Will Friedle and Danielle Fishel say they’re still open to reconnecting with Ben Savage, after years of distance following their Boy Meets World days—now with Friedle hoping he “comes back” and Fishel imagining her former costar as a new dad.
It wasn’t a big public statement that caught the moment—it was a question that came up during recording.
On Wednesday. June 3. Will Friedle told People that while he and Danielle Fishel were recording an episode of “Pod Meets World” that morning. something surfaced that the two of them couldn’t stop thinking about: a question “that we all wanted to know.” Friedle said that if Ben Savage had been on with them. it would have been answered right then. and “we would have heard a great story.”.
Friedle, 49, played Savage’s onscreen brother when Boy Meets World ran from 1993 to 2000. In the same interview, he said he still wants to talk. “I still want to pick up the phone,” he said. “I know I’m shouting into the void, but I’m going to keep doing it. I haven’t given up on my friend.”
“I’m hoping that he comes back into our lives at some point,” Friedle added, “and when he does, we’re going to have a lot to talk about.”
Fishel. 45. said she’s carrying similar hopes—though the longing now has a different shape. tied to Savage’s new life. She described “loving imagining him in this new chapter of his life as a dad. ” adding that she knows he has had a baby girl. In her view, Savage is now “a husband,” and she said she likes thinking about him in that capacity.
She also shared how much she misses knowing the details. “It makes me sad sometimes when I think about the fact that I would love to just know, like, ‘How’s it going? What’s happening now? What are the milestones that are being checked off?’” Fishel said.
Savage, 45, welcomed a daughter with wife Tessa Angermeier in November 2025. And before things between the cast shifted. Fishel said she and Savage talked about fatherhood—talks that linger in her mind now that it’s become real. “We talked a lot about how he looked forward to being a dad someday,” she told People. “So I like imagining this phase of life that he’s in now.”.
Even with the sadness. Fishel said she’s also reached “a place of immense understanding and grace” about why Savage may not want to revisit their time together. She explained that “Not everybody wants to talk about uncomfortable truths. ” and said the three of them had agreed they wanted to address what happened. “Although we were nervous, it was a journey we were willing and excited to go down.”.
Friedle and Fishel, along with Rider Strong, launched “Pod Meets World” in 2022. It was initially reported that Savage was in talks to cohost the podcast, but he ultimately stepped away from the project. By 2023, the trio confirmed that Savage had “disappeared” from their lives.
Friedle later insisted there was no specific fight behind the distance. In 2023, he told Variety, “We didn’t have a fight. There’s no falling out,” adding, “There was no animosity.”
What remains, from Friedle’s recording-day question to Fishel’s longing over the milestones she can’t track, is the same unresolved thread: they want Savage back in their orbit—especially now, with a new baby girl and a husband’s life unfolding since November 2025.
Will Friedle Danielle Fishel Ben Savage Pod Meets World Boy Meets World Rider Strong Tessa Angermeier podcast reconciliation