Recess: All Growed Down

**Recess: All Growed Down** is a 2003 American film directed by Howy Parkins and Brenda Piluso. It is based on the television series Recess and is the third film. The film was released on December 9, 2003 as a direct-to-video.

## Plot

In this movie, the Recess gang remembers how they all met back in kindergarten. It begins with T.J. and four of his gang looking forward to starting a game of croquet with Mikey's new set, but they need to find an empty space to do so.

They find a nice quiet piece of ground, and are about to set up when they are abruptly captured by the Kindergartners. They are surprised that the Kindergartners seem to no longer like the gang. The reason is that the Kindergartners have a new leader called Chief Stinky who despises Big Kids and because of being bigger, Chief Stinky orders the other Kindergartners around and forces them to hold the gang as prisoners.

Desperate to be released, the gang starts telling stories of past episodes to make the Kindergartners remember how well they used to get along. T.J. tells the first story about when he encountered the Kindergartners ("The Legend of Big Kid"). After that Gretchen tells them the story about the "pee wee pals" ("Wild Child"). After that Mikey asks Tubby to remember how the two became friends ("Kindergarten Derby"). But despite all three stories being told, the Kindergartners are still too afraid of Chief Stinky to admit that they remember.

After a while, Gus comes outside from the nurse's office and starts looking for the gang, only to get captured as well. To convince Hector (the Kindergartner in pyjamas) about how he was his "safety man", he tells a story about when he first went to kindergarten. At first the other gang members remind him that he didn't come to the school until the gang was in 4th grade (a reference to their memories in the episode "The New Kid"), and besides, none of them even want to think about when they were savage Kindergartners. But Gus points out that long before, he briefly had been a Kindergarten student.

In his story, his parents bring him to Third Street Elementary School. Gus is a wild child and thinks that the other students he meets will be just like him, but to his surprise everyone is acting well behaved in class, and Ms. Finster reads them a story. When Recess begins all the children are quiet and nobody acts like they do in the future. Gus notices Gretchen just reads and never gives anyone ideas, Vince just runs around quietly, the digger twins just play in a sandbox, the swinging girls do not swing roughly or hang upside down and Spinelli is a timid little girl with a doll. Gus then meets one little boy with a red cap whose name is Theodore Jasper Detweiler. Gus befriends him and gives him his nickname: T.J.

Shortly afterward, Gus realizes that everyone is being neat and behaved because they are afraid of Mikey who acts as a monstrous bully, and Randall is the one who tames him. Gus is enraged and he later reveals the reason that Mikey acted like a monster is because Randall told him lies and said he was his only friend. Mikey is actually friendly and explains that Randall was behind everything because he wanted to take control of the whole grade and have everything belong to him.

Then Gus convinces all the Kindergartners that they should be like him and be wild like a normal Kindergartner, then all the kids begin to act like their future selves, Vince becomes more active, Gretchen starts passing her theories to other kids, Spinelli realizes that she is a very tough girl and T.J. becomes brave and adventurous. Randall is horrified and quickly tells Ms. Finster that everyone is all messy. Miss Finster is furious and demands to know who did this. When she finds out that Gus was behind it all, she takes him to Principal Prickly’s office. However, T.J. and the gang form a plan and rescue Gus, leaving Spinelli's doll in the chair he was sitting in. Gus is forced to leave the school the next day.

After he finishes his story, Gus tells Hector that he and all the other Kindergartners should stand up to Stinky. So, the little children trip Stinky, making him cry and as the others rejoice, Captain Sticky makes Hector the new leader. The Gang are then released. T.J. and the gang tell Gus that he was very clever to make up such a story, Gus agrees that he just imagined it all and then the gang starts to spend the rest of the recess having fun together.

However, Ms. Finster has been watching and tells Randall to keep an eye on Gus, and then vows that someday she will get revenge, hinting that Gus' story was true after all.

## Cast and Characters

* Andrew Lawrence as Theodore Jasper "T.J." Detweiler
	+ Myles Jeffrey as Young T.J.
* Rickey D'Shon Collins as Vincent Pierre "Vince" LaSalle
* Courtland Mead as Gustav Patton "Gus" Griswald
* Ashley Johnson as Gretchen Priscilla Grundler
* Pamela Adlon as Ashley Funicello Spinelli
* Jason Davis as Michael "Mikey" Blumberg
* April Winchell as Miss Muriel P. Finster
* Helen Slayton-Hughes as Miss Lemon
* Dabney Coleman as Principal Peter Prickly
* Allyce Beasley as Miss Alordayne Grotke
* Ryan O'Donohue as Randall J. Weems