Up the Down Staircase (1967)

Drama

Sylvia Barrett is a rookie teacher at New York's inner-city Calvin Coolidge High: her lit classes are overcrowded, a window is broken, there's no chalk, books arrive late. The administration is concerned mainly with forms and rules (there's an up and and a down staircase); bells ring at the wrong time. Nevertheless, she tries. How she handles the chaos and her despair in her first semester makes up the film: a promising student drops out, another sleeps through class, a girl with a crush on a male teacher gets suicidal, and a bright but troublesome student misunderstands Sylvia's reaching out. A discussion of Dickens, parents' night, and a mock trial highlight the term. Can she make it?

Updated May 11 2020

Releases:

US -

1967-01-01

MoreLess Releases

Keywords:

teacher

FACTS

Runtime: 124 mins Rating: 7.7 Tag Line: Simple words that start a war: "Good morning. My name is Miss Barrett. I am your Home Room teacher..."

Cast

Ruth White

Mrs. Dubose

Sandy Dennis

Martha Nicholas

Jean Stapleton

Birdie Conrad

Frances Sternhagen

Virginia

Sorrell Booke

Harvey Beckman

Eileen Heckart

Henrietta Pastorfield

Vinnette Carroll

The Mother

Florence Stanley

Ellen Friedenberg