Brian Jordan Alvarez is one of the most interesting voices in comedy. The general public likely recognizes him as Estéfan in “Will & Grace,” Wesley in “Jane the Virgin,” or Cole in “M3GAN,” but real ones know that he’s the brilliant mind behind the Gotham Award-nominated five-part web comedy series “The Gay and Wondrous Life of Caleb Gallo” … and, if you’ve spent any time on TikTok, his hit viral universe of filterface characters like TJ Mack. Now, Alvarez serves as the creator, executive producer, and star of the FX workplace comedy “English Teacher,” the best new comedy of 2024 and the rare show that manages to tackle Gen Z without sounding like it was written by a bunch of dinosaurs who still ask their nephews to help them open PDFs.
Alvarez plays Evan Marquez, an openly gay English teacher at Morrison-Hensley High in Austin, Texas. He works with his best friend and fellow teacher Gwen (longtime comedy partner Stephanie Koenig), and their co-workers principal Grant Moretti (Enrico Colantoni), gym teacher Markie Hillridge (Sean Patton), school counselor Rick (Carmen Christopher), and new teacher Harry (Langston Kerman). Together, they have to navigate not only the rapidly evolving teenage landscape of their students, but the political minefield of public school teaching in the Lone Star State.
Given the school setting and Alvarez coming from a similar background of internet comedy as Quinta Brunson, “English Teacher” was immediately compared to the Emmy Award-winning “Abbott Elementary,” despite the shows taking completely different approaches to comedy and storytelling. The latter is presented in a mockumentary style and is lighthearted enough for ABC audiences, while “English Teacher” is a more traditional sitcom with a greater presence of students due to their age.
It’s also the perfect balance of the chronically online type of Gen Z humor that fuels TikTok trends and moral panics from those who think “these kids today are too woke,” and the genuine struggles of adults who were once the arbiters of progressive thinking, but are now struggling to catch up.
2024 problems require 2024 comedy solutions
A major conflict is introduced in the very first episode of “English Teacher”: Evan is in hot water after a parent (whose child has since graduated and is now in college) complained about him kissing his boyfriend, now-former teacher Malcolm (Jordan Firstman). The students are all buzzing about him being under “investigation” and the school district has decided that he also has been banned from dating any other faculty members. The parent eventually drops the case, but the damage is already done. Not to mention, the reason the mom dropped it in the first place is because the conservative gym teacher also threatened the mom at a country club by saying that if she didn’t back off, he’d tell everyone her son is gay.
“You can’t fight homophobia with homophobia!” Evan screams, but Markie isn’t hearing it. “Life is a football game and you keep showing up in a tutu,” Markie replies.
Like the many school-based sitcoms that came before it. “English Teacher” isn’t just about the generational differences between adults and students, but also a gaggle of adults who likely wouldn’t ever affiliate with one another if they weren’t forced to within the confines of a school building. Since quitting the school, Malcolm is living his best gay life and trying to convince Evan to quit teaching and do the same. But Evan feels compelled to stay in the suburban school district to help prepare the next generation to become more empathetic people away from the conservative nature of most of their parents — even if it means having to listen to whatever weird conservative conspiracy theory Markie’s fixated on this week or juggling the psychological chess game that is appeasing a panicky school district in 2024.
“English Teacher” firmly believes in progressive politics, but it doesn’t paint the conservative adults as wholly “bad” or the more left-leaning adults as inherently altruistic. To put it lovingly, they’re all just trying their best … in whatever way that means for each of them.
English Teacher is a show that gets Gen Z, good and bad
The film and television industry has been desperately trying to find a way to relate to Gen Z, but considering how quickly pop culture, trends, and sensibilities evolve thanks to the constant connection of the internet … good GOD, it’s been struggling. A majority of the humor is either rooted in Gen X/Boomers failing to understand “kids these days,” or it’s straight-up mocking Gen Z without any respect for them at all. “English Teacher,” however, finds the balance and avoids falling into cringe.
Sometimes the students reflect the absolute best of Gen Z, proof that “the kids are alright” and their quest for equity is far beyond the generations that came before. Episode 2 is all about the LGBTQ+IA2S alliance pushing back against the Powderpuff Football tradition of cheerleaders playing football while the football players dress as cheerleaders, and it turns into a glorious performance of the football players embracing legitimate drag performance in ways the football players of yesteryear would have never been as comfortable to pull off.
But the show isn’t afraid to acknowledge that teenagers — like all teenagers — are a gaggle of impulsive, hormonal, freaks of chaos. Millennial teens were the same way, as were Gen X, Boomers, and so on and so forth. All that changes is how the impulsive, hormonal, freaks of chaos behavior is exhibited. The best example comes in episode 3, “Kayla Syndrome” where a student announces she has “asymptomatic Tourette’s syndrome” and that it’s “only self-diagnosable.” The entire school becomes deeply invested in her “struggle” and is ready to call out anyone who makes “huge mistakes because they haven’t learned the etiquette.” It sounds absolutely ridiculous, but all of the young actors treat the situation with deadly, deadpan seriousness, which makes it work. It’s not a joke, A.T. (later named “Kayla Syndrome”) is SERIOUS.
Note: There is a problem with school districts mistreating their students with disabilities and frequently not believing them as legitimate, but that’s not what’s happening here.
The benefit of being immersed in Gen Z culture
Brian Jordan Alvarez is fully immersed in online culture and has grown a massive audience on TikTok, which means he understands the intricacies of Gen Z better than the overwhelming majority of veteran writers working in film and television. It’s also reflected in the casting of the show. The aforementioned Kayla is played by Romy Mars, who has the nepo baby claim to fame of being Sofia Coppola’s daughter. To younger audiences, though, she’s best known for the famous viral TikTok of her making vodka sauce pasta after getting grounded for trying to “charter a helicopter from New York to Maryland on her dad’s credit card because she wanted to have dinner with her camp friend.”
One of the funniest members of Mr. Marquez’s book club is the pink-haired Tiffany, played to perfection by rapper and social media influencer Aliyah’s Interlude. When Evan hires a drag queen to teach the boys proper drag technique before the Powderpuff game, Alvarez cast Trixie Mattel – arguably the most famous drag queen with younger generations. Controversial TikTok star and the creator behind the meme expression “did you just put yourself in a mid-off with me girl [sic],” Ivy Wolk, also appears as Kayla’s best friend Chelsea. This is just scratching the surface of the promising young talent appearing on the show, but is emblematic of how tapped in Alvarez is to “the youth.”
The teens actually talk like teens because he’s not writing these characters as an outsider looking in or looking down; he’s writing based on a sincere understanding of both the highs and lows from firsthand experience. And if you check the comments on the TikToks Alvarez has made about the show, it’s resonating. Brian Jordan Alvarez has made something magical, and if there’s any justice in this world, “English Teacher” will continue on for as long as he has stories to tell.
