Slice of ‘Life’ lacks layers of substance

Yvonne A.K. Johnson has called “Life 101” a work in progress, which is an important thing to know when going to this show.

Don’t expect anything too sophisticated or polished. While it has its strong points, this ensemble musical about seven students on a study abroad trip to London is filled with too many holes to be considered a finished product.

The show was co-written by Johnson, the Spokane Civic Theatre’s executive artistic director, and Donovan Stohlberg, the Civic’s marketing director. Stohlberg also wrote the show’s 10 songs, which constitute one of the better aspects of the show. The songs are tuneful and serviceable in the classic Broadway show tune style. One of my favorites was the rousing drinking song “To the Queen,” in which the students drown themselves in British pub culture.

David Hardie, as the nerdy Timothy Mensing, is particularly funny as he gets increasingly sloshed.

However, the score’s lyrics, by L.B. Hamilton, tend to drag the songs down. They are filled with clichés, along the lines of “Wanting it all paves a road straight to nowhere.”

However, a more fundamental problem rests in the characters themselves. They all represent a certain college stereotype: There’s the nerd, the jock, the sorority girl, the spacey chick and the brain. This is intentional and even referenced frequently in the script, as in, “Timmy, you’re kind of cute for a nerd.”

Intentional or not, it’s a credibility killer. We see them as types, not real people. The fact that they later reveal opposite qualities – such as the sorority girl (played nicely by Maureen Krels), who turns out not to be shallow – does not help. If anything, it makes the show even more predictable.

The other fundamental problem is that “Life 101,” despite the title, does not necessarily resemble real life. Would a jock really be sent on a theater study trip to allow a baseball-gambling scandal to blow over? Would one of the students really be an undercover observer of (vaguely explained) educational techniques?

Then there’s the character of James Rickman, played by Douglas Vinson. We are told early that he is the “golden boy” of the group because he is a writer. Glossing over the problem of whether being a writer has ever made anyone a golden boy, I was later amazed to hear this character assert that he “hates art.”

Well, a college kid who fancies himself a writer might conceivably hate the impressionists, or Picasso in his blue period. But what kind of writer would spout such an absurd, blanket, ignorant generalization?

The show veers toward pathos in the end, when the beloved professor suddenly collapses. As contrived as this was, I found it easier to take than the closing number, which sums up what the students have all learned: “You are unique,” and “be yourself.”

Stohlberg and Johnson should dig a little deeper into these characters and this plot if they want “Life 101” to go beyond “Lite 101.” They have some work to do.