--- description: In 'Night School' Haddish plays teacher Carrie to Kevin Hart’s student Teddy, a school dropout trying to get a GED to become a stockbroker title: Only Tiffany Haddish Could Make ‘Night School’ Worth Watching image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blteaee50ee170b6747/69893b3397cdff33026b651f/night-school-tiffany-haddish-kevin-hart.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [Entertainment](/section/entertainment/) ## Entertainment Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [movies](/tag/movies/) ## movies Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # Only Tiffany Haddish Could Make _Night School_ Worth Watching  by [Stephanie Zacharek](/author/stephanie-zacharek/)  ## Stephanie Zacharek Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Film Critic Sep 27, 2018 10:05 AM CUT  Haddish and Hart spar as a mismatched teacher and student Haddish and Hart spar as a mismatched teacher and studentUniversal  by [Stephanie Zacharek](/author/stephanie-zacharek/)  ## Stephanie Zacharek Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Film Critic Sep 27, 2018 10:05 AM CUT It was only last summer, in Malcolm D. Lee’s [ebullient and raunchy _Girls Trip_](http://time.com/4864477/girls-trip-review/ "undefined"), that Tiffany Haddish surfed into view like a comic Venus on the half shell: She was so vibrant, she made every scene sing. Her timing, both loose-limbed and sure-footed, meant she could ride the wave of even the most ridiculous joke with ease. Haddish is now in high demand, but her glorious–and deserved–ascent doesn’t mean every project is worthy of her. In _Night School_, also directed by Lee, Haddish plays teacher Carrie to [Kevin Hart’s](http://time.com/5187614/kevin-hart-super-bowl-conan-interview/ "undefined") student Teddy, a high school dropout trying to get a GED so he can become a stockbroker and thus feel worthy of his smart, successful fiancée Lisa (Megalyn Echikunwoke). Lee has a knack for making perceptive comedies (_The Best Man Holiday_, _Undercover Brother_) marked by their generosity of spirit. He’s less interested in rigid stereotypes than in scratching the surface to see what quirks he can find beneath. That’s true of _Night School_ too: Teddy’s classmates are at first rigid comedic placeholders–the spoiled white girl (Anne Winters), the angry Latino (Al Madrigal)–only to become warmer and more fully dimensional once you get to know them. But for now, at least, a movie featuring Kevin Hart is going to be a Kevin Hart movie: at this point, his personality is too big to fold up; his jackrabbit energy dominates. That doesn’t leave much oxygen for Haddish, whose loopy, billowing spirit needs lots of airspace. And still, somehow, she’s the movie’s guiding presence. Her finest moment is her entrance: Carrie and Teddy first meet not in the classroom but when their cars are stopped at a light, and Teddy expresses shock at the salacious, marvelous trash talk streaming from her mouth as she yaks on her cell phone. (The person on the other end is her mom.) These two instant enemies argue and sputter before Haddish’s Carrie peels off, leaving Teddy–whose car has a broken windshield, among other issues–in the dust. “Bye, boo!” she calls back to him, but the tone has been set. Hart clings tight to the rest of the movie, as if she hadn’t already driven away with it. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5407906/tiffany-haddish-night-school/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5407906/tiffany-haddish-night-school/"},"headline":"Only Tiffany Haddish Could Make Night School Worth Watching","datePublished":"2018-09-27T10:05:26.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T21:33:42.718Z","description":"In 'Night School' Haddish plays teacher Carrie to Kevin Hart’s student Teddy, a school dropout trying to get a GED to become a stockbroker","url":"https://time.com/5407906/tiffany-haddish-night-school/","keywords":["movies"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blteaee50ee170b6747/69893b3397cdff33026b651f/night-school-tiffany-haddish-kevin-hart.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Stephanie Zacharek","jobTitle":"Film Critic","url":"https://time.com/author/stephanie-zacharek/"}],"articleSection":"Entertainment","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blteaee50ee170b6747/69893b3397cdff33026b651f/night-school-tiffany-haddish-kevin-hart.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Night School Tiffany Haddish Kevin Hart","caption":"Haddish and Hart spar as a mismatched teacher and student","creditText":"Universal","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/entertainment/","name":"Entertainment"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/movies/","name":"movies"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5407906/tiffany-haddish-night-school/","name":"Only Tiffany Haddish Could Make Night School Worth Watching"}}]}] ```