remembering Jimmy


Remembering Jimmy || Special Features || Mr. Novak

Mr. Novak
"I liked the scenes that dealt and interacted Novak with the students, in which Novak was not all-knowing but trying his best, and vulnerable; and that the kids were not treated as someone that should be ruled by an authoritarian teacher figure, but rather from someone who's lived longer and has more experience by the very nature of that, and has a better perspective, perhaps, on some of the same hurdles the student's are facing, because the teacher's faced them before. Not that he knows it all, but he sure can ease the way." James Franciscus on "Mr. Novak"

For two seasons Jim Franciscus delighted us in his portrayal of a HS English Teacher Mr. Novak. The series was unique in the fact that some of the episodes didn't end "happily ever after," - unusual for a show of that era. Shot on location at John Marshall HS in Los Angeles. The brick design of the building was exactly what they were looking for, (in case you didn't know, almost all building in California are coated in stucco). The brick building gave the appearance that the school could have been located anywhere in the U.S. However, there were disadvantages to filming in a real school, as Jim recalled, "We couldn't shoot during school time, so we would start work at six at night and film until six in the morning; we'd do that three times a week -really just long, hard hours. But that was the only way to do it, except during the summer." Creator, Executive Producer, and main writer, Jack Neuman remembered, "We could go in at four o'clock on Friday when everybody had left school, and we could shoot till midnight, and then if were really pressed we could shoot all day Saturday, to get all the hallways and kids and everything. The kids were all delighted - they got $3.00 a day to be extras." Teachers everywhere wrote in to tell their stories, hoping they would be portrayed as an episode. In fact, one of the episodes that was banned by the network, could have prevented real-life teenage tragedies. Mr. Neuman wrote a two-part episode about venereal disease and was to conclude it as an episode of Dr. Kildare. Jim recalled,"It was a terrific show and Standards and Practices said 'Absolutely not. We can't mention that subject.' We went crazy. We said 'It gotta be mentioned 'cause these are the people that are getting it! You can't put it under the rug.' And I remember John Ryan and Jack Neuman and myself - we were livid, and threatened to strike and all kinds of stuff. But we lost the battle. We were ready to shoot and we got the word to cancel it."

Though the show had the potential to face some real-life topics, Jim was frustrated that the networks refused to air them. After Novak, Jim decided to turn to the big screen, in hopes this media would allow more adult topics to be depicted.

Regarding the end of Novak, Jim said,"I was glad it went off after two years because I felt we had said pretty much what we wanted to talk about, and another year and another year would kind of just milk the thing a little dry."

Excerpts taken from a two-part series featured in TV Collector Back Issues. The actual articles contain much more information on "Mr. Novak" and the cast. Contact the TV Collector for information on how to obtain these issues today!

Contact Bob and Tim's TV Tape Trader to obtain your copies of "Mr. Novak"

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