I don't know if Coolidge High is representative of most "problem" schools, but I have a feeling it might be. It is also the worst of times, they decide, because there are still rats in their bathrooms. It is the best of times the students say, because we are "surrounded' by prosperity" - the words are ironic.
Vincent Millay and planning little speeches on "First Impression." But she gradually feels her way into the minds of her students, and when they make the incredible discovery in "Tale of Two Cities" that today might also be the best of times and the worst of times, she breaks through. The new teacher starts with fanciful notions, quoting Edna St. Kagan (Salvatore Rosa), the glib, loud, fat class president who always wears a tie and always tucks it into his belt. Or Joe Ferone ( Jeff Howard), who can earn good grades when he wants to but gets more attention if he doesn't.
Like Alice Blake (superbly played by Ellen O'Mara), a chubby, painfully shy girl who falls in love with a handsome English teacher. A veteran teacher suggests maybe she should have substituted "steamship." These are the things you have to think about if you propose to reach real kids.Īs Miss Dennis slowly comes to know the students in her classes, they slowly turn out to be individuals with problems. Her first lesson comes in the first two minutes of her first class, when she quotes Emily Dickinson ("There is no frigate like a book") and the students hoot with laughter. She doesn't know how to teach, what to teach or, in the end, even why she wants to teach.
As the teacher, Sandy Dennis is perfectly cast.
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