The star of CBS' police procedural guest co-hosts Monday's show to kick off ET in the Bahamas Week.
FBI star Zeeko Zaki is ready to head back to work! The star of the CBS police drama kicked off ET in the Bahamas Week from the idyllic Baha Mar resort, where he had a bit of summer fun with ET's Nischelle Turner co-hosting Monday's show -- including braving giant water slides -- before jetting off to New York City to begin production on the new season.
Zaki, rocking a healthy tan from the Bahamas sun, joked that when he's back in uniform as Special Agent O.A. Zidan, he'll have to find a way to keep his hiatus glow going.
"I think we are just going to have to keep it consistent through the whole year," he quipped. "So we might just have to find some tanning booths on set!"
And when filming officially commences on season 5, Zaki's co-star, Missy Peregrym -- who announced Friday she gave birth to her second baby, a daughter, in June -- won't be back as Special Agent Maggie Bell just yet, taking an extended maternity leave before resuming work sometime in September.
"We'll see, we'll see," he said when asked if his FBI castmates have any celebratory plans to welcome her back. "Maybe her and the kids will enter undercover in an episode and we'll get to kind of do it on screen. That'd be great."
With five years under his belt on FBI, Zaki reflected on the impact the show and his character, whose family history and origins were changed to mirror his own story, has had on his life and career so far. The 32-year-old spoke specifically about the writers incorporating his Muslim and Egyptian heritage into O.A.'s background.
"It was an honor to have the platform to have the opportunity. And it's really great it worked and that we got to show the business side that we got to have all these different perspective in these shows so hopefully we will continue to open doors and change the narrative," said Zaki, who's hoping for another crossover with the other shows in the FBI universe, Most Wanted and International. "The best part about it was when I did the research for the show, I realized how I was more like most of the FBI agents... And then we realized our job was to show the world the diversity and the enthusiasm of all the agents."
He also discussed his 100-pound weight loss over the last eight years and the secret to his gradual slim-down.
"The craziest part was just being kind of a different person every year. You get like 10 pounds a year, I wanted to do it slow. But my biggest tip and the thing that I walked away from was a little trick I learned from The 4-Hour Body by Timothy Ferriss -- 30 grams of protein within 30 minutes of waking up. So give it a shot," he suggested. "The fact that we kind of got to reveal whoever this guy is with you guys here was pretty exciting because until I look in the mirror, I just still feel like that old kid."
FBI premieres season 5 on Tuesday, Sept. 20 at 8 p.m. ET/PT on CBS.
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