Renaissance Man (1994) on Netflix
Fired from his Detroit advertising job, Bill Rago takes the only work offered: teaching literacy to Army recruits at Fort McClane. Most can barely read and the class runs six weeks.
- Netflix3.4/5
- IMDb6.2/1020,517 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes12%
Trailer
Plot summary
Bill Rago is divorced and out of work when the unemployment agency hands him a temporary teaching post at Fort McClane, an Army training base. The job is to bring a group of undereducated recruits up to basic literacy in six weeks. The soldiers are semi-literate and unenthusiastic, Drill Sergeant Cass holds the class in low regard, and Captain Tom Murdoch, who runs the project, doubts they will pass. Looking for a way in, Rago reads from his favorite play, Hamlet, and gives each student a part in a classroom reading; the recruits have never met a play before and take to it.
Cast
- Peter Simmonsas Pvt. Brian Davis, Jr.
Show all 20 cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Renaissance Man (1994)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- The scenes at the fictional "Fort McClane" were filmed at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, with production trailers set up alongside the barracks on "Tank Hill". Soldiers were filmed doing physical training and basic rifle marksmanship, and the graduation scene was shot during an actual basic training graduation.
- The film was reissued on 16 September 1994 on just 17 screens in the Seattle area under a new title, By the Book, but did not fare any better.
- The film flopped at the US box office, grossing only $24 million in the United States and Canada in 12 weeks, hindered by competing with summer blockbusters such as Speed, True Lies, The Flintstones and The Lion King.
- Director Penny Marshall requested rewrites to make the script funnier, not merely by adding more jokes but by "deepening the characters and finding all the humor and heart in them".
