ll never forget the look on the actress’ face when we opened the bunker where her character was being kept. It just… it’s stuck with me ever since.
GOSSELAAR: I’m on a different side of the show, so I don’t really remember the cases as much as I should. But something that absolutely moves me that’s another component of the show is the character of Margaret (played by Kelli Williams), whose young son disappeared from a local bus station 13 years ago. Every night after work, she goes back to that station in hopes of finding him again. That whole storyline really gets to me, especially as a parent. I completely understand those emotions as a viewer.
HAMPTON: 100%. I’m a mother too, and you’re never not thinking about your own kids when you’re telling a story like that.
GOSSELAAR: I love that story a lot. And Kelli is such a fantastic actor.

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Shanola, how will the dynamic between Gabi and her team be irrevocably changed now that they know the truth about Sir?
HAMPTON: Well it’s changed tremendously. It’s nowhere near what it was. Just like any relationship that happens in life, once a big thing happens, you’re never the same. It’s how you recover. And you’ll see in the first few episodes, they don’t make it easy for her. There’s a lot of resentment. There’s a lot of hurt as in life and it takes them a long, long time to really even get an understanding of one another after what she’s done. So it’s not going to be the same Mosely and Associates that we left in season 1. It’s going to be a whole different ball game for everyone.

Is that fun to play as an actor?
HAMPTON: It is, but i think it’s more satisfying for the audience. Sure, some champion her and give her a break, but a lot of people have some anger towards Gabi for the hypocrisy of what she did. So I think the audience will be happy that there’s not a quick fix. And that’s one of the advantages of doing 22 episodes; we can take our time to get to whatever that new normal is going to be because we have the luxury of time to do it.

Mark-Paul, in season 1 we often saw Sir in flashbacks scenes. Did you enjoy those more than the ones where you were in the basement?
GOSSELAAR: You’d think I would, because I could move around more but doing the flashbacks, I personally don’t enjoy it. It usually involves me either tormenting or torturing these young actors playing Gabrielle and Lacey/Bella. So when I have to do those days, it does gnaw at me and they’re a little more difficult than just being in the present. I mean, it’s no cakewalk being in the basement — or even in season 2, some of the other things I do. But flashbacks generally involve me being a really s—-y person to a child. And being a father, it’s tough. Those are tough days.

So what do you do to prepare for those days?
GOSSELAAR: I really put a lot of trust into NK and our incredible writers. We’re on this journey together and I’m just the vehicle on screen telling their story. And I know I use the word fortune a lot, but I feel fortunate to tell the stories they’re creating.
HAMPTON: Our writers really have the magical thing to balance, to tell these important stories while also entertaining the audience and keeping their heart racing the whole time. That’s very hard to do, so I just focus on what’s there on the page. If you stick to that, you really can’t go wrong
GOSSELAAR: We don’t even rehearse! Shanola doesn’t like to rehearse. I don’t mind it. I prefer to know the material inside and out. And so the more I say it, the more I become comfortable with it. But she likes everything to be organic.
HAMPTON: It’s better that way for me because it feels natural.
GOSSELAAR: Everything you see on the screen is almost the first or second time we’ve said these lines aloud. We’re working off each other. It’s like a dance: she gives me something, I give her something and we trust each other that we’ll get there together. That’s what you see.

Is there something you do to decompress after these intense storylines?
HAMPTON: I sing and dance!
GOSSELAAR: Shanola’s songs… I’ve never seen anything like it.

Wait wait — what are you singing, Shanola? Are we talking like, Taylor Swift?
HAMPTON: No, they’re originals. I make up songs about everything. Right before our first shoot of the day, I’ll sing [set to the Looney Tunes theme], ‘It’s… the… first scene of the day / And we came to play / It’s the first scene, it’s the first scene, first scene of the day!’
GOSSELAAR: And she incorporates the entire crew into too. She has them all singing and dancing.
HAMPTON: I’ll sing, ‘We’re making a TV show!’ And then everybody else has to sing, ‘TV show.’ And then I’ll say the names of the people on the crew. “We’ve got Hugo and Steve and Mona and we’re making a TV show!’ All sorts of things like that.
GOSSELAAR: Mind you, we’re in the this dingy basement set while all this is going on. And then seconds later they call ‘action’ and she snaps right into it and she’s Gabrielle Mosley, as if none of that even just happened.

How on earth…
HAMPTON: Look, every actor is different — and no judgement — but me? I’m not one of those method actors. I love my life. I have a great life. I’ve got two kids and I got a awesome husband. I do not need Gabi’s trauma in my life. So I am able to really disconnect.
GOSSELAAR: I’m not a method actor either. But I’m also not not a method actor, you know what I mean? Like, I can’t turn a light switch on and off; I take a lot with me home. That’s why it’s good that I’m filming this here in Atlanta, because I can wash a lot of it off before I make the trek home for the next four hours on a plane. But Shanola is a light switch.
HAMPTON: When they say ‘rolling,’ I click into her and wherever she is at that moment and when they say ‘cut,’ I am back to being me, singing and dancing.
GOSSELAAR: I remember when we were making the pilot, I called my team and said, ‘Is this a comedy that we’re doing? I don’t know if she’s going to be able to pull this off!’ Because I hadn’t seen any of her other scenes, just the ones we were doing together. And it’s like she was rehearsing for a musical!
HAMPTON: I definitely like to keep things light on set. I don’t believe in carrying all that drama. Even our sound mixer will tell you, I adapt a different cadence to my voice when I’m Gabi. And at first it’s very jaunting to hear me go between one and the other, but that’s what gets me through it.
GOSSELAAR: She’s just so effervescent and such a bright human being — and really good at what she does — that she’s able to turn that switch. And it’s a joy to be around. She just makes it easy.

Season 2 of Found premieres Thursday, Oct. 3 at 10 p.m. ET. Season 1 can be streamed on Peacock.