Season four continues to celebrate the worst of human nature and the best of local comedy – with a couple of big-time international cameos.
Taika Waititi needs a coffin. In the opening scenes of the new season of Educators, Waititi turns up to St Macleod’s College as Tony, brother of woodwork teacher Ra (Cohen Holloway). He arrives with a simple request: he needs a coffin, in the shape of a ghetto blaster, by 1pm. His breakdancer mate Frank has carked it, and Tony accidentally left the coffin back in Tauranga. Ra’s students are busy making bread boards, but how hard would it be for them to secretly whip up a coffin? “It’s just lots of bits of bread boards stuck together!” Tony pleads.
Educators is back, and weirdly, all is right with the world. Created by Jackie van Beek, Jesse Griffin and Jonny Brugh, the award-winning improvised comedy takes us behind the scenes of a fictional high school, a bleak and dysfunctional universe filled with inept adults, inappropriate situations and uncomfortable interactions. As well as teaching kids how to build a coffin, this season features egg-throwing teens, dangerous teacher driving, another questionable school production and teachers putting students into holding pens. Everything is fine.
This gloriously dark and awkward fourth season is further proof that Educators is New Zealand’s most consistently funny comedy series. Deputy principal Robyn (Jackie van Beek) continues to steal every scene, rolling smokes in her office and giving terrible advice to students. Newly psychic secretary Sheree (Yvette Parsons) is flat out doing professional tarot readings on school time and hires her goth son Malcolm as her assistant, while PE teacher Vinnie (Rick Donald) is still a hotbed of rage and regret. 50-year-old Robert (Paul Glover) shows up in uniform each day despite not being enrolled, and embraces work experience as the school caretaker.
Kura Forrester is again a delight as drama teacher Judy, Liv Parker returns as ex-student Georgina and Tom Sainsbury is back as the ever hopeless Rudy. But it’s principal Jarred (Brugh) who is put through the emotional wringer this season, after he’s contacted by a mysterious young man who claims to be his son Jeremy (played by The Spinoff’s own Robbie Nicol). Jarred has been exploring his subconscious through self hypnosis, and his apocalyptic painting of his naked self in an embrace with the Angel of Death now hangs proudly in the school sick bay.
Season four also takes us deeper into the messy lives of the teachers, stepping into Robyn’s first home nightmare and meeting her sisters and mother. British comedy star Julia Davis (Nighty-Night, Sally4Eva) plays Robyn’s sister Catherine, while The Mighty Boosh’s Julian Barratt guest stars as a detective. They’re impressive guest stars, and along with Waititi, these comedy legends slip seamlessly into the chaos, so much so that I wished they were in more scenes. (Van Beek told The Spinoff earlier this year that improvising with Davis on Educators was her favourite moment from her entire career).
A high school is one of those social microcosms that’s rich with comedic potential, but Educators is also the home to New Zealand’s brightest comedy talent. Along with Nicol, Angella Dravid, Justine Smith, Mike Minogue and Kimberly Crossman also pop up in season four, joining the long list of New Zealand comedians who have had a terrifying role in fictionally raising the next generation of New Zealanders. Dravid in particular is a gem as the science teacher trying to introduce discipline to the school, while Minogue plays a rogue board of trustees member who chucks up an election hoarding on school grounds and indulges in some creative accounting with the school finances.
Have there ever been so many hopeless antiheroes in one TV show? Educators continues to nail the New Zealand psyche by being both recognisable, relatable and ridiculous, celebrating the worst parts of human nature – selfishness, dishonesty, fondness for leaf blowers – that we pretend aren’t hiding deep within us all. These are awful people doing awful things, and yet, we can’t look away.
Despite the entire show being unscripted and improvised, the short 20-minute episodes keep it feeling tight and controlled. Each episode delivers the perfect amount of chaos, delivered in a wonderfully droll and understated New Zealand way. I hope Educators never goes into retirement – but if it ever does, may it be buried in a ghettoblaster coffin made out of breadboards.
Educators streams on TVNZ+.
