To get the ice just right, filmmakers tapped Norfolk expertise

By Joseph Kelly

The underdogs who battle the odds—the washed-up boxer, the outclassed football team, the aging baseball slugger with one last homerun in him—are all Hollywood standbys. Ronald Reagan may be remembered as much for “win one for the Gipper” as he is for two terms as president.

But when you replace the boxing ring, the football field or the baseball stadium with an icy curling rink, can you still eke out that same kind of tear-at-your-heart emotional drama?

The Rhode Island-based film company Verdi Productions is hoping to do just that with its latest production, “The Roaring Game”, a romantic comedy. To get the story straight, Verdi recruited some curling experts from right here in Norfolk.

Curling has a storied history in our town—in fact, 2026 marks 70 years from the day when the Norfolk Curling Club held its first meeting. But except for other frigid climes like Minnesota, Wisconsin and virtually all of Canada, where curling is a mainstay of rural life, the sport has always operated out of the limelight.

That’s been changing since 1998 when curling returned to the Winter Olympics as a medal sport. Now every four years, the world seems to fall in love with curling all over again. Anticipating this quadrennial surge of interest, Verdi released “The Roaring Game” to coincide with this year’s winter Olympics in Cortina.

The movie gets its title because that’s what curling is called—unlike hockey, the playing surface in curling is pebbled, not smooth, so the granite curling rock makes a roaring sound as it glides over the ice. The plot revolves around Ricky Rhodes, a hockey star in college who has since fallen on hard times and now works as a janitor. Ricky has been concealing this small detail about his employment from his girlfriend Kelly, who is herself a superb hockey player and has just won a spot on the

U.S. team going to the “World Games.” After Kelly discovers Ricky’s deception and dumps him, a distraught Rhodes searches for a way to win her back. Hearing that the U.S. Curling Team has been unexpectedly disqualified, Rhodes decides to field a team and go for the gold.

Known for crime dramas and mob-themed films with a New England twist, Verdi Productions and the director Tommy DeNucci have encased the romcom story line of “The Roaring Game” inside a bed of sordid machinations. Most of them involve a mobster known as the Plow King, well-played by Mickey Rourke. Ex-Patriots tight end Rob “Gronk” Gronkowski also makes a few appearances.

But because it is a curling film, the hero is the ice. And that’s where Norfolk comes in. After renting a hockey rink in Cranston, the producers quickly realized they had no idea how to make it look and act like a curling rink. One call after another led them to Jon Barbagallo, long-time member of the Norfolk Curling Club. Last October, with a trailer full of equipment in tow, Jon, his daughter Rachel, his father Lou, Mark Walsh, Harvey Chalmers and Phill West all traveled to Cranston where they spent the next six and a half days making movie magic.

First, they transformed the hockey rink into a curling rink with all new ice and markings. Once that was done, the curling scenes were shot as the movie follows the Rhodes team through qualifying rounds and then matches with Canada, Jamaica, China, Germany and Russia.

Do they win? Do Ricky and Kelly reconcile? Is the movie any good? No spoiler alerts or rotten tomatoes here. But rest assured, for each shot of curling rocks roaring down the ice and dislodging other curling rocks, your dedicated team from Norfolk was hard at work behind the scenes making it look completely authentic.

“The Roaring Game” is by no means the first film to feature curling. Many will recall the 2002 “Men With Brooms” starring Leslie Nielsen. Neither production is likely to warm the hearts of curling purists as they both feature scenes of curling rocks going completely airborne along with other improbabilities.

Once shooting was done, and after making cameo appearances as extras, the Norfolk crew got back to work getting the curling rink ready to host a Cranston hockey league. Will they find themselves four years from now providing expert guidance on yet another curling film? It’s very possible, especially given the strong showing of the U.S. this year at Cortina, earning a silver medal in the mixed doubles and narrowly missing a bronze in the women’s competition. The love affair with curling shows no signs of abating. At Norfolk and other clubs, “Learn to Curl” events are regularly overbooked. Get ready for 2030 in the French Alps.