English Teacher

Oh!

Mr. Marquez, Mr. Marquez, Mr. Marquez.

Excuse me. What? What...

- Whoa. - What... What's going on?

- We need your help right now. - With Powderpuff.

Powderpuff? What's Powderpuff?

You know, when the girls play football,

and then the football players dress as cheerleaders.

- Oh, that. Yeah. - Yeah.

I'm sorry, I don't know anything about football.

- Hold on. - Mr. Marquez.

Nobody is mad about the girls playing football.

They're mad about us dressing up as cheerleaders.

And why are you guys coming to me? 'Cause I'm gay?

Sweet of you guys, but I don't wanna be on the news

as the gay guy fighting for young men's rights to dress up like girls.

Come on, Mr. Marquez. This is our senior year.

It's the most things we look forward to.

It's the most things you look forward to?

Jason, the grammar.

It's the thing you look forward to the most.

Wow. Yeah, that is what I've been.

See? You're already helping.

Okay, I'm sorry, guys. I just... It's not...

- Hold on, man. - Please. Think about it.

I'll talk to Coach Hillridge after school. How's that?

- That's dope. - Yeah!

Great.

- - All right. Huddle up. Listen.

You ladies all begged for a female coach this year for Powderpuff.

And since everybody gets what they want these days,

give it up for Ms. Sanders.

Hi. Thank you.

Unfortunately, I don't know all the technical

dos and don'ts of football per se, so I've brought Coach Hillridge here.

He's just gonna assist me on small things.

Like, when you catch the ball, which way do you go?

And then why do you ever kick the ball?

That's right. Ms. Sanders is your coach today, so just ignore me.

You won't notice me at all.

I'll just be here teaching her how to teach you how to play football.

- That's right. - Tell 'em to start running sprints.

- Sprints! - Come on.

Evan, catch.

Hey, I told your football players

I'd help them save their Powderpuff performance.

- You're trying to cancel that? - You think I wanna cancel Powderpuff?

Why? I love that shit.

Come on. Big football dudes dressed up like cheerleaders.

- Oh! - That's the height of comedy, man.

- Come on. - God, Gwen.

You gotta take it up with Moretti.

- I'm taking it up with Moretti. - Catch him.

- What do I do now? - Burpees.

- It's time for "blurpees," girls! - Burpees.

- Hey, Grant. - No, Evan!

- Grant. - No, I'm off the clock.

- My car is technically not school grounds. - Listen, what is this Powderpuff thing?

You're canceling this Powderpuff thing? What is this?

We're not canceling anything. Nothing is being canceled.

Look, it's not... It's being discussed.

It's not all of Powderpuff.

It's just the... the boys' cheerleading performance

has become a sort of a hot button issue, all right?

Just tell the parents to lighten up.

- It's not the parents. - What?

Not the parents. The parents love it.

Big football guys in girls' clothes. It's funny stuff, Evan.

Even I, back in the day, I was in Powderpuff back in the day.

- Really? - Yeah, we had a cheer

about our butts, kicking butts.

That's me. I didn't even have to shave my legs.

- You look like Hilary Duff. - Thank you.

If it's not the parents, who's trying to cancel it?

The students. The LGBTQ+IA2S+ Alliance.

That's crazy. Why didn't they just come talk to me?

I helped rhinestone their flag.

- They think you're homophobic now. - What? Why?

They think that you don't believe in lesbians.

Oh, come on.

- That was taken out of context. - What context was it in?

Just I was having a regular conversation with Gwen.

And I was telling her I have a hard time believing that lesbians

aren't attracted to men.

Okay. So you're saying...

Powderpuff is this old boomer tradition

where the boys get to make fun of the girls.

And more importantly,

these football players are "gender-switching" as a joke

when there are people in this school who are actually nonbinary or trans.

- And that is not a joke. - Pablo.

Wake up.

Is anybody actually upset about it?

Like, in my experience, if men wanna dress up as women,

- you should just let them. - Let my boys have fun.

I actually love Powderpuff

because the boys have to admit how hard our cheers are.

Becca, you literally quit cheerleading.

Yeah, because I literally died for three minutes last year. I went to hell.

Stop talking about that.

I've never liked Powderpuff, personally.

- Why, Jeff? - It sickens me.

- The beauty is too intense. - That's crazy.

Who here is in the LGBTQIA2S+ Alliance?

Okay. Look, if you guys had come to me, I would have gently reminded you

that while your hearts may be in the right place,

in actuality, you're banning a drag performance at a school in the South.

- Ooh! - Stop being a contrarian.

You know, it's bullshit that these cool jock kids

get to dress however they want and everybody loves it.

They're doing it as a joke. It's not like real authentic drag.

So, you guys just want the boys

to be authentic and respectful in their performance.

That would make you happy?

- Yeah. - Yeah. Sure.

Okay. Good to know.

- Yes, Tiffany. - This is literally book club.

Like, why are we talking about this?

- - So, when you talk to the boys

just, like, keep it base level, keep it easy.

- They're new to all this. - All right. I got it. Yeah.

They're gonna be maybe shocked.

You still do those, uh, poetry jams?

No, that was just at A&M. I stopped after college.

Oh. I miss those college parties.

I remember you, like, refused to take photos with a digital camera.

You'd be like, "I only use real film."

- Right. Right. Right. - And you had that mullet.

I'm much less of a loser now.

- And what do you do here? Oh. - I teach English.

Hey, guys.

Um, I would like to introduce you today to a very special friend of mine.

This is Shazam.

Hello, hello, my little babies. Hello.

- Hi, Shazam. - Hi.

Shazam was the queen of drag back in college.

And now, she has a long-running show in Austin called Woman of La Mancha .

That actually got canceled. The show is now called Drink Ticket Tuesday .

When you are old enough to drink,

maybe you can go check that out, or don't tell anybody I said that.

So, are you, like, a dude?

I'm like a dude. Yeah, I'm cool like you guys.

I'm a cool dude. I sit home. I wear tube socks.

I blow my nose. I have hair.

But when she's dressed like this, she is Shazam.

When I'm dressed like this,

I'm your mama.

Okay.

Quick question: Does anybody own a ferret?

- Do they have ferrets? - I'm just trying to connect with the kids.

- They're not eight. - I don't know how old they are.

Here's the deal, guys.

Shazam is gonna teach you guys the proper way to dress like a girl.

The right way. You know, it's a little bit like if you're gonna drink

or experiment with drugs, I'd rather you do it in the house.

That's not a great example.

But she and I, we're gonna be your coaches in this.

Them, like, real titties? Or, like, what you got going on?

Honey. No, this is a breastplate.

It looks great, right? Very realistic.

- Yeah, it looks awesome. - We call it a titty bib.

And this is a lace-front wig.

- My mom has that. - Okay.

So, is there, like, a titty bib for your dick too? Or, like, where's that at?

Yes, I am tucked.

- It's like a jockstrap or like a cup. - It just kind of...

- Does it pop in? - Yeah, I tie it

on the end of a ping-pong ball and shove it up my ass.

Don't laugh. That's rude.

Yeah. No, no. You guys can laugh. This is what I'm saying.

Shazam is very funny. Drag can be very funny.

So, if you guys, for this Powderpuff performance, instead of doing joke drag

or half drag or just the cheerleading outfits,

if you just do authentic, real drag like this,

then the LGBTQ Alliance cannot be upset.

So, you want us dress like this?

Oh, honey. I don't think you have the balls to dress like this.

- Ooh! - Oh-ho-ho-ho!

And that... This is good. This is the thing.

She just read you, and you can read her back and...

- And I'm an accelerated reader, Tray. - Damn.

Drag is about self-expression. About being larger than life.

Shazam used to have a motto in college, used to say, "We don't mark it, baby"...

- We do everything full-out. - "We go full-out."

- What is "mark it"? - It's like...

When you don't go all the way on something.

Yeah, it's like, one, two, three, four.

You know, you wanna be like...

Like when you don't hustle in football.

Oh. Okay.

We're gonna go all out. You guys on board? Maybe?

Mmm...

Fuck it.

It's my senior year. Let's get it for Coach Shazam.

- Yeah! - Let's go.

- Whoo! - Yeah!

- Coach Shazam. - Coach. Yeah.

- - Okay. Uh... Oh...

Sarah, you hold the ball, you're gonna hike it to...

- To who? - To the quarterback.