Politics is typically kabuki theater or Greek tragedy -- we closely watch the players go through the motions even though we already know the outcome of the day’s events.

But we got a weird dose of improv theater yesterday when Alberto Carvalho dithered and then ducked on live TV when he very publicly turned down Mayor de Blasio’s offer to be the next schools chancellor.

An apparent master of drama, Carvalho ramped up the suspense during an emergency meeting of the Miami-Dade School Board, where he serves as superintendent.  Forget reality TV, chancellor TV was the rage in City Hall as Carvalho asked the board for five minutes – which stretched into 20 – before he made his big decision.

If you take him at his word, Carvalho was moved at the last minute by the “Stand and Deliver” pleas by children and parents for him to stay.

But you can’t help but wonder if this was some sort of provincial power play by Carvalho, who got the Miami board members to all but kiss his ring and pledge an oath of fealty.

It’s the kind of love he wouldn’t get in New York where Schools chancellors usually hear a different kind of oath from parents and politicians. So Alberto Carvalho is now the all-powerful education king of Miami. But who will ever offer him a job outside of Miami?

Meanwhile, Mayor de Blasio is stuck at the table, dealt an embarrassing hand by a Florida card shark. It was all great theater but hopefully the city’s schoolchildren will indirectly benefit from a quick exit by a bad actor.

And at least the Yankees get to keep Giancarlo Stanton.

 

Bob Hardt