Chalk

Troy Schremmer
Janelle Schremmer
Shannon Haragan
Jeff Guerrero
Chris Mass

Director

Mike Akel

Using his high school teaching experience as impetus, director Mike Akel made Chalk to encourage school reform through enlightening viewers to the challenges teachers face. This comedic mockumentary capitalizes on four teachers' frustrations during the course of their school semester, by interviewing them individually as well as placing them together in scenes depicting faculty meetings, school spelling bees, and happy hours at a local bar. Allegedly real, though clearly ironic in the style of Christopher Guest's Waiting for Guffman or Spinal Tap, Chalk's characters expose themselves as actors through subtle hints, such as when P.E. Coach Webb (Janelle Schremmer) states her heterosexuality outright in her introduction to the camera. Later, Mrs. Reddell (Shannon Haragan), a teacher struggling with her promotion to Assistant Principal, clumsily breaks up a schoolyard fight with physical comedy reminiscent of the Three Stooges. Two history teachers, Mr. Lowrey (Troy Schremmer), the bumbling beginner, and Mr. Stroope (Chris Mass), who aggressively pursues the Teacher of the Year award, act as polar opposites to illustrate how neither whimpy coddling nor harsh militarism will work in the classroom. As Lowrey complains in the teacher's lounge that someone has stolen his yogurt from the fridge, Stroope's in the field shooting cans to blow off stress. Ultimately, the comedy makes way for touching scenes showing Mr. Lowrey's major improvement, and the realization that America loses many of its best teachers to messy academic infrastructure, lack of teacher support and financial hardship, making Chalk entertaining but also politically astute. --Trinie Dalton