Roller Derby

Classic. Fifty-two years of Corrie ethos and culture illustrated Monday in a few brief moments by Michelle and Tracy – in rollers. Comedy, family history, strong women, intergenerational conflict, your life lived in the street as much as in your home, community relations as spectator sport. It was all there in their fight worthy of, well, a roller derby.

Dennis Tanner said it best, “It’s times like this I can’t help thinking about my mum.” Elsie Tanner would have felt as if she’d never left the street.

Tracy followed Michelle into Audrey’s salon, then sat baiting her about Ryan and how wonderful he is, how generous etc. etc. Michelle getting so angry she was literally rising out of the chair but tried to stifle herself. Until she couldn’t take it any longer.

Rollers?

Do hairdressers use rollers any more? I wondered when David was putting rollers in Tracy’s hair, then Maria did the same with Michelle’s. I still don’t know the answer, but I quickly saw the point of using them in this scene. Just for visuals of two angry women going at each other, each with great big, different coloured bobble heads.

The staff shocked but amused.Two elderly clients waiting in the background and getting their money’s worth in entertainment. Then David pushing them through the door, “take it outside.”

So the whole neighbourhood got to watch and intervene, or not. Dennis Tanner included. How lovely. Ryan, seeing his mother and his purported girlfriend going at it in the street, left his customers at the counter of the kebab shop and ran over to see what was happening. And finally, Michelle told him what she should have said a long time ago: “My house, my rules. You don’t like it, get out.”

That scene made enduring the past weeks of the Tracy and Ryan gagfest worthwhile. And it wouldn’t have been the same without the rollers.