The Roommate

Or: Breaking Broads

Sharon (Ann Price) a woman “retired” from her marriage, with a son far away in New York and not much of anything to do, grafted to her shell in rural Iowa, takes on Robyn (Tracy Sunderland) a reticent traveler with a mysterious past and peculiar hobbies. As they grow closer in the confines of her home, Sharon finds herself feeling alive more and more in Robyn’s company, and soon finds herself drawing her roommate back towards the exciting and dangerous world she left behind.

Jen Silverman’s comedy begins lightly, dabbingly, with many incomplete phrases not spark save for those created by two distinct personalities buzzing into each other. By the end of act one, however Silverman has greased the wheels with mystery and danger, and a distinct language has grown up between her characters. To say more spoils the soup, but it is a long and riotous ride to a well crafted end.

Price delights in Sharon’s emergence and transformation, with side long glances, and wild outbursts as she sloughs off her midwestern pupa to reveal what has always been underneath. Sunderland’s Robyn, an addict of many things trying to start over again on so many things, possess an edge melancholy, coupled with a tamped humor, that serves well with Price’s wrigglishness. By the time they reach the end, they’ve gone beyond the predictable Odd Couple relationship and found something deeper and truly touching.