"ROOFSLIDING," Harris Fine Arts Center, Brigham Young University, Provo, through April 4 (422-4322), running time: 2 hours, 15 minutes (one intermission)
"Roofsliding" premiered at Brigham Young University Friday. Morag Plaice Shepherd's well-written, enjoyable and insightful comedy directed by Rodger Sorensen provides a look at contemporary Scottish village life through the occupants of a chimney-topped red brick tenement with a striking set designed by Jennifer Mortensen.
Partly soap opera and partly social comment, the relationships play out in sharp dialogue and clever plotting — all in fairly consistent Scottish dialect. That lilting speech with its guttural g's and rolling r's and its unfamiliar idioms might be indecipherable to some ears right at first, but in a few minutes listeners find their way into the language, though they may find the "och" and the "wee" just a bit overdone.
The actors ably become their characters and provide a balance of comedy and believability.An exception is Leah Florence as Michelle who, unfortunately, perhaps by direction, appears a bit cartoonish compared to the other performers. Francis (Lauren Noll) an apparently well-meaning friend provides information to Janice (Caitlin Wise) that prompts her to lock her boyfriend Cirks well-played by Hank Florence out of their apartment.
The domestic dispute loudly and repeatedly announced by the custom of banging on the door with a tin pan impacts the neighbors. Andrew Veenstra plays James, the indolent, sports TV-watching husband of Rachael, a conflicted working woman performed by Brighton Hertford.
James can't leave the TV long enough to find out what all the banging is about or even to notice when his wife leaves for a new job interview and begins to believe that he has extra-sensory powers. In another apartment Mum, played by Julie Sanders, deals with her mother, Granny, who is played by faculty member Allison Belnap.
Granny's fantasies cow her daughter and drive her granddaughter, Alex, played by Maggie Laurencell, out of the house.
Alex interacts with all the other characters, and Laurencell provides a strong, yet subtle characterization of a young woman in her 20s trying to leave her adolescence behind and is, in fact, more centered than any one else in the play.
The vignettes from each apartment are integrated well except for Granny's wandering through the neighbor's apartment instead of around it.
The play was workshopped through several BYU classes, and its conflicts arise from the characters' behavior, which remains stuck in elementary and junior high school rivalries. Lack of ambition or vision of the future also hobbles the characters and keeps them in immature patterns of behavior.
The program provides extensive notes on Scottish stereotypes, clan and soccer rivalries as well as a piece on the daring practice of "roofsliding," the male-only sport of walking the ridge of steep roofs of three-story tenements and then sitting down, lying flat and sliding over the slates until their heels hit the rain gutters. While who slides down first or fastest is not important, complete silence is, and the winners are evidently the ones who do not fall off and maim or kill themselves.
The play also begins with a voice-only recitation of the roofsliding notes from the program. And yet all the information seems somewhat super-imposed. This sport is not actually part of the play or referred to in the play, and the foolish emotional games of the characters are clear without this extra baggage.
Jean Marshall is a freelance writer.
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