Nia Long may have been the wind beneath Idina Menzel’s wings in Lifetime’s Beaches remake, but the TV movie’s contemporary setting meant she was deprived the opportunity of sporting some of Barbara Hershey’s ’80s looks from the original. Luckily, Long is set to make a trip to the past for her new TV project: TV Line reports she’ll star in ABC’s The Goldbergs spin-off, which is set in the ’90s. Long did guest star on The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air, so she knows exactly what kind of ’90s fashions to rock.
The series centers on Coach Rick Mellor (Bryan Callen), a no-nonsense high school gym teacher who will team up with a coworker to “act as father figures” to their students. Long will play Lucy Winston, a single mom who begins working at the school in part because the job offers free tuition for her sons, who are apparently “getting older and inching towards trouble.” It sounds like her kids will have a period of adjustment, which presumably means Lucy will, too. But with a couple of childless teachers looking after everyone, the problems should be resolved in 22 minutes flat.