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You are at:Home » Some Reflections from AD, Marjorie Chan
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Some Reflections from AD, Marjorie Chan

28 August 20256 Mins Read

As we start our last week of performances for The Little Prince, with student matinees. Created by Landon Krentz, along with many Deaf collaborators, it has been extraordinary to be able to sit in back rows of the Mainspace (I’m often found there!) and be surrounded by Deaf and hearing families enjoying the bold, and imagistic play created from a Deaf aesthetic.

I have recalled that same joy, when the privilege of theatre, allowed me the opportunity to experience specific cultural moments from specific communities. I remember looking down from the mezzanine at an audience where most people were wearing hijabs at Ahmed Meree’s Suitcase/Adrenaline. I remember watching Rubble by Suvendrin Lena, inspired in part by the writing of Palestine’s national poet Mahmoud Darwish, and sitting beside an audience who would recite the poetry alongside the performers under their breath. I remember the exuberance of the lobby for TPM’s first Black Out Night for Natasha Adiyana Morris’ The Negroes are Congregating, before I left the building for the night and many more memories.

TPM has always been a place where diverse perspectives and artistic forms are celebrated and amplified. Cultural aesthetics and preferences, whether drawn from an ethnic background, or otherwise shared background such as the Deaf creators of The Little Prince open the door to completely unique expressions of art. Ultimately, experiencing Deaf culture through theatre, is no different than attending any other show created from a culturally specific place.

I have been thinking of TPM’s journey with the Deaf community. It made me reflect on some of the experiences I have been lucky to witness, facilitate and manifest here, (below are some of my reflections only and certainly not at all a comprehensive list of the projects that touched Deaf culture here!).

My first memory of not Deaf artists, but ASL interpretation onstage at the Mainspace was way back in 2011 for Montparnasse by Erin Shields. In this production, hearing interpreters were supported by the Deaf Community Consultant, Anita Harding (who now teaches at Gallaudet University!). It was not my first time seeing an ASL interpreted performance, having seen the default at that time of the interpreters on the side of the stage. And notably for me, was a sensitivity to the choices made that occasionally integrated the interpreters onstage and at that time, it was a significant shift in my thinking.

Flash forward to 2014, where I met writer Adam Pottle in Kitchener at MT Space’s Impact Festival which I was AD of Cahoots Theatre. A playwright visiting from Saskatchewan, we were both late to a conference session, so hung out at the back of room, mutually embarrassed and amused at our tardiness. He told me he was a writer, but he couldn’t really make out my response because of the noise in the room, and as I learned later in the hallway, Deaf. He shared his play Ultrasound with me, which was ultimately was co-produced by Cahoots/TPM on the Mainstage! There were many things against us in making it happen, not the least of which trying to secure funding for Adam to complete the play. Although Adam, was at that time, already a published author of several books, and an award-winning poet. I was told by the Canada Council that he did not qualify as a professional playwright. I gave the council rep a mouthful, as they should obviously consider his professional experience, and then hung up and cried at my desk. We found the money in other ways!

In the end, I was so thrilled to be able to share this story of a Deaf couple, as they navigate the possibility of having a hearing child enter their family. With stunning performances from Elizabeth Morris (also Associate Director of The Little Prince) and Chris Dodd (Founder and AD of Sound Off, Deaf Theatre Festival), the work was also supported by Catherine Joell Mackinnon as ASL Coach, and Deaf Community Consultant. Heart-breaking and challenging our assumptions, the production included voice, ASL and dynamic captioning.

In 2019, TPM invited Theatre Manu from Norway to perform Crying Hands, telling the neglected story of the Deaf experience during the Holocaust. Performed and created by Deaf artists, this company started in 1999 performs exclusively in sign, and adapted their production to ASL for their North American tour. Harrowing, and mostly silent, save for the voicing interpreter present for the hearing audiences, it was a moving and enlightening experience for me. It was also at a time that former Artistic Director Andy McKim had already announced his departure, and I was in a situation to consider whether I would be applying for the position. Needless to say, it was an inspiring performance for many reasons!

The Accessibility Labs followed soon after, funded by a grant and a premise from former leadership (AD Andy McKim, and Associate Jivesh Parasram, this large scale Open Door grant, was left in the hands of Indrit Kasapi and myself, as incoming Artistic Director}, that asked if there were different, and alternative ways of thinking about accessibility. Over many brainstorms, and many out of the box ideas, somehow Indrit made the budget and work happen! There are numerous projects that intersected with the Deaf community including experiments in form, process and aesthetics. Many of these were happening during the pandemic lock-down, so the fact that we were continuing to explore, create and engage made it an incredibly hopeful experience. I especially loved working with the co-writers Jack Volpe and Anna Chatterton as collaborators for the libretti about a hearing and Deaf couple as they navigate communication. With Catherine Joell Mackinnon as the co-dramaturge, we still hope to take this opera to the stage at some point! Check out the mini-doc about the process here, as well as 6 other documentaries from that initiative.

In 2022, as the lockdowns ended, and international travel began tentatively again, TPM welcomed Scored in Silence by Chisato Minimimura as a part of the first BeyondTO Festival. This powerful piece about the Deaf survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings, was created through sign, animated projection, vibration technology and my first experience of Visual Vernacular. This performance form also serves as the basis for the acting in The Little Prince. Coined by American Deaf performer Bernard Bragg in the 60s, the form was greatly inspired by the artist’s time with mime Marcel Marceau. Although informed through these beginnings by mime, VV (as colloquially known) encompasses so much more in nuance and approach as the form continued to be developed by Deaf artists.

Chisato is a virtuosic performer, magnetic and utterly mesmerizing and we hope to be able to bring her back to Canada some day in the future!  

As ever, we are only in the midst of this journey and are excited to see the possibilities of future seasons at TPM. 

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