REVIEW: 'Bad Education' tells of a school superintendent who led a double life — and stole a lot of money

How much is a public school worth to a community?

Well, people want the best for their children. They'll pay more to live in a neighborhood where their kids can go to a school that is perceived to be of high quality, which can give them an advantage when they're applying to Ivy League universities. This raises property values for childless homeowners as well as the tax bases for cities, counties and states. Leaving aside our obligation to educate our young, to give each child a reasonably fair shot at attaining a place in our society, schools matter as economic engines.

Whether you have kids going to them or not, you don't want your public schools to fail. You want them to thrive, like the schools in the Roslyn school district on New York's Long Island did in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Roslyn High School was the only high school in the district, and based on test scores, it was ranked among the 10 best in the country. Every year, a quarter of the school's graduating seniors got into elite colleges. It had good athletic programs, solid teachers, and apparently a student newspaper that wouldn't quit.

Because in March 2004, that student newspaper, the Hilltop Beacon, published a story about an assistant superintendent for the district who had been quietly fired by the school board. Pam Gluckin, who wasn't named in the initial story, would eventually be convicted of embezzling more than $4 million from the school district, and eventually, it was discovered more than $11 million of the district's money had disappeared. The scandal torpedoed the career of the well-liked district superintendent, Frank Tassone, a former literature teacher who had presided over the district for more than a decade. Tassone, who eventually plead guilty to larceny charges, is believed to have stolen more than $2 million from the school district.

Bad Education, the HBO movie about the Roslyn school district scandal, is the second feature from Cory Finley, whose murderously cool Thoroughbreds was one of the highlights of 2018. Though Finley comes at filmmaking from a playwriting background, the script for Bad Education was written by Mike Makowsky, who was a student in the Roslyn district at the time, and it borrows something of the tone of "The Bad Superintendent," a 2004 New York magazine piece by Robert Kolker that wondered aloud if maybe the parents and board should have figured out earlier that something was wrong.

Bad Education takes a somewhat softer approach than that, portraying Tassone (a weirdly charismatic Hugh Jackman) as a complicated and possibly sociopathtic creature; an erudite clothes horse who saw himself as the embodiment of his district. He drove a Mercedes and wore Canali suits to present a certain image to the world at large.

At the same time, he was brazenly appropriating funds that were supposed to go toward improving the schools in his charge. Tassone cared deeply about serving his clients. Or at least he could convince them he cared deeply. Tassone seemingly knew every parent, student and teacher in his district -- he had a Clintonesque ability to recall their names and passions and was able to present as a deeply empathetic individual. And he was getting good results.

As Tassone, Jackman assumes that air of insouciant untouchability that you sometimes see in high dollar college basketball coaches like Rick Pitino and John Calipari.

Gluckin (a brilliant, dangerous Allison Janney) is, in the film at least, his chief deputy, and similarly beloved, though she's less careful. She advises her niece, who works with her in the district office, to abuse the district's credit card, telling her she'll reconcile things later -- that she's been handling things a long time. The credit card is a matter of convenience, so long as it's paid back it's no harm, no foul.

But then Gluckin's none-too-bright son is caught buying home remodeling supplies with the district's card, and Gluckin's world falls apart. School board president Big Bob Spicer (a wonderfully calibrated Ray Romano) wants to call the police, but Tassone has thought it through -- let her resign quietly, and agree to pay the money back. No police, no breach of public trust, no drawn-out prosecution and possible civil action. He pressures an accountant for a number -- something under $250,000. She'll clean out her desk and pay it back. It's the best thing for everybody.

But Gluckin knows who Tassone is protecting. And it isn't her. And there's earnest student Rachel Bhargava (Geraldine Viswanathan) who's asking questions about the proposed $8 million skybridge project -- how can the school afford that when the roof is leaking?

While Bad Education is not a documentary, it adheres fairly closely to the broad outlines of the actual Roslyn case. Tassone was, in some quarters, beloved. He was also perceived as a little squirrelly by some, who didn't buy the monastic widower act. Bad Education's Tassone is a gay man with a secret life, a longtime partner with whom he shared an apartment on the Upper East side of Manhattan and another lover (who he regularly visited on the district's dime) stashed in Las Vegas. The film implies Tassone's gayness was an open secret, which means it was something he was trying to hide, yet another walled-off part of himself.

It's interesting to note that the real Tassone has called foul over that part of his portrayal. Released from prison a decade ago, and still -- as the movie points out -- drawing more than $173,000 a year from his pension, he says that although he admires the work Jackman and Janney do in the film, he was always a proud gay man. And that while he had a lover in the desert, his partner -- who he's still with -- was always aware of the other man.

It's not hard to see why he might be upset. Tassone's private life might not have been as disordered and duplicitous as depicted. And that's his name. As much as I like this film, it's a little troubling that these particular details got fudged. I'm not sure Tassone's habit of keeping secrets had anything to do with his love life. Maybe he needed the money to support a double life, but it's at least as reasonable to think he believed he was entitled to the money.

Because, after all, he delivered for the Roslyn school district. He delivered for the parents and other stakeholders. Maybe in a better world, his compensation would have better mirrored his value.

It might have been better for Tassone had he stuck to teaching English.

Anyway, this is a great vehicle for Jackman, who reminds us that he isn't just a movie star gliding along on goodwill and magnetism, and Janney, who slides effortlessly from competent graciousness to hot filament fury with just a touch of indelible Long Island tackiness in reserve. But my favorite performance here is Romano's haggard, tired school board president, no doubt a guy who got lucky and is just trying to give something back to the community, who finds himself betrayed not by the politicians, but by the career professionals he thought he could count on.

"I hope you find peace, Frank," he tells Tassone after the sky has fallen. It sounds like a curse.

MovieStyle on 05/08/2020