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).

Single gal Connie Brooks (Eve Arden) is the new English teacher at Madison High School. Phillip Boynton (Robert Rockwell) is the handsome biology teacher. Osgood Conklin is the by-the-book principal. Lawrence Nolan (Don Porter) is a rich newspaper owner and the father of one of the students.

Our Miss Brooks started as a radio show (1948-1957) and became a success in the early TV medium (1952-56). I'm not familiar with either. The oddity here is that the movie restarts the story after four years on TV. The students look that much older and ill-fitting. I assume the idea is that most of the public have yet to get a TV. So there's no reason to do a continuation movie since most people haven't seen the show to start. I get that idea but maybe get new younger kids.

In TV terminology, this is an extended pilot episode. I can see the appeal of this franchise. This is a simple single gal sitcom in a school. She's a fine strong character. There's a functional love triangle. Aging her up makes her a better spinster. It works somewhat as a movie. It's all fine if unspectacular.

I remember the TV series "Our Miss Brooks," though it's possible I saw it in syndication. 1952 is a little early, even for me.

After the show was canceled, this film was made, completely ignoring the fact that Brooks had moved on to an elementary school. We go back to her arrival at Madison High, meeting Mr. Boynton, etc. We also have a subplot involving a student (Nick Adams) and his wealthy father (Don Porter).

I love seeing Richard Crenna playing the teen-aged Walter Denton - he went on to so much good work in TV and film. Eve Arden plays Miss Brooks the way unmarried women were played in those days -- desperate to get married. Arden always had that wry delivery that served her well in this role. Despite wanting to nab Mr. Boynton, the character of Connie Brooks is a good teacher and an independent woman, dedicated to her work and students.

Robert Rockwell, Gale Gordon, and the rest of the TV cast is on board. Few people realize that Robert Rockwell worked into the mid-'90s, and if you recall the Werther's candy commercial with the attractive white-haired man giving his grandson Werther's, that was him.

Nice trip down nostalgia lane. It was a more innocent time for sure.

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.)

One of my favorite scenes in this film is between Eve Arden who plays Miss Constance Brooks and her soon to be landlady Mrs. Davis, almost as good as the 'Who's on first' bit. I especially liked that her cat, Minerva, also had to approve. Miss Brooks is new to town and has been employed to teach English at Madison High School. Student Stretch Snodgrass, aka Fabian, gives her a tour which is where she first meets fellow teacher of Biology (Phillip Boynton), who she starts dating. Unfortunately, Phil's idea of a date is peanuts at the zoo...it's a long game, but she is hoping to eventually see him with her in a cute little cottage with a white picket fence.

"Well, ours wasn't the fastest romance on record, but it didn't take any time at all to prove itself one of the slowest."-Miss Brooks

Their military like principal, Mr. Osgood Conklin, is not well liked amongst the staff or the students...so when he decides to run for office of coordinator of education, he figures out a way to have the popular Miss Brooks be his Campaign Manager. Miss Brooks isn't thrilled, until she realizes that him vacating the position would create an opening which would come with a promotion with more money for her love interest the biology teacher Phil. Her selling point to the students...get rid of Mr. Conklin! Campaign slogan "Get Mr. Conklin into public office and out of Madison!"...it's one everyone can get behind.

Miss Brooks has a side project teaching the son of a wealthy newspaper tycoon Lawrence Nolan, played by Don Porter, who becomes a romantic rival for our biology teacher Phil!

Fun and wholesome high school comedy whose biggest selling point is that it stars Eve Arden, who I really enjoyed seeing in a starring role. Eve Arden is so often relegated to the best friend or sidekick role...but no one delivers a snappy-line like she does (especially in films such as Mildred Pierce). Both a fun vintage film and a family friendly one that has me recommending it to both families and fans of Eve Arden!