Drexell's Class

Drexell's Class is an American sitcom that aired Thursday at 8:30 on Fox as part of its 1991–92 lineup. The show was created by Andrew Nicholls and Darrell Vickers.

Synopsis
Drexell's Class starred Dabney Coleman as Otis Drexell, a fifth-grade teacher at fictional Grantwood Elementary School in Cedar Bluffs, Iowa. Drexell's backstory revealed that he was a corporate raider who lost a large amount of money on a failed venture, dodged his taxes, and was arrested. At his sentencing, he was offered a suspended sentence if he worked as a teacher at the understaffed school to pay off his back taxes. Drexell was a divorced man whose two daughters lived with him. The cast also included two antagonists, rival teacher Roscoe Davis (Dakin Matthews) and Principal Francine Itkin (Randy Graff), who was later succeeded by Principal Marylin Ridge (Edie McClurg).

One of Drexell's few friends at the school was P.E. teacher George (Cleavant Derricks), who shared Drexell's love of sports and beer. Most episodes revolved around Drexell's unwillingness to teach his students lessons by the book, or trying to be a good father to his daughters. On one occasion, Drexell's ex-wife made an appearance; Drexell hoped she would remarry so he could stop paying alimony.

Cast

 * Dabney Coleman as Otis Drexell
 * Randy Graff as Principal Francine E. Itkin
 * Dakin Matthews as Roscoe Davis
 * Jason Biggs as Willie Trancas
 * Heidi Zeigler as Nicole Finnigan
 * Damian Cagnolatti as Kenny Sanders
 * Matthew Lawrence as Walker
 * A. J. Langer as Melissa Drexell
 * Brittany Murphy as Brenda Drexell
 * Edie McClurg as Principal Marilyn Ridge
 * Cleavant Derricks as George Foster
 * Phil Buckman as Slash
 * Jacqueline Donnelly as Bernadette
 * Matthew Slowik as Lionel

In popular culture

 * The Simpsons made light of the show's cancellation in their 1992 "Treehouse of Horror III" episode with a "graveyard of cancelled shows". A tombstone of Drexell's Class is featured alongside tombstones of Fish Police, Capitol Critters, and Family Dog.
 * An early episode of the show had a montage of historically accurate flags, from the Red Ensign of Colonial America and showing how the American flag changed, with the current 50-star flag marked "1991" followed by the flag of Japan marked "2000". This had been criticized by Asian-American groups and the Veterans of Foreign Wars who considered that to be a joke in poor taste.