Our Miss Brooks

I saw "Our Miss Brooks" with the incomparable Eve Arden. This comedy tickles your innermost being. I am a fanatical devotee of the TV series, and this movie disappoints me not. He who hasn't watched it or TV series has missed the finest morsels human wit has to offer. I never laughed, but my whole body chuckled. (From my diary).

WHEN THIS THEATRICAL movie hit the local theatre screens in 1956, the CBS Network powerhouse sitcom was long over the hill and heading toward its eternal reword in Sitcom Heaven. Ignoring the old axiom of "If it ain't broke, don't fix it!", those in charge at CBS decided to revamp the series with unnecessary changes of venue (different school), setting (City & state) and cast characters.

WELL, THERE HAD certainly been enough popularity and appeal left in this now "venerable" CBS Radio/Television and someone had the brainstorm to bring its story and original characters to the big screen of our local theaters. Disdaining the changes that had been foisted on us in the waning days of the series, the theatrical version of OUR MISS BROOKS brought the story back to Connie Brooks' arrival at Madison High School and her meeting with Mr. Boynton, Mrs. Davis, Walter Denton, Mr. Conklin, Harriet Conklin, "Stretch" Snodgrass, .....etc.

ADDED TO THE original gang and story-line was a sort of subplot involving Mr. Conklin's running for office of Educational rep and the introduction of Don Porter as widower and well to do newspaper publisher (and potential suitor) Lawrence Nolan. Then Warner Brothers contract player, Nick Adams, portrayed son of the rich guy, Gary Nolan.

ALL THINGS CONSIDERED, the picture was a successful 1950's style comedy that did a great job in closing the OUR MISS BROOKS story with a "....And They Lived Happily Ever After!" fairy tale ending.

THE FILM ALSO gave us a chance to see the members of the supporting cast at their very best. These players are: Gale Gordon (Mr. Conklin), Jane Morgan (Mrs. Davis), Richard Crenna (Walter Denton),Gloria McMillan (Harriet Conklin)and Leonard Smith (Stretch Snodgrass). Robert Rockwell (Mr. Boynton) was perhaps shown to the best as he was allowed to show much of his yet unseen abilities.* Also, before we forget, cameo by lovely, statuesque and non-speaking, uncredited actress is really June Blair; formerly Playboy Magazine's "Playmate of the Year for 1957, as well as the future Mrs. David Nelson ADVENTURES OF OZZIE & HARRIET).

TAKING THE TIME to screen this theatrical film version of OUR MISS BROOKS will prove to be time not wasted by anyone.

NOTE: * The part of Mr. Phillip Boynton on the radio version was portrayed by one Ira Grossel; who would change his name to Jeff Chandler and pursue a most successful, but all too abrupt film career. But whoever was to play the very naive Biology teacher would have to be taller than average; as Miss Eve Arden was, herself, a very tall woman.

Using students to raise funds for the Principal running for office? That doesn't sound ethical, by today's standards. LOVE Eve Arden, the English teacher in "Miss Brooks". My favorite role is when she is Joan Crawford's sidekick in "Mildred Pierce". She never really got her man in films, and thirty years later, Arden is now the principal in "Grease". In the film version of "Our Miss Brooks", she is the English teacher at the local high school, trying to spur a student on. Gale Gordon is the Principal, and his role is actually pretty toned down from all those episodes in "Lucy". The story takes some left and right turns, but it ends up being all about finding Miss Brooks a husband. I had always thought the film came first, but apparently this was released right at the end of the TV series. Here, life would imitate art... Nick Adams plays the troubled student, and would overdose at age 36. It's pretty good, if you just go along for the ride. Not her best role, but not her worst. Directed by Al Lewis, who had written and directed the TV series. Eve did mostly TV shows after this.

This film came out right after the cancellation of the popular TV series in 1956. The writers (from the original series) completely ignored the fact that the TV show underwent a major format change in it's last season. Miss Brooks went to work in an elementary school following the demolition of Madison High. This change never completely worked and the series was cancelled. That said, this feature tells the story, from the beginning, of Miss Brooks arriving in Madison, meeting and moving in with Mrs. Davis, and progressing in her romance with Mr. Boynton over a period of months. There is a secondary romantic subplot interjected with Don Porter, and the film unfolds with virtually the entire cast from the beloved series. The Warner Bros. designed sets closely approximate the ones fashioned at Desilu for the TV show, and Minerva the cat (played by the same cat from the 1950 comedy "Rhubarb") gets ample screen time. Fans of the series and even those who have never seen it or heard the many radio episodes out there will enjoy this funny, gentle story of Connie Brooks and her co-horts.

The movie manages to blend more serious points with a light-hearted humor worthy of the OMB franchise. As expected, Brooks (Arden) gets a lot of good snappy lines. In fact, the script individualizes each of the characters in distinctive fashion, from bumbling Boyton to squeaky Denton to smug Conklin. Of course, Brooks being a respected English teacher can't be spoofed, but as a single middle-age woman, she gets her share.

But please, oh please, don't let Denton squeak out another tune. He may have ruined music forever. And get a load of June Blair as the knock-out blonde who parades through the newspaper office like a candy doll in a boy's gym class. There's also a number of nice touches, like Brooks nudging open a dreamy bridal door, or the stuffy Conklin stepping onto a broken ladder and into the sea, or the helpful location shots of mid-50's suburbia.

The plot has several threads—untangling Brooks' romantic life, reforming a delinquent Gary Nolan (Nick Adams), getting Conklin elected to School Board, among others. Note the one straight role is Adams' wayward teen. This was a time when juvenile delinquency was a major social concern. So the script goes to some length showing how the boy is reformed by honest work.

Overall, the canny script manages to interweave the many threads in entertaining fashion. Nonetheless, it's the impeccable Arden who carries the show with her compelling presence. All in all, I think it's a rather underrated 90-minutes of smoothly done chuckles, and a fitting final curtain for the memorable OMB.

(In passing-- I suspect one reason the movie has been generally overlooked is because of the familiarity of the format, namely the long-running TV and radio versions, that eclipsed the overall quality of this production.)