Scotland on Screen: Alan Cumming and Jono McLeod on My Old School

Do you have a wild story from your school days that you love to roll out whenever you get together with your old classmates? However outlandish your anecdote, we guarantee it can’t top the tale in the jaw-dropping documentary My Old School, as retold by filmmaker Jono McLeod and his fellow Bearsden Academy 5C classmates. 

Taking us back to 1993, the story starts with a new kid from Canada named Brandon Lee arriving in town, and there's something off about him. First, he has the same moniker as a recently deceased movie star – Brandon Lee was accidentally shot on the set of The Crow a few months earlier. Second, he arrive on day one with a leather briefcase by his side and a face that didn’t quite fit; rumours of a car accident and plastic surgery abounded.

Lee stood out, but as McLeod’s film shows, he started to integrate. More than integrate! He thrived. The first ace Lee had up his sleeve was access to a car (teens learn to drive early in Canada, apparently). He also had great taste in music, and impressed his peers with a surprising knowledge of early-80s indie rock. Students also warmed to his compassion for his fellow underdogs, like classmate Stefen, who was the target of racist bullies. Lee was soon one of the popular kids, and was an ace in the classroom too. He even got cast as the lead in the school’s production of South Pacific, despite little ability to hold a tune, as evident in the grainy home video that's one of the few archive images we see of Lee while attending Bearsden Academy. 

But Lee wasn't all he claimed. If you were around in Scotland in the early-90s, you’re sure to remember the uproar caused by his long con. The story was so huge that a Hollywood movie starring Alan Cumming was planned. That feature never came to pass, but Cumming does get his opportunity to play Lee in McLeod’s documentary, providing a lip-synch to his audio testimony.

"I think Scotland was sideswiped by the audacity of it," Cumming says of Lee’s escapades when I sit down to speak to him and McLeod ahead of My Old School’s European premiere at Glasgow Film Festival. “We think of ourselves as being canny people and that makes the story all the more unbelievable.” It’s hard to think of a more mischievous and playful actor than Cumming. Back in the mid-90s, he was perfect casting to play this audacious conman, and he’s clearly full of admiration. “I love the idea of what he did, and the detail and the planning,” he beams. “You know, when I’m doing my work, I'm completely focused, so I really admire his commitment… and just his balls of steel, basically.”

It wasn’t just the opportunity to step into a juicy role he prepared for decades ago that appealed to Cumming. The fact that McLeod was actually in 5C to witness it all was hugely enticing too. “The idea that I was getting the story directly from the horse's mouth, that made it really exciting,” says the actor. “I think this is a much better film than mine would have been because it's by the people who were actually there, you know? It's authentic in a way that mine wouldn't have been.”

Cumming is spot on. It’s the feeling of being inside the story rather than an observer casting an eye over the evidence that makes My Old School so compelling. “I knew that the film would be very different if it was made by a filmmaker who wasn't in the class,” says McLeod. “And, well, nobody else in class became a documentary filmmaker, so it was kinda down to me. But I really view it as an ensemble film. I just stitched it together but it's really about the classmates.” 

Cumming isn’t the only famous Scottish voice on the soundtrack. Many of Lee and his classmates’ recollections are brought to life through poppy animated flashbacks that call to mind 90s fave Daria, with Clare Grogan, Dawn Steele and Joe McFadden giving voice to some of the key players who couldn’t (or wouldn't) take part. Lulu is fun too as the school’s ferocious deputy teacher. It’s the charisma and chemistry of the former 5C students that really makes the film sing, though. 

McLeod agrees: “People are really responding to the 5C classmates and the connection they have with the camera. And I guess that the connection they have with the camera, is that the camera is me. 

“I wanted the audience to kind of feel like they were a member of class 5C, basically,” he continues. “And that's really what we all wanted, I guess, as a class, for the film to be told in a sensitive way. That's what I've agonised over for years, and hopefully I've managed to achieve that.”

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Released on 19 Aug by Dogwoof; certificate 15
GFT host a preview of My Old School on 16 Aug, followed by a Q&A with Alan Cumming and Jono McLeod

Jono McLeod's filmography: My Old School (2022)
Instagram: @myoldschoolfilm

Alan Cumming's filmography (selected): My Old School (2022), Battle of the Sexes (2017), Any Day Now (2012), X2 (2003), Spy Kids (2001) Josie and the Pussycats (2001), Eyes Wide Shut (1999), Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion (1997), GoldenEye (1995)
Instagram: @alancummingreally
alancumming.com