My Old School

[The Naitch]

Anyone catch this on BBC Scotland/iPlayer? The story of how 32 year old Brian McKinnon aka Brandon Lee posed as a 17 year old at Bearsden Academy for a year.

This is the first proper deep dive into the whole story. Most of the teachers/pupils of the time are involved as is Brian/Brandon though, for whatever reason, he didn't want to appear on camera so his audio interview is lip synched by Alan Cumming who, funnily enough, was cast to play him in a film back in the late 90s before it got canned.

I thought the way they went about this documentary/film was so well done. It being made by one of the pupils definitely added a bit of authenticity. Only bit that seemed a bit off was how he got admitted in the first place but, otherwise, a cracking retelling of surely the most bizarre saga to hit Bearsden.

I was in 2nd year (at a different school in Glasgow) around the time the whole thing unravelled and even then couldn't believe how he got away with it for so long. Still don't.

Edited December 30, 2022 by The Naitch

[accies1874]

I thought the choice to cast Alan Cumming made the doc worse and tbh didn't find the actual story all that interesting beyond the basic premise. There was a bit of "is that it?" once the mystery started unravelling. Interesting as a news story or article but not as a documentary. 

Imo anyway

[Richey Edwards]

Haven't seen the documentary, but I have seen the news story about this and have no idea how he got away with that at all. c**t looked even older than 32. He looked more like 42.

[Stu]

Thought it was good. Impressed at the cast they got for it, even if the actors only had tiny voice parts.

Vaguely remember the news reports about it at the time. When they mentioned he's still applying for medical schools even now it reminded me of The Phantom of the Open, where a guy decides he's great at golf and keeps trying to get into The Open using fake names.

[Guest]

Watched it tonight. Fascinating but bizarre story. Very easy to see with hindsight I suppose. Did enjoy them piling on the teacher who was obviously an absolute arsehole. Thought it was very Well done.

[rollstar]

I enjoyed the documentary - I was aware of the story as it unfolded at the time but this fills in a lot of details, while raising more questions which no one really seems to have the answers to.

There was some funny background detail in the cartoons, my favorite being "UTI Cinemas".

[peasy23]

Watched it last night, thought it was very well done. I can remember the news stories at the time, and can also remember 15 and 16 year olds at my school who had permanent 5 o'clock shadows and looked much older. My daughter is 16 and when I put it on last night she asked what I was watching, told her the basic premise of a 32 yo posing as a 16 yo to go back to school, her immediate response "was it for paedo reasons?" Tbh that would have made more sense than all the lies that Brandon/Brian came up with.

The whole thing was and still is utterly bizarre, both in the fact that he continues to be very economical with the truth imo, and that he duped so many people in the first place. 

[Arthur daley]

Only caught the last half hour  il need to watch it fully so apologies if this has been mentioned on the programme ,Definitely more to this story than had been said going by the comments on here  ,but don’t think we will ever find out the whole truth , Iam unsure what he would have done if he had finished uni and got a job with things such as national insurance or tax, what was he going to do? pretend to be his dad again and phone up the hospital like he did the school to try and trick them like he managed to do to the school , he used to live beside someone that worked for me on and off way back before he went and pulled his school scam ,that was  when he lived in his old house not his mothers house as shown on tv in Bearsden,.with out giving his address away as wouldn’t be fair to   even though his mums house was shown on tv it was fairly close to his mothers maybe a five min drive ,after he had  just left  school I think  we passed him on drymen road and the guy working with me  said basically that guy went back to school but he’s in his 30’s ,if the guy had told me the date back then i would have checked the newspaper as he had some stories and  that wasn’t even the most unbelievable one ,think I had said he’s a teacher or the janny but he did swear other people had seen him in the school uniform and  Also driving with pupils so I thought he was staff rather than a pedo (sheltered life I’ve lived ) so was a shocker when it came out in the paper but there was definitely more people in the area that knew about it before that . 

[milhouse]

Just watched this. Had heard the story before but thought it was someone coming from US/Canada to gain citizenship or university entry then fleeing back when caught. No idea the reality was that ridiculous. Someone please explain to me how he wasn't prosecuted for fraud at least. Never mind the creepiness of having parties in his house for 16 year olds with alcohol, the school play situation etc.