If you take the LIRR (the reverse commute,) you can easily identify with Aaron Port (Josh Radnor) who travels to Levittown each week to teach an adult ed class on creative writing. If you’ve ever taught, you can connect with him when he asks students to read, only to have them all avert their eyes. Before the class even begins, three Jewish women are quick to explain to him that they are only there because the classes they wanted were already closed out. The other three students are Jack (Frank Wood), Marc (Michael Oberholtzer) and Joan (Elizabeth Reaser).
Aaron’s approach toward teaching is not to. He offers no comments or critiques and is quick to remind the students that he is not a teacher. They read and all he asks is “any comments?”
The personalities of the participants become more apparent as the class progresses. A relationship develops between Aaron and Joan. The audience waits for it to move to another level, yet it never does. Although childless and without a job, Joan still lives in Levitttown, a family community. When she finally reads her work, her stories depict darkness and isolation. Reaser has a strange Southern twang and seems a bit distant.