Although multi-disciplinary art has existed for decades now, Deaf Arts seem not to have quite reached that stage yet. Of course, exceptions such as Aaron Williamson and Sign Dance Collective spring to mind, although these tend towards the ‘deaf and disabled’ sensibility rather than a specific deaf cultural focus.Within the creative Deaf/BSL Community, the divide between the performing arts and visual art remains. One rarely sees deaf performers at art gallery private views, while deaf visual artists becoming extras on BBC TV’s Switch don’t count as multi-disciplinary: they just need the money.
Hence the column. Each month, an aspect of Deaf Arts will be covered in the form of a review, opinion piece or profile. Not that one hopes to generate a school of multidisciplinary creative thinking: perish the thought. Rather, the aim is to explore and celebrate Deaf Arts in its entirety.
Thus it begins with Deafinitely Theatre. Their last production, Lipstick and Lollipops - Charlie Swinbourne’s playwriting debut – didn’t impress, due to a storyline rather too reminiscent of Eastenders to feel truly original, and a habit for characters to appear at cross-purposes, confounding all sense of time and space.
Given the company’s past output, however – dramas have explored cochlear implant politics, Nazi deaf genocide, and dysfunctional family life - it could be safely assumed that future plays would not repeat such mistakes.
Indeed, both Deafinitely Creative - a showcase of eight pieces by deaf writers – and Double Sentence, Deafinitely Theatre’s new work-in-progress, both of which were staged at Oval House Theatre over two nights, showed evidence of both a return to form and potential for further ingenuity.
To detail every one of the eight shorts-in-progress - developed over four intensive monthly sessions in London following a week-long residential writing course in Shropshire – would be impossible.
Nevertheless Mary-Jayne Russell de Clifford’s Buttercup (a charming story about an orphaned nun trying to avoid the laundry man’s attentions), Aliya Gulamani’s Energy (love and life in an unusual industrial climate) and Norma McGilp’s Hold The Line (a cracking dialogue between a deaf woman and her interpreter wrestling for control) should all be noted.
More anticipation was reserved for Double Sentence. Taking place on a black stage - unadorned save for a white-tape floor grid – the story concerns Tom Fry (Matthew Gurney), a Deaf BSL user adapting to prison life. After attempts to co-operate with staff and inmates fail to overcome the proverbial linguistic barrier, he is visited by Anna (Emma Case), a clinical psychologist with sign language skills, who could provide just the lifeline he needs.
Sadly, the respite is short-lived: another psychologist, Mary (the estimable Caroline Parker), brought in for a second opinion, lacks Anna’s communication skills and misinterprets Tom’s frustrated requests as an act of insanity. As a result, solitary confinement is recommended.
So far, so expected. This was classic issues-driven theatre that drew from four months’ research involving Deaf prisoners and ex-offenders for the first time and Deafinitely Theatre’s own political inclinations.
Its lucidity, however, was a surprise. A 20-minute preview following just two weeks of script development this might have been, but Double Sentence indicated an impeccably tight, absorbing story that brought home the appallingly bleak prognosis that many Deaf BSL prisoners face, commanding strong performances all-round.
Co-writers Andrew Muir – an actor and playwright responsible for the award-winning Green Grass, Push (selected as Time Out Critic’s Choice) and The Owl’s Nest – and Paula Garfield, Deafinitely’s Artistic Director, hope to go on national tour with Double Sentence in late 2009 (depending on funding) once scripting is complete.
One looks forward to what could lie in store – although not necessarily for poor Tom.
Visit www.deafinitelytheatre.co.uk for news of future developments.
(c) Melissa Mostyn 2009
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