Blindness is built into the narrative and performance of Rainbow on Mars, an Alice in Wonderland-esque production created in partnership with the National Ballet of Canada
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Without the shorthand of sight, there are so many details to communicate. And the way you choose to communicate those details can dramatically alter their interpretation. That idea is a jumping-off point for Devon Healey’s new show Rainbow on Mars, a co-production from the National Ballet of Canada and Toronto-based theatre company Outside the March.
Playwright and performer Devon Healey, left, with choreographer Robert Binet, right, during rehearsal on July 18. Rainbow on Mars is a co-production from The National Ballet of Canada and Toronto-based theatre company Outside the March.Melissa Tait/The Globe and Mail
The play – an Alice in Wonderland-esque narrative exploring Healey’s vision loss, with the playwright doubling as the lead performer – is an attempt to communicate ballet to a blind and low-vision audience, while offering sighted patrons a new perspective on dance.
“There is a myth that blindness is the opposite of seeing. It’s this presumption that blindness is a complete absence of vision rather than a way of knowing the world,” said Healey, who is also an assistant professor of disability studies at the University of Toronto. “I really wanted to go on an adventure into blindness. And in that adventure, I started to build a connection with dance.”
The spark of connection was fostered by Outside the March’s artistic director, Mitchell Cushman. During an early workshop, Cushman paired the playwright with choreographer Robert Binet, artistic director of Fall for Dance North and a former choreographic associate of the National Ballet. Together, they focused on a process Healey calls “immersive descriptive audio.”
Text from the immersive descriptive audio is overlaid on top of rehearsal footage, as performed by Vanessa Smythe and dancers at The National Ballet of Canada in Toronto.
Timothy Moore/The Globe and Mail
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Usually accessibility needs are only considered once a play, movie or television show is already finished. For example, “descriptive audio” is an audio narration track – added to a program in postproduction – that provides barebones information about the visual elements. While useful for blind and low-vision audiences, the effect often makes access feel like an afterthought.
In contrast, Healy notes that with immersive descriptive audio, “blindness is built into the artistic process.” As a core element of Rainbow on Mars, the creative team considered how the show would be experienced by audiences with sight loss (the Royal National Institute for the Blind notes that 93 per cent of legally blind people have some level of vision), working to emphasize the mood and feeling of its dance, stage directions and other visual elements, rather than rendering a literal interpretation of events. More poetry than math.
It’s something that’s helped reframe and expand how Binet and the 12 dancers in the show – a group of international performers, training as part of the National Ballet’s apprentice program – think about their work. Both philosophically and practically.
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