(courtesy IMP Awards)
Walking into a streaming series of a perceived idea of what it is, and then finding out it is that but so much more, is one of the great delights of plunging into this sort of binge-happy storytelling.
If you are to watch the trailer, and we often do because who doesn’t like a sneak peek of what’s on offer, you would assume English Teacher, created by Brian Jordan Alvarez, is one bright, frothy sitcom delight, along the lines of Abbott Elementary, albeit it with a little more grit and a tad more edge.
And while English Teacher is very funny with some beautifully realised characters, who are whimsically loopy without losing the narrative-propelling honesty of their flawed humanity, and apt to go to some very idiosyncratic places, it is also fairly honest look at the issues facing modern teachers and the profession of teaching as a whole in our modern, agenda-driven age.
Front and centre of these appealing just-over-twenty minutes stories, which pack a lot in their disciplined timeframes, is the titular teacher, Evan Marquez, who teaches English at Morrison-Hensley High School in Austin, Texas, a liberal, arts-loving urban area surrounded by trademark Texan conservatism.
It’s an interesting mix of the progressive and the decidedly anti-woke and while Evan manages to somehow get away with a lot like, like bringing in a drag queen friend to teach the football team how to act like women for a yearly crossdressing tradition known as “Powderpuff”, he also finds himself at the pointy end of agendas by parents like blonde bombshell provocateur mother, Linda Harrison (Jenn Lyon) who tries to get Evan drummed out of the school for being gay and then for failing his students when they hand in demonstrably subpar essays on a book they clearly haven’t even read.
It’s the dance, an often macabrely frustrating one that has Evan often questioning his life choices, between the idealism of the show’s protagonist, and the forces arrayed against him, or forced to curb him, not because they want to but because they have no choice like the principal, Grant Moretti (Enrico Colantoni), which powers the comedic/dramatic delights of this superbly written show.
An ability to laugh at life’s absurdities is often seen as a gift and if that’s the case, then English Teacher is the gift that keeps on giving, plunging Evan and colleagues like BFF, Gwen Sanders (Stephanie Koenig), guidance counsellor Rick Santana (Carmen Christopher) and athletic director and PE teacher Markie Hillridge (Sean Patton), who has way more depth to him than you first assume, into situations that routinely test who they are as people and as teachers.
In an often challenging environment, the grim realities of which come to a head in “Convention”, where Evan flirts with the idea of putting down his idealism love of teaching and embracing the finances-bolstering world of corporate capitalism, English Teacher tackles everything from AI intrusion into learning, combative parents who think they know how to educate better than their children’s teachers, and the knowingness of students who think they know everything courtesy of platforms like TikTok.
Rather refreshingly, English Teacher doesn’t overly focus on the students, though they make memorable appearances in episodes like “Kayla Syndrome” and “Field Trip”, preferring instead to focus on the teachers, and principally, of course, Evan who may be damn good at what he does but who struggles to bridge the gap between what he wants in life and what he has.
It’s a chasm of a challenge that confronts him not just in the halls of his school, but in his personal life as he finds himself unable to fully break up with his on-again, off-again boyfriend Malcolm (Jordan Firstman) who, rather sweetly for a fairly switched on, if goofy guy, thinks he gives off a “masc energy” which Evan and fellow gay teacher Harry (Langston Kerman), so thinks Malcolm, lack.
As the eight finely0tuned episodes progress, it emerges that Malcolm has way more depth of humanity and caring than Evan gave him credit for, and that perhaps Evan needs to be a little more grounded and honest about he approaches his relationship, whatever its full form, with Malcolm, and honestly, his teaching career too.
A competent, sassy and driven teacher, Evan is also, rather wonderfully, flawed, as is the system in which he teaches and it’s this willingness to be honest about the failings of its characters and the educational environment in which they are situated, that gives this very funny show such a sizeable emotional impact.
Yes, you are laughing at the whimsy and outright silliness of s*x-mad suburban mums and kids who invent medical conditions, leveraged off genuine woke insights, to evade doing actual work, and the overall weirdness of a place devoted to education that feels more like an ideas battleground, but you’re also challenged to ask yourself what you’d do if you were Evan and all your career-driving idealism kept butting up against the grim reality of the world around you and the pitfalls of your healthy but flawed humanity.
An interview with creator and star Brian Jordan Alvarez …