This portrait of a corrupt teacher is full of the quotidian material at which the workplace drama Mr. Novak excelled: gripes about students stealing teachers’ parking spots, debates over teaching the texts versus teaching the test. At the center is Harold Otis, an English teacher whose dubious methods come under scrutiny when rookie Mr. Novak (James Franciscus) finds his incoming students from Otis’ class underprepared. Sitting in, Novak realizes that Otis achieves his popularity through comedy, sidelining the curriculum for a steady stream of wisecracks. Novak tries it himself but feels cheap. Then Novak discovers that Otis passes his pupils by feeding them the answers to the tests and, with the righteousness of a fallen disciple, sets out to bring him down. As Otis, Herschel Bernardi traverses a precisely delineated arc: first wry and cynical when Otis is in his element, then cagey, scared, surly, self-pitying, and finally meek. It’s a world-class performance, but writer Milton Rosen understands that Otis is the sort not to reveal himself and supplies most of the key insights via third parties. “He’s afraid of us, I think,” says one student (Shelley Fabares), and Novak lands the death blow: the kids are laughing as payment for favors, not because the jokes are funny. Rosen gives his pathetic creation a second chance that rings false by today’s standards, but this is such a full-blooded character study that it would be churlish to begrudge Mr. Otis at least the possibility of redemption.
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