Kathy Ireland Reveals What She Did to Get Fired from 'Saved by the Bell 'in 1990 (Exclusive)
"It's not the only time I got fired, but I think it was the first time," she told PEOPLE exclusively at the 32nd Annual Movieguide Awards in Hollywood on Feb. 7.
Ireland, 61, recalled how she auditioned for the part of a nurse on the series, which ran from 1989 to 1993. "It's like, 'Okay, my mom's a nurse, so I know how nurses behave.' Well, this nurse, they wanted to flirt with this boy, and he was ... I'm in my 20s and he's a teenager," she said of star Mark-Paul Gosselaar, a.k.a. Zack Morris. "I was like, 'I can't flirt with him. He's a teenager. I mean, that's just wrong. I'm not going to do that.' So I got the big boot."
Related: 'Saved by the Bell' Cast: Where Are They Now?
"I think I was only there the first day. Maybe I made it to day two," she added. "We did the read-throughs and they staged it, and then they're like, we better get somebody else."
In her time, "I got a few acting offers and it paid the bills," she said of stints on series like Melrose Place, Sabrina the Teenage Witch and Suddenly Susan, among others. "I knew it wasn't a strength. I enjoyed it. I was thrilled."
Ireland, famous at the time for her 13 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue appearances and an endless stream of campaigns, also told PEOPLE, "Modeling was not my path. It was an opportunity to save money to go to college or start a business."
"The whole time I worked in that industry, I was trying and failing at businesses," she continued. "I look at failure as education in that respect."
Though she's now known for everything from her Fashion 360 line for HSN and her fragrance collection to her Kathy Ireland Worldwide licensing brand and Ireland Pay credit card processing company, she could remember two ventures that didn't go great.
Related: Kathy Ireland Reflects on Her Iconic Modeling Career and the 'Gift' She Received Along the Way (Exclusive)
"One example was skincare," she said. "I worked with scientists and was trying to find just the right formula. But there would always be something off."
Another opportunity that didn't pan out? Beer.
"Someone gave me a book on making beer, and I'm not a good cook. So when my first batch was really good, I thought, wow. And the profit margins were really good. And I thought, I'm going to put the big brewers out of business, this is amazing," she recalled.
"Next batch tasted like a science project," she said. "It was really bad!"
But the experience left her with a lesson.
"When you pour your heart and soul into a business, you've got to love it," she shared.
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