News
Legacy was reviewed in the
San Francisco Bay Times.
By Linda Ayres-Frederick
Published: January 31, 2008
And now for something completely and excitingly different: Legacy,
written and directed by Channing Sargent. This fantastical, true tale
is a complex story of Ms. Sargent’s family tree. She is a fifth-generation
granddaughter of Brigham Young, [first president] of the Church of Latter
Day Saints, which means she has the inside dope on secrets of Mormon history,
polygamy and Utah, all of which are revealed in this intimate guided tour.
Now, just because you are a direct descendent of the Church Head Honcho
doesn’t mean you are OF the church, or stodgy or dull. Ms. Sargent
didn’t go to church as the other children had to do. Instead, she
was free to wear shorts and play outside on Sundays. More importantly,
she was free to think for herself. Channing developed a mind of her own
outside the confines of her neighborhood. With text, personal narrative,
video, and movement, Channing’s active imagination quietly deconstructs
that life and steadily rebuilds it as she persistently asks the question,
“What does it mean?” to be the descendent of such a personage.
With her assured voice and calm timbre, Ms. Sargent and her cast go through
the list of the wives of Brigham Young, accompanied by projected photographs
of those women’s faces. As their names and statuses are acknowledged
— how they stayed with or escaped the oppression of their marriage
to that man — one feels the powerful presence of those long-deceased
women giving thanks. If Ms. Sargent has inherited anything, it is an innate
sense of the power of the spoken word and the pioneering spirit to use
it for just cause. She is definitely a performing artist whose voice we
look forward to hearing more of.