Teachers' Lounge

Teachers' Lounge is a comedy set at Amsterdam High School, a fictitious New York City public school.

Originally produced in the 1990s as a contemporary play, this modest revision sets the play in 1990.

Wallace Johnson, fresh out of college, is the newest member of the English Department. On the first day of the fall term he meets his new colleagues--Marty Goldberg, a bitter, burnt-out teacher in his 50s; Nora O’Reilly, a liberal bohemian-type in her 40s; Stan Cohen, a system-abuser around 50 who's always scheming to get out of teaching; Felix White, a finicky, uptight man mama’s boy in his 30s; Sal Vincent, a booze-soaked playboy in his early 40s and Susan Wagner, an a ruthless and ambitious, authoritarian woman shrew in her early 30s.

As the fall term progresses, Wallace encounters the inanity of the school system as well as the cynicism, despair and lost idealism of his colleagues. He also encounters the wrath of the unseen principal. Wallace has come into teaching without any training and his lack of preparation quickly leads to despondency. Sal and Nora try to help but can’t provide more than moral support. Sal is having trouble enough keeping his personal life together. And Nora, who dresses as literary characters to motivate her students, has herself become increasingly despondent.

The principal finally decides that Wallace must shape up fast or be terminated. He names Susan as his mentor. Susan, who is desperate to impress him and be named the new chairperson of the English department, approaches the job with relish. Her tenure is short-lived, however. When Marty finds out that being a mentor means teaching one less class, he uses dirt on Taft “he'd kill to keep from his wife” to get the job for himself.
Marty is no help as a mentor. The best he can do is shatter Nora’s idealistic facade and admit the disillusionment of his own lost youth. Susan, meanwhile, finds another cause to make herself look good. Nora, dressed as Blanche Dubois and teaching a passage of provocative poetry accidentally exposes a breast to her class. Susan starts a campaign to get her removed from the classroom.

In spite of all the negatives around him, Wallace starts to improve and no longer has the principal breathing down his neck. However, he faces another problem--budget cuts. The final day of the fall term is one of great anticipation. Will Wallace be terminated? Will the superintendent bring Nora up on charges of immorality? Will Susan become chairperson? To the great relief of the other teachers, Susan does not get the job. Felix, who has been waging a secret campaign for the position, does. Wallace is terminated and the charges against Nora are dropped. Nora quits anyway, realizing that she is on the brink of burnout and passing the torch on to Wallace, who can now keep his job.