One of the most popular
family sitcom stories of the Comfort TV era is the student who develops a crush
on a teacher.
I wonder, in the wake of so
many news stories about inappropriate teacher-student relationships, if this trope
is still popular today. Perhaps, like episodes in which characters get drunk in
a funny way, it has been relegated to the scrapheap of ideas that can no longer
be explored without offending someone.
That would be unfortunate.
For decades the teacher crush was a go-to plot because it could naturally
accommodate both comedy and earnest, sometimes painful emotion, which most viewers
can appreciate having gone through a similar experience.
For me it was Miss Bobbin
in second grade, a hippie chick with long dark hair that wore flowery
sundresses and taught barefoot. Ah, the ‘70s.
Looking back on a selection
of these episodes, there is an almost even divide between boys falling for
female teachers, and girls falling for male instructors.
Most happen in high school,
which is understandable. And when the series is set in high school at least one
story like this is inescapable. Even the nerdy, reedy-voiced Wally Cox, who
played a science teacher in Mister Peepers, became the object of
a student’s affections in “The Teenage Crush” (1952).
No series went there faster
than
The Patty Duke Show. “The French Teacher” was the first episode of the
first season, and has Patty failing French (“a moth-eaten drag”) until her teacher
leaves to get married and is replaced by dashing substitute Andre Malon
(Jean-Pierre Aumont).
Starry-eyed looks turn to genuine hope after Andre offers
to show her Paris if she ever visits. But when Patty starts to make plans for
their future, Andre turns to her father for help:
Andre: “I think she wants to marry me!”
Martin: “It would serve you right.”
Patty was among the luckier
students in these stories – a solution was found that spared her any feelings
of rejection. Bud Anderson of Father Knows Best was not as
fortunate during his infatuation with a French teacher in “Bud Branches Out.” Now
a college freshman at the start of the show’s sixth and final season, he gets
herded into French by mistake and decides to stick around after an amour-at-first-sight glance at Miss
Luvois.
Through one of those
patented sitcom misunderstandings, a dinner invitation to Bud sent by his
girlfriend is delivered by Miss Luvois, and he thinks it’s from her. Standing
outside her home with flowers in hand, he learns the hard way that it wasn’t. But
don’t feel too bad for Bud, as the girlfriend he returns to is played by
gorgeous Roberta Shore.
Heartbreak usually passes
quickly in these situations. In The Brady Bunch episode “The
Undergraduate” the family can’t figure out why Greg is flunking math. Alice finds
a note in his pocket addressed to “My true love Linda,” but after paging
through a yearbook they can’t find a Linda in his class. The mystery is solved
when Mike opens a school conference invitation from Greg’s math teacher – Linda
O’Hara.
Greg remains smitten until
he meets Linda’s fiancé, Dodger first-baseman Wes Parker (playing himself). He
offers Greg tickets to the season opener if the kid gets his math grade up, and
Greg happily chooses baseball over love.
Such bribery would not work
with Cissy Davis on Family Affair; her crush vanished when she learns the object of
her affection is a jerk.
In “Think Deep” Robert Reed
plays philosophy teacher Julian Hill, the kind of supercilious twit still found
in higher education. But he has a goatee and says things like “The true
personality is hidden beneath a welter of self-denigration,” and that was
enough for Cissy. But then Uncle Bill invites him to dinner and the twins spill
coffee on his suit, prompting the outraged Julian to call them “little monsters.”
The shattered look on Cissy’s face says it all.
The show seemed to take
another run at this plotline two seasons later in “The Substitute Teacher,” in
which Jody develops a fascination with Miss Evans, wonderfully played by June
Lockhart. Turns out this time it’s not puppy love, but Jody gravitating toward
her because of her resemblance to his late mother. Few shows delivered that
kind of emotional gut-punch better than Family
Affair.
While most crush stories
are told from the student perspective, Room 222 explored how the situation
can be just as distressing to the teacher. In “The Coat” guidance counselor Liz
McIntyre (wonderful Denise Nicholas) helps a troubled student get a job at a
department store, and he mistakes her professional interest for something more.
He buys her an expensive coat from the store to show his affection (actually he
steals it, but it’s the thought that counts). Liz agonizes over the proper
response, knowing that the wrong one may drive a dropout risk out of school for
good.
Then there are those rare episodes
where the student’s attraction is actually reciprocated. On The
Facts of Life, the two-part episode “Taking a Chance on Love” has 19
year-old Jo embarking on a romance with her 30 year-old photography teacher. And
on Wings,
Brian gets to live the dream by spending the night with his ninth-grade English
teacher (played by Peggy Lipton!) in “Miss Jenkins.”
Unfortunately, he gets so
caught up in the fantasy he can’t handle reality.
Joe: “You mean…”
Brian: “I got an incomplete.’
Do I have a favorite? Glad
you asked. The episode is titled “I Love You, I Love You, I Love You, I Think”
and it’s from Gidget. It starts when Gidget meets an older guy on the beach and
they start surfing together.
She loves it when he calls her “a pint-sized adorable
doll,” though he won’t admit they have a relationship. “At least for the next
five to six years,” he tells her. “Talk to me then and I might make you a
serious proposition.”
With school starting next
Monday, the mystery man urges Gidget to forget him, and she calls it the
perfect romance – “over before it had a chance to begin.” But on Monday she
walks into math class and guess who’s her teacher?
This was the pivotal scene,
because given the flirting and feelings and the now much more obvious age
difference, it could easily play the wrong way. But while the moment is every
bit as awkward as it should be, it’s also hilarious, because of some unexpected
slapstick moments and because Sally Field is a gifted actress.
Teacher and student finally
talk things out, but a lot of stuff implied on the beach is deftly sidestepped
in the climax, probably because there was no better way out. Still, this is one of those TV episodes that's a lot more complex and provocative than its creators intended.
If you’d like to plan your
own teacher crush classic TV night, you have many other options to choose from:
“Beaver’s Crush” (Leave
it to Beaver)
“Another Day Another
Scholar” (The Jimmy Stewart Show)
“The Love God” (My
Three Sons)
“Love at First Byte” (Head
of the Class)
“The Communication Gap” (Nanny
and the Professor)
Each one offers its own variations
on a story that almost always makes for fun television.
