Sound and Fury

OK, I have to tell you a little thing.

My folks thought I was deaf for a long time. I didn't talk until I was well into my third year. Turned out, I just didn't talk because I didn't have to. Adults always spoke for me.

But, because of all that, my folks became very interested in the Theater for the Deaf here in Dallas. Now, I'd like to point out the above trailer is for Deaf West Theater in Pasadena, but there used to be one in DFW. Let me tell you how those go:

For every character on stage, there are two actors: one signs the other speaks. In the production for the trailer above, Charlie has a child actor as his speaking voice at the start of the show. As his intellect develops, he gains an adult speaking actor. I can tell you now, when the child speaking actor returned to the stage, the audience gasped. They could see what it meant.

The first production I ever saw was a biopic of Edgar Allen Poe. The program listed the actors and the signs for everyone's name: speaking Poe was a P to the head. Signing Poe was a P to the heart. When they did "The Tell-Tale Heart", there were speakers with heavy bass for the heartbeat.

They also did productions of The Last Unicorn and Pippin. Man alive, I love me some puppets. Pretty sure the Red Bull was at least five puppeteers.

So let me show you this:



Lemme tell you something: all of those dancers are deaf. Some of them are even blind. The choreography includes them blowing on each other's necks so they can work out the timing.

I remember that Danno always liked the music I played in my car, but I have to also remember he'd blown out his eardrums a few years prior. The reason we showed what we did at Anime Hell was it was what he could hear. He was practically deaf himself.

Guan Yin is the bodhisattva of compassion. Her mantra is what saw a dying cat off.

We show a lot of cruel videos at hell. Sure it makes us laugh, but I'll only ask one thing of you:

Stay safe.
Have fun.
Be kind.