Casting Drusilla

Juliet Landau didn’t audition for the part of Drusilla. Joss had seen her in Ed Wood, and asked her to meet him, the casting director (Marcia Shulman) and two executive producers (Gail Berman and David Greenwalt). At the meeting, they discussed the character and then Juliet was asked within the hour to play Drusilla.

Casting Spike

Juliet Landau has said that after she had been cast, she went to the audition for Spike to read with potential actors for that character. She and James immediately clicked. They were reading a scene and they went to kiss then turned away towards the camera instead. The producers loved it and this scene was included in the two’s first episode, School Hard, and in a promotion for their characters.

Happy squirrels

The following exchange between Buffy and Giles was deleted from School Hard:

Mouthwash vamp

This line of Spike’s to another vampire was deleted from School Hard: “Would it kill ya, a little mouthwash every couple hundred years?”

Spike’s coat

Spike’s trademark is his old long black coat. To get the look, costume designers took a brand new $2000 coat and ran it over with a truck to make it look old and dirty. In the show, Spike took his coat from the second Slayer he killed - Nikki Wood in New York (Fool For Love).

Vodka and Schnapps

This line of Xander’s was cut from the episode School Hard:

Alan Abelew

Alan Abelew, who played Brian in School Hard, has also been in Don’t Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood, Meatballs 4, Stand Alone, Creature Wasn’t Nice, Lucas Tanner and The All-American Girl.

Alexandra Johnes

Alexandra Johnes played bad-girl turned vampire in School Hard. She has also been in Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, The NeverEnding Story II: The Next Chapter and Zelly and Me.

Andrew Palmer

Andrew Palmer played the “lean boy” in School Hard. He has also been in Elizabethtown, The Keeper, Firestorm Rising, How Stella Got Her Groove Back and Star Trek: First Contact.

Brian Reddy

Brian played Police Chief Bob in School Hard and I Only Have Eyes For You. Brian has also been in O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Dante’s Peak, The Birdcage and Casino.

Gregory Scott Cummins

Gregory played “Big Ugly” in School Hard. Gregory has also been in The Italian Job (with Seth Green, who played Oz) and Batman returns. He played a vampire hunter in the B-movie Blood Ties, in which Robia LaMorte (Jenny Calendar) played a “Female Shrike”.

Keith MacKechnie

Keith MacKechnie played one of the parents in School Hard. He has played a few characters in Lee Stanley and Shane Stanley’s films, always with the last name, Van Bommel. He has appeared in A Sight for Sore Eyes, Dark Blue, Carman: The Champion, Held for Ransom, Unshackled, Pontiac Moon, Big Girls Don’t Cry… They Get Even, Straight Talk, Martians Go Home, Christmas Vacation and Judgement.

Bob, the Police Chief

Sunnydale’s Police Chief aided Principal Snyder to cover up Spike’s vampire attack in School Hard (blaming the event on gangs on PCP). He also helped to cover up the incident in the school when cafeteria spaghetti turned into snakes in I Only Have Eyes For You.

Sheila

Sheila was a rebellious Sunnydale High student who once stabbed a horticulture teacher with a trowel. Snyder roped her into helping Buffy with Parent-Teacher Night, but she was turned into a vampire by Spike and Drusilla. Sheila attacked Buffy, but managed to get away in School Hard.

Bell around the neck

In All the Way, Buffy is startled when she runs into Spike in the Magic Shop basement. She says, “Bell. Neck. Look into it.” In School Hard, Xander says the same thing about Angel, “Okay, that’s it. I’m puttin’ a collar with a little bell on that guy.” In Phases, Larry says to Xander, “Harris. Sheesh. Next time wear a bell.”

Buffy’s bad French

Buffy struggled with French in school - in School Hard, she and Willow study together and Buffy says, “La vache… doit me… touche… de la… jeudi. Was it wrong? Should I use the plural?” to which Willow replies, “No. But you said, ‘The cow should touch me from Thursday.’” In No Place Like Home, Buffy translates the French phrase “Tirer la Couture” (”Draw back the curtain”) as “Rotate many foodstuffs”.

First time Joyce

Buffy’s mother’s name - Joyce - is mentioned for the first time in School Hard.

Fish Tank bar

In School Hard, delinquent schoolgirl Sheila drinks in the Fish Tank bar in Sunnydale.

Gangs on PCP

We first discover that Principal Snyder knows that something odd is going on in Sunnydale in School Hard. When talking to the police after escaping the school, he scoffs at telling the truth, deciding to go with the old “gangs on PCP” story instead.

Get away from my daughter

Joyce saves her daughter in School Hard by hitting Spike over the head with a fire axe. She reminds him of this in a hilarious scene when she meets him again in Becoming (Part 2).

Joyce through a wall

The scene in School Hard where Buffy talks to Joyce through a hole in the wall was propably the influence for the scene in Restless where Buffy discovers her mother has decided to live in a wall.

Miss Edith

Drusilla’s favourite doll is called Miss Edith. In School Hard, Miss Edith was punished by Dru who said, “Miss Edith speaks out of turn. She’s a bad example, and will have no cakes today.” In Halloween, Dru says, “Miss Edith needs her tea” and in What’s My Line? (Part 1), she tells Spike, “I need to change Miss Edith”.

Nancy Boy

The phrase “Nancy Boy” is used three times in Buffy and Angel - In Tabula Rasa, Spike says, “He’s got his crust all stiff and upper with that nancy
boy accent” and in School Hard he says, “A lot faster than nancy-boy there.” In Sense and Sensitivity, Tony says to Angel, “”Seems that sensitivity training I paid for really took, huh, nancy boy?”

Population Count in Sunnydale

According to the sign Spike passed on the way into Sunnydale in School Hard, the town’s population was 38,500. Interestingly, the population was the same in season three’s Lover’s Walk. Either nobody had changed the sign or people have babies rapidly in the town because people sure have been dying.

Smoking bad

Mr. Platt’s smoking in Beauty and the Beasts reinforces the shows clear bias against smoking, as every character in the show who has smoked has been either evil (Spike and the evil Angel) or doomed (Laura in Nightmares; the prostitute who was Angel’s first kill after re-losing his soul; and Sheila in School Hard). The same theory applies to alcohol too.

Spike’s age

Giles says Spike is “barely two hundred”, according to his books, in School Hard. His books must be a little out, because later episodes (such as The Initiative) make it clear that Spike is actually around 120 at this time.

Spike’s car

Spike drives a Desoto Sportsman, with blacked out windows. The license plate is a Californian one - HIA 873.

Watcher’s Journal

All Watchers who are assigned to Slayers must keep a journal of activities, as a reference for future Watchers. It is from these that Giles and Buffy learnt about the histories of Angel (in Halloween) and Spike (in School Hard).

Welcome to Sunnydale

Spike mirrors his first entrance to Sunnydale from School Hard in Lover’s Walk when he crashes through the ‘Welcome to Sunnydale’ sign.

Nickel

In School Hard, the band Nickel play in The Bronze. We hear ‘1000 Nights’ as Xander dances and Willow helps Buffy study French and ‘Stupid Thing’ as Spike watches Buffy, Xander and Willow dance. Both songs are from their album Stupid Thing.

St. Vigeous

St. Vigeous led a crusade of vampires. The crusade “swept through Edessa, Harran, and points east”, according to Giles in School Hard. The Night of St. Vigeous is a time when vampires’ powers are at their greatest, though no reason is given.

Tainted blood

There’s some discussion in Go Fish that Angel can’t drink the blood of the swim team as it’s contaminated. This is first shown in School Hard when Spike talks about being at Woodstock and drinking from a drugged hippy there.

Vampire hugs

In School Hard when Spike and Angel hug, the camera is behind Angel’s shoulder and as soon as Spike hugs Angel, Spike’s look changes from happiness to disgust. Maybe he could sense Angel’s soul when they hugged?

Anne Rice

Anne Rice was the author of a popular best-selling series of vampire novels, including Interview with the Vampire, The Vampire Lestat and Queen of the Damned. In School Hard, Spike says to Angel, “People still fall for that old Anne Rice routine?”
In Buffy vs Dracula, Buffy tells Dracula, “I’ve fought more than a couple pimply, overweight vamps that called themselves Lestat.” She’s referring to the main charismatic vampire character of Anne Rice’s The Vampire Chronicles.
The story in Lies My Parents Told Me of Spike siring his mother as a vampire may come from Anne Rice’s The Vampire Chronicles. In the book, the character Lestat sired his mother Gabrielle, because she was ill and to prevent her from dying.
When Darla tries to get a vampire to sire her in The Trial, they have the following conversation:

Darla: “Weird?! It’s mythic!”
Shempire: “No, you been reading too much Anne Rice, lady. You got no idea how this thing works.”

In Origin, Connor asks Angel, “Do you spend all your time making out with other vampires, like in Anne Rice novels?”

Boxer Rebellion

The Boxer Rebellion was first mentioned in School Hard. It was an anti-Westerner uprising in China that took place from 1900 to 1901. During the rebellion, Spike killed a Slayer (his first, we discovered in Fool For Love). Angel had his soul at that point but he attempted to pretend he didn’t to retain ‘normality’ with his fellow vampires. Darla eventually left him during the rebellion.

Die Hard

The title and some plot elements of School Hard are taken from the Bruce Willis action movie Die Hard.

Star Wars

George Lucas’s Star Wars films are a cult phenomenon. They are referenced numerous times in the Buffyverse. The original trilogy included the movies Star Wars (1977), The Empire Strikes Back (1980) and Return Of The Jedi (1983) and the movies The Phantom Menace (1999), Attack of the Clones (2002) and Revenge of the Sith (2005) were made later on.

• In When She Was Bad, when Xander and Willow play Guess the Movie from the tag line (Willow: “Use the Force, Luke.”,
  Xander: “Do I even have to dignify that with a guess?”)
• In School Hard, Spike told Angel that, “You were my Yoda!” Yoda was the ancient Jedi master who became the mentor and teacher for both Obi-Wan Kenobi and Luke Skywalker.
• A visual reference to Star Wars can be seen in The Zeppo, when Xander runs into the corridor and runs back out with the gang members chasing him. Han Solo does the same thing in Star Wars.
• In Choices, Buffy says that Faith has turned to ‘the dark side’.
• In The Freshman, Xander confuses the Star Wars Jedi code quoted by Yoda in The Phantom Menace. (”Hate leads to anger…no wait…Fear leads to hate, hate leads to the dark side”). Also in that episode, the old frat house that the vampires are holed up in is the Psi Theta house. If you write those two greek letters together, and pronounce them together, you get Sith.
• In Fear, Itself, Xander says to Oz, “Sensing a disturbance in the Force, Master?”
• Buffy using the chain to choke Sobek the snake-demon in Shadow is reminiscent of Princess Leia killing Jabba the Hutt in Return of the Jedi.
• In Forever, Ben calls Glory’s minions “Jawa rejects” after the small hooded and robed creatures in Star Wars.
• In Life Serial, Andrew paints a Death Star from Star Wars on the side of the gang’s van. It’s the Empire’s revised design from Return of the Jedi, which Jonathan says is flawed.
• In the episode Two To Go, Andrew says, “We’ve got maybe seconds before Darth Rosenberg grinds us all into to Jawa burgers and not one of you bunch has the Midichlorians to stop her.” These are all Star Wars references: Darth is a title given to a Sith Warrior (such as Darth Vader); Jawas are the hooded creatures who live on Tatooine, and Midichlorians are micro-organisms which exist in all living things. Andrew says, “Laugh it up, Fuzzball” which is a quote from Star Wars. Andrew also later says in Two To Go, “…in a galaxy far, far away” - yet another Star Wars reference.
• In All the Way, Tara and Willow see a couple dressed as Princess Leia and Luke Skywalker kissing in the Bronze. Willow asks, “Do they know they’re brother and sister?”
• In Smashed, we see that the three nerds own a mint condition (though out of its packaging) 1979 Boba Fett action figure. Though Boba Fett was first introduced in The Empire Strikes Back (made in 1980), the earliest Boba Fett figure was made in 1979, before the film was released.
• In Dead Things, Jonathan and Andrew play fight with green light sabres.
• In Entropy, Warren calls Jonathan “Padawan”.
• In Conversations with Dead People, Jonathan and Warren have the following conversation: Warren: “Come on, “If you strike me down…” Andrew: “I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine…That boy is our last hope.” Warren: “No, there is another.” These are all quotes from Star Wars.
• In Potential, Xander says to Andrew, “Say Skywalker, and I smack you.” He is, of course, referring to Star Wars‘ Luke Skywalker.
• In Showtime, Andrew says, “I’m bored. Episode I bored.” He’s referring to George Lucas’s disappointing movie Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace.
• In Never Leave Me, Warren/The First says, “I’m like Obi Wan”. He also says to Andrew, “We’re right in the trench, and the exhaust port’s in sight.” This is a reference to the scene in Star Wars in which the Death Star is under attack.
• In Bring on the Night, Andrew says, “I’m like Vader in the last 5 minutes of Jedi with redemptive powers minus a redemptive struggle of epic redemption which chronicles…” He’s referring to the last scenes of the final Star Wars movie Return of the Jedi.
• In Storyteller, there are two framed Star Wars comics on the wall in Andrew’s opening scene.
• In Dirty Girls, Andrew says, “But like so many tragic heroes, Faith was seduced by the lure of the dark side.”

Uncle Tom’s Cabin

Spike says to Angel in School Hard, “Man, I can’t believe this. You Uncle Tom!” This is a reference to the 1852 novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896).

Woodstock Festival

Spike said he was at the hippy festival Woodstock in School Hard. The festival was held in Bethel, New York in August, 1969. Musicians there included Jimi Hendrix, the Grateful Dead and Neil Young.

Seen at 07.00 minutes:

Drusilla runs her finger down Spike’s cheek, drawing blood with her fingernail. If you look closely, Dru’s fingernail doesn’t actually touch Spike’s skin.

Seen at 13.39 minutes:

When Willow and Buffy are studying in the Bronze, there are books on the table. Then when Xander goes to get a stake from Buffy’s purse, there are no longer any books there.

Seen at 15.28 minutes:

In School Hard, Buffy and Spike first meet when he goes to the Bronze claiming a girl is being attacked outside. After Buffy has saved the girl, Spike emerges from the shadows and Buffy realises she’s been set up. A shot of Buffy turning round is used twice in this scene - first when the vampire asks Spike for help, and secondly, when Spike starts clapping.

Seen at 22.46 minutes:

When Cordelia and Buffy are talking near the punch table, Cordelia’s arms are crossed across her chest and on her hips in alternate shots.

Seen at 28.12 minutes:

When Spike is walking down the school hallway, you can briefly see his reflection on the lockers to the right.

Seen at 35.15 minutes:

Spike shouts at Angel, “You were my sire, man!” It later turns out that actually Angelus sired Drusilla, who then sired Spike. To clear up the confusion, Joss Whedon has gone on record to say that both come to the same thing, and he always intended that Drusilla be Spike’s sire. He also says he’s bad at maths, if that helps.

Seen at 37.13 minutes:

Spike’s stunt double can clearly be seen when he fights Buffy in the school. When he punches his hand through a wall, you can see that the stunt double has much bigger hair than Spike’s.

Seen at 38.19 minutes:

Why do Xander, Buffy and Giles leave the school without trying to find Willow? They don’t seem at all concerned that she’s missing.