Original subtitles

You have some stuff that you learn,

but other stuff doesn't need to be taught at school.

- Canteen's crap this year. - Yeah.

They changed all the bad foods into the good foods.

They're just tight. Don't let you do anything.

No iPods, no phones,

no hats, no undertops.

I do special history, yeah.

We stopped Special Maths after year seven.

I've been in every special class

since I've gotten to high school.

I remember one excursion we got to go to this park,

and it had... what were they called?

I don't know. I didn't go.

Unfortunately bullying's a problem in the school.

White shoes are not on, mate.

Black shoes or you just don't get to play at lunchtime.

So what I do is I work

with the victims, but also the perpetrators.

Get with them one on one

to try and locate the root causes of what's going on.

I didn't do it, sir.

Didn't do what, Jonah?

Nothing.

I've got a year-seven boy out there crying,

saying you tormented him. You bullied him

and you threw his schoolbag over the train line.

How is that appropriate behavior?

There's a difference between bullying and joking around.

We're joking around with him, sir.

He doesn't get it, it's not my fault.

- That may be how you see it... - He cries.

I could tell him a knock-knock joke and he'd start crying 'cause he's a homo.

Well, I've gotta tell you, it's not appropriate.

It's not appropriate because he's a homo.

We were trying to have a fun time

on the way before school.

Was it fun for Ben?

- He just didn't get that it was fun. - Yes.

We weren't even bullying him, sir. We just "Punk'd" him.

I said, "You got 'Punk'd"' afterwards and he didn't even get it.

- He took it serious. - What does that mean..."Punk'd"?

It's a show, sir. It's a TV show. Don't you ever watch TV?

Listening! Please, cast.

Liam, I'd appreciate some manners, thank you.

Candace?

Our music productions are open to any students

that want to be involved.

And they really love it. For some, it's the highlight of their year.

It's an upbeat sort of production,

and I think it's a lot of fun.

Right, left, right, up.

Got Mr. Gregson helping me out.

He's one of my senior drama teachers.

And he is from a dance and theater background

and he's a real asset.

That's how you hold it for the phrase at the end.

She loves my crowd scenes. I direct the big stuff

onstage that she can't handle, the mayhem scenes she loves.

There's plenty of mayhem going on in this production.

- There is. - On and off the stage.

That's what I always say. She's stolen that from me: On and offstage.

I'm in one of my off years at the moment.

I direct every second production.

So this is Meredith's turn this year.

I tend to do the "wow" shows.

- Every second year we do traditionals. - Yeah.

It's difficult for me sometimes taking the backseat

in my off years. I find it hard sort of sitting back

and letting her do her thing.

Sometimes I'm...

"What's she doing?" But that's her choice.

She makes choices that I don't always agree with.

Listening to your director, please.

Mrs. Cotton is in charge.

Could I get two strong boys...

I have done Lord knows how many shows over the years.

I tend to do the more modern

or cutting-edge productions. I write my own stuff.

Original musicals... I've had a bit of critical acclaim for that.

And this is the big show I did last year..."Tsunamarama,"

which was about the tsunami tragedy

set to the music of Bananarama.

But no, I find plenty to do

- when it comes to Meredith's shows. - Thanks, Rodney.

Take a sip.

I've tried to reinterpret the songs

with a modern perspective.

We work well together, and I help her out.

When Meredith's feeling lost with anything,

- I point out where she may be wrong. - It's a real help.

Make it really aggressive and macho.

The program's a first, I believe.

And I think it's brilliant.

It really is giving an opportunity for one

of our girls to go to another school

that's totally different and experience a life

that's nothing like what she would experience here at Summer Heights.

It's a swap program.

I guess they're hoping to prove that you can get an equally valid

and valuable educational experience

in either the public or the private system.

We're looking forward to meeting our exchange student, aren't we?

Perhaps, Chantelle, would you like to... the school sent us over a tape

so we'd be able to see the student.

Thanks, Chantelle.

At Hillford Girls Grammar,

we pride ourselves on cultivating girls

who can succeed in not just one, but many areas.

At Hillford, girls like me

are offered a world of opportunity.

Sport.

Drama.

Music.

And more music.

And of course, academia.

It's a well-rounded education

in an amazing environment.

- Hi, miss. - Hi, Ja'mie, what's all this?

Looks like too much fun.

Haven't you got an assignment due tomorrow?

Oh, yeah, thanks, miss. Library, here I come.

Yes, well, she's sponsored kids,

she's modeled for "Dolly" magazine,

she's been nominee for Australian of the Year

and she's still only 16.

To be honest, I can't wait to meet her.

Oh my God.

Hi, I'm Ja'mie.

- It's so cool to be here. - Nice to meet you.

- This is Chantelle. - Hi, Chantelle.

Get my bag. It's in the back.

- Oh my God. You're going to Hillford. - Yep.

That's really cool. You'll fit in. There's so many Asians there.

Oh my God. It's so cool to be here.

Get back in the car. You're not coming in with me.

- Bye. - Bye.

My name is Greg Gregson.

But the kids at school call me Mr. G,

which is sort of an abbreviation

that some of the more popular teachers seem to get.

And I've been a senior drama teacher here

at Summer Heights for nine years now.

Coffee coffee coffee, before we teach-ee teach-ee.

Always interested in the performing arts: Singing, dancing, acting.

And Mom always says that even as a baby,

other babies were crying

in a sort of monotone way,

but if I called out to Mom, rather than, "Mom"

like other kids, I would go, "Mom!"

Instead of..."Mom."

I was always dancing and choreographing stuff.

I remember doing...

I choreographed the whole "Xanadu" soundtrack,

performed it for my friends at my ninth birthday.

Got into Teacher's College, majored in drama there

and just thrived. I was very known

for the shows that I'd done there.

I did many musicals.

We did "Starlight Express" as a one-man show.

I did "Cats"...it was just a cabaret, one man.

Probably the one you may have even heard of,

I did "Bubble Wrap,"

which was me and a couple of other boys.

I would emerge from various types of packaging.

I was at industry level at that stage,

and I thought, "Hang on, I know a job

where I can sing and I can dance and I can act every day

and get paid for it." And it was drama teaching.

Welcome to the magical world of drama.

I'm always joking with the principal. I always say to Margaret,

"You've got yourself an entertainment industry professional

for the price of a teacher, so where's my pay raise?"

Occasionally you come across a very special student.

You're a legend, sir.

For me, Jonah Takalua

is a lot more than he seems on the surface.

Fuck you, sir!

- Jonah is an at-risker. - Easy with the language.

He comes from a single-parent family. Lost his mother at an early age.

He's physically a lot bigger than most of the students his age.

And you can easily forget that he's really just a 13-year-old kid

- in year eight. - Gimme it!

There are attention-deficit issues.

- He's been on and off Ritalin. - I made it.

There's a problem with aggression with Jonah.

Two minutes, pussy.

Fuck you, motherfucker.

There's a lot of built-up frustration in the boy.

Do you want Skunk Boy? Do you want Fatty?

Or do you want Sexy Face?

- Jonah always makes shit up, man. - Bullshit, I do.

- I don't make shit up. - He even made shit up

that he met 50 Cent in the fucking city.

- I did meet 50 Cent in the city. - Shut up.

When he was here on the fucking tour.

He made up he had a girlfriend too.

I do have a fucking girlfriend. She's from my old school.

- What's her name? - Amanda or some shit.

This is Jonah's third school in 18 months.

He was expelled from the other two,

once for setting fire to a student's locker

and the other for defacing the principal's car.

- Take you out here. - Oh my God.

It's so kind of, like not shady. Do you know what I mean?

Like, there's not that many trees.

Like, I think when they were choosing people, they wanted someone

who was good at pretty much everything,

and, like, because it's gonna be on the news and on TV and stuff,

like, I don't wanna brag, but I think they wanted someone decent looking.

It's way less, like... not crap,

but less povo than I thought it would be.

That's cute. I love that. Oh my God.

What does that mean?

I love your bins. They're so random.

And teachers at my school are always going,

"Ja'mie, Oh my God, you're the most likely to succeed" and stuff.

'Cause I'm, like, the smartest non-Asian in year 11.

This is my blazer colors.

And I'm good at sport and everything that Asians can't do,

so I'm such a good ambassador for the school.

The buildings are so kind of gray.

- Yes, they are. - No offense.

I think I'm really gonna love it here,

like I got a really good feeling about it.

Public schools are so random.

And I make friends really easily.

Hi, I'm starting on Monday. Ja'mie.

- I can't wait to start. - Sorry, I was saying hi.

We used to have huge bushes here once,

but we had a girl raped behind them,

so we had to have them removed,

chopped down.

And as you can see, the kids have done an anti-rape mural behind,

which is nice. And we've got our state-of-the-art gym down there.

- Hello. This is Toby... - Hello.

- One of our specials from the Special Education Centre

that we have here at the school.

It's a separate part of the school down the bottom,

but we allow them to play with the normal kids at recess and lunch

and that sort of thing.

Yeah, so normally we're not allowed to touch them like this...

the students at the school... 'cause of the child protection laws,

but we usually turn a blind eye with these ones.

This sort of thing's fine.

That sort of thing, not fine.

Fine. Not fine.

- Miss, I need your help. - Shh! Quiet, Jonah, please.

I don't know how to do it. I can't be quiet if I don't know how to do it.

I teach Jonah Takalua year-eight English.

Are you gonna help me or what, miss?

He's disruptive. He interferes with other students' learning,

and he can be very rude.

Oh, miss, you farted. Miss just farted!

Jonah, time out. Time out now.

I don't wanna go to timeout. It's not my fault you farted.

I have set up a timeout desk,

which is at the back of the classroom.

- Cap off, Jonah. - Why? I'm in timeout.

- I'm not in actual school. - Give it to me now.

You'll get it back at the end of the class.

When he's sitting there, he knows he's been behaving

in an inappropriate manner.

Can't take that home with you, miss.

He really doesn't seem to want to learn.

And I know that myself along with other staff members

often feel like we're wasting our time with Jonah.

- The only one talking is you. - Shush!

You're the one talking.

Teachers at this school are so racist.

They always blame me for shit.

If anything ever happens in school, teachers go,

"Jonah, he must have done it." If shit goes missing,

or any kids are crying or some shit,

they go, "Jonah must have fucking done some shit."

- Jonah, please! - Sorry, miss,

I'm just allergic to some shit up here.

Must be allergic to your fart, miss.

Miss Wheatley's just a bitch.

She doesn't even smile when she walks through the playground.

- Hey, miss! - She doesn't.

She'll never get a boyfriend if she is so serious all the time.

Why don't you smile for once, miss?

Have you got your period or what, miss?

- Jonah really is... - Annoying.

Yeah, he just screws up the whole classroom

really badly.

Once we had to write a short story for English

and he didn't do any of it.

And the night before he called me

and asked me to repeat the whole story word for word for him.

The next day, he submitted my story under his name.

- The principal's dick. - It's boring to do work.

If you don't care about it, why would you do it?

I'd rather do fun stuff.

And you can do fun stuff when you're an adult

so why can't you fucking do it when you're at school?

My drama classroom is my haven.

It's where I come alive.

♪ Welcome to Mr. G's room, G's room, G's room ♪

♪ Welcome to Mr. G's room, come inside... ♪

Most of the time it's just chill out

with bean bags, pillows, cushions, that sort of thing.

♪ And take your shoes off, find a spot on the floor ♪

♪ Welcome to Mr. G's room... ♪

My teaching methods are fairly unique.

Someone join in.

I get pretty experimental and I go crazy sometimes.

I just let loose.

Into the room... Thank God you're here.

I've been shot.

Thank God you're here. Where have you been, bitch?

Boring is not a word that you hear in this room.

Spin around, Chinaman, spin around, spin around.

If there's something boring to do, then we find a fun way of doing it.

And he's dead. Slap the butcher!

Slap the butcher is one of the fun games that we play.

I'm gonna slap you, Emily!

It deals with the idea of possession

in theater.

One thing that I like to do from time to time

is I just perform for the kids for a whole lesson,

just to give them a sort of benchmark of how things are done.

So they can see how someone at a professional industry level

handles the performance side of things.

And that, in a way, gives them confidence.

There's still a drama syllabus that I have to cover.

Most of what I do has a grounding in education.

There is a lesson to be learned.

Five, six, seven, eight...

I'm a dancer from way back, so once a week,

I pay a visit to the Special Education Centre, where I teach Special Dance.

- Has anybody seen dancers? I'm here! - Yeah!

Dance doesn't discriminate.

Virtually anyone can do it.

Arms, arms.

Horsie, horsie, shimmy and up.

They have some interesting moves that I've never seen before

in normal people.

Their bodies move in a different way.

What I find is that they like a firm hand.

They have everyone, "Look after the special kids.

You better be nice to them or they'll crumble."

Pathetic, Cosima, pathetic.

They'll never make it professionally as a dancer,

but if you get stuck into them,

they seem to respond quite well.

Why are we not on the floor, everyone? Why are you not down, Jessica?

Disappointing me this week. Not good.

Thank you, Mr. Cameron, for your welcome.

And thank you to the traditional landowners

of Summer Heights, the Wurundjeri people.

My name is Ja'mie.

J-a... apostrophe... m-i-e.

Weird name, I know, but you'll get used to it.

Yes, I come from one of the most expensive private girls' schools

in the state, but I'm actually really cool.

Please don't be intimidated by me.

People always go,

"Private schools create better citizens,"

but I would say they create better quality citizens.

Studies have shown that students

from private schools are more likely

to get into uni

and end up making a lot more money,

while wife-beaters and rapists

are nearly all public-school educated.

Sorry, no offense, but it's true.

We're Poly Force.

We're the only four Polynesian people here

in the whole school.

Yeah, I'm one of the best break-dancers in the whole of the school.

Yeah, you're the best breaker in this whole suburb.

Yeah, in the whole suburb.

I live for break-dancing.

I wanna do it professionally when I get older.

Slow down, boys.

FOBs mean "fresh off the boat," 'cause we're all islanders,

like Samoans and Tongans.

Yeah, and we got a reputation for being really tough and stuff,

and teachers are fully scared of us.

They have this rule where we're not allowed to go more than 10 meters

from the fence on the boundary of the school

in case we beat the shit out of pedestrians and stuff and kids.

- We don't attack people. - We have a reputation for being violent

and stuff, so we might attack someone.

You never know what we might do.

This is the boys' toilets where we hang out sometimes

just doing tagging and shit.

This is my own "dick-tation."

So it's a dick, and then you just write "tation,"

like you know dictation that you do in English?

If you just move your way around the room,

you find other things...

"Lick my ballz"... that's one of mine as well.

- Who the fuck is Bek? - Who is it, yeah?

- I don't know... - Mr. James is coming... looking for you.

Fuck! I'm supposed to be doing detention.

- Jonah, come on, mate. - Sir, don't come in. I'm pissing.

- Don't look at my dick, sir. - No one's looking at it. Just hurry up.

Sir, you'll look like a poofter.

- Don't look at me. - Hurry up!

Get out, sir!

That's how you get out of detention.

When teachers come in, they think they look like perverts,

so they have to go straightaway. It's the best method.

Those on the floor. Those on my desk.

I know he's not gonna like me saying it,

but he really is wasting his talent doing choreography

on an old-hat musical like "Anything Goes."

Tell me something I don't know.

You really should be doing your own.

Exactly.

I mean, that's where I belong.

- Get out. - Excuse me...

I need to create my own stuff. That's it.

I have an urge to do it, and I need to do it, so...

I mean, I'm dealing with a principal

who does not seem to get what it takes

to run a successful drama department.

She doesn't think it's worthy of funding.

Margaret's..."You've gotta talk to Meredith.

She's the head of the department. You're not head of department, Greg."

No, I'm not gonna talk to her.

She doesn't know what she's doing. Why would I talk to her?

And what's worse is I'm competing

with Warren Carmichael over at Mercy College

who's putting on brilliant musicals.

"Bully Elliot" earlier this year was wonderful.

They had a boy over there that was bashed into a coma

after a bullying incident.

And one of the drama teachers wrote a musical about it.

"Bully Elliot"... absolutely brilliant.

Greg and I went across incognito.

- We didn't want them to know it was us. - It was a fantastic show.

That's what we need here.

Summer Heights High needs its own "Bully Elliot,"

and we're not gonna get it with "Anything Bloody Goes."

There's one more thing. I ask one little favor of the principal:

Can I bring my dog to school and take her to class,

and I'm flatly refused.

The fact that Celine has to spend all her time inside

in my office is borderline cruelty.

Celine is one of the smartest dogs you will ever meet.

Yeah, she's very very smart.

Celine has an oversized brain.

She's got one of the largest brains

for a dog of her age and species.

As you can see, that's how you're meant to hold them.

That's the brain just at the front there.

We've got her with a dog agency,

and she auditioned for a Best and Less ad in 2002.

Unintentionally, she was in the Pets Paradise commercial

a few years ago when I first bought her.

She was one of the litter that was in the window.

At least I'm pretty sure it was her

in the window.

Celine, you wanna go and see Rodney?

Don't touch. Just look.

Some of you come from povo families,

but that's not your fault.

Some of you, I know, don't even have Foxtel.

She seems to be a very confident girl,

and I think that will help her to fit in very well here.

Can I have the screen down, please?

She'll probably find out that kids are kids,

that they have the same issues

no matter what school they're in.

These are some photos of the world that I come from.

My friends think I'm an idiot.

They're like, "Why would you go to Summer Heights High?

It's like the boganest school in the world."

It's such a random thing for me to do, but I'm always doing things

that push outside the boundaries. Do you know what I mean?

That's me being an idiot.

My friends say that I look like Mischa Barton in that photo. I so don't.

I usually try to avoid public-school people.

Do you know what I mean? Like, one time I went to this year-10 formal

with this guy from a public school as a joke,

like me and my friends thought it'd be so cool

to just check out all the bogans and stuff.

Do you know what I mean? And it was such a crap formal.

Oh my God. That's from my modeling portfolio.

They should not be in there. That's really embarrassing.

I think it's a dumb thing.

Like, I think a lot of public-school people are dumb.

I think that it's not really their fault. That's the thing.

It comes from their parents.

I'm up to a thousand friends on MySpace, and I could always do with more.

The kids have got a lot to learn at this school.

I'll see everyone on Monday. Please come up and talk to me. I won't bite.

And I feel as though I can teach them how to behave

in the real world. Do you know what I mean?

Ben says that you were the ringleader, Jonah.

- Bullshit. - That it was you who threw his bag

over the train line.

Yeah, 'cause it was supposed to be funny. He didn't laugh.

How is it okay for you to bully Ben?

- 'Cause he's a wranger. - A what?

A wranger, sir. 'Cause he's got red hair.

"Orangutan." That's what we called him.

And does that make it okay for him to be bullied

because he has red hair?

- Well, people are racist... - To us!

- So we could be racist to wrangers.

But redheads aren't a race, Jonah.

But, sir, there's heaps of them. They're everywhere.

I'll tell you what's gonna happen, okay?

You're gonna clean this off Ben's bag.

- It's not gonna come off. - And the other thing is

you're not gonna catch the train anymore.

- Bullshit! - And that means

that your father's gonna have to pick you up

and drop you off at school every day. And I don't think...

- Don't laugh, motherfucker! ...he'll be very happy, Jonah.

I wasn't the only ringleader. These boys were in it too.

You are not making it easy.

- You want this to go into Miss Murray? - Take a joke.

Don't you even know what "Punk'd" is?

Why don't you watch MTV for once?

Did you wanna come back this afternoon and try this again, do you?

Or are you gonna look at Ben and say, "Sorry, Ben"?

- Sorry, homo. - No, Jonah, that's not acceptable.

Try again.

Sorry, wranger.

Jonah, you are gonna acknowledge Ben as a human being.

Now look at him

and say, "Sorry, Ben."

- Sorry, Ben! - No, Jonah.

Politely and properly apologize to Ben.

Okay, I'll look at him and shake his hand.

Yes. And say, "Sorry, Ben."

Sorry, Ben, motherfucker!

- No, Jonah. - He's a fucking homo!

Everyone goes,

"Oh, Jonah, he's, like, a dumbass islander,

and he's got... there's no hope for him."

- Sir. - Yes, Jonah.

What's the difference between a dick and a penis?

But they don't understand that I'm just choosing to be dumb.

I'm not dumb. I'm just choosing not to be smart at the moment,

but if I put in effort,

then I could be really smart, but I choose not to.

And they don't get that.

I doesn't work if I do that.

It goes off.

Jonah's got a lot of problems.

He's up against the odds, really.

What I would like to see is him

not get expelled again.

I'd like to see him get through a full term

without getting into any serious trouble at all,

and I've sort of taken that on as a mission.

- Hey, get your ass in the car. - I'm getting in the car...

And with our help, from the school, the staff,

and with the support of his family, we can do it.

What the fuck you say to me?

I said I fucking love you.

I fucking love you, okay?

My ass, you love me.

Motherfucker.

We'll go through it again. Candace, watching me, please.

And your American accent was pathetic last time.

Thank you, Rodney.

When I look at where I am now,

and I think about where I could have been,

I have to admit I used to feel unsure,

but these days, I couldn't feel more certain.

Drama teaching is where I'm supposed to be.

People say, "Drama, it's a bludge subject. It's a povo subject.

There's no jobs in it."

Wrong. Drama changes lives.

- High-five. - I have kids come up in the playground.

They say, "Oh, Mr. G, we're so glad

that we got involved in that production.

That was the best experience of my life."

And I turn around to those kids, and I say, "Cool."

And our staff are always on at me,

saying, "Oh, Greg, don't confuse your role.

You're there merely to educate."

Wrong again. I'm not there merely to educate.

I'm there to inspire them.

Thank God you're here. Grandma's been raped.

I'm there to teach them the discipline of dance,

and the craft of the stage.

I'm there to teach them to dare to dream

and to bring into their lives a little bit of magic.

Hold it, morons.

And release. Finally, good, yay! High-five.

Is that the arrangement you want?

Your call, your shot.

I'm really nervous this morning.

My breasts would have been bigger, but I had an eating disorder in year eight.

Do you have any lesbians at this school?

Just because I'm rich doesn't mean I'm a bitch.

- Inside. - Sorry, guys.

- Point it down. - Shut up and let me explain.

Butterfly, foot.

Oh my God, we're friends.

I have a bit of sad news here.

The news has been life-changing.

Yes yes!

Don't have time for it, Toby.

I'm looking for volunteers to cover my playground duty.

No, I don't do my Kermit voice.

- Sue says you've taken her pigeonhole. - She's a bloody liar.

- I have an announcement. - Move or I'll run you down.

I am excited. I'm excited.

You got your period or what, miss?

- Jonah now has a contract. - So fuck you, sir.

- "Jared was..." - Wanking.

The main thing I wanna do is to learn to read.

Bullshit children's book. I don't wanna read it anyway.

If you fuck up in school, that's fucked.

You said put my balls on the ground.

Why don't you fucking kill yourself?

Sorry, Shanks.

She has made the right decision.

Mr. G, are you all right?

I wish I was going back to Hillford.

That's not disruptive. That's entertainment.