Reflections Through a DeafLens

Greetings,

The National Technical Institute of the Deaf recently unveiled a new deaf theatre website coordinated by Aaron Kelstone with the assistance of EDR staff Simon Ting and Cathy Clarke and faculty member Patricia Durr. This webiste showcases and promotes the works of national deaf and hard-of-hearing actors, performers and scriptwriters avalable through the National Technical Institute for the Deaf, a college of Rochester Institute of Teechnology. The site is designed for actors, performers, scriptwriters, students, teachers, scholars, and researchers. It offers access to biographies of the actors, performers or scriptwriters with descriptions of their work. Articles, scripts, book chapters and links to related sites are also featured. Please note that this is still a work in progress and more items will be added through this year.
http://www.rit.edu/ntid/deaftheatre/

The website is a positive and exciting contribution to society at large and specifically to theatre and Deaf Culture.  Congratulations to Aaron Kelstone and all who made this website possible. What a wonderful way to kick off the new year!

Happy New Year everyone,

Jane

Jane

Greeting Colleagues,

Linda Bove, star of television and stage bats a thousand in an interview on a national well-respected radio program, National Public Radio. Cool, calm and collected, Linda responds to questions regarding casting a hearing actor in a deaf role.  

In my book, she's up there with Babe Ruth and Ted Williams to use a baseball analogy. If we're talking golf, she'd rank alongside Babe Didrikson and Tiger Woods.

Well done Linda, you did us proud, real proud.

Stay tuned,

Jane

Links:

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0100581/

http://blogs.wnyc.org/culture/2009/11/16/deaf-actors-demand-equal-stage-time/

Greetings,

The Producers Guild of America Diversity recently took a position on supporting disabled actors.   Kudos to them for standing up to the "system." Check out this link.

Unconfirmed word on the street is that Glee producers approached a school for deaf children and are or have already selected few students to be included in a choir scene in episode ten of Glee.

Stay tuned,

Jane

Greeting Colleagues,

The controversy continues. Fresh on the heels of The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter comes another production, Miracle Worker with Abigail Breslin (hearing) in the role of the deaf blind character, Helen Keller.

In iVillage, Entertainment, more on the casting of a hearing person in the role of Helen Keller. The Kidglue story adds that Blind people are also angry. 

Thirty Mile Woman talks about the controversial casting and offers an interesting perspective. 

Across the pond, British reality TV (Channel Four) launched a new show with disabled people, Cast Offs.

A British blogger, Femalefirst talks about the new reality show.

Simon Startin writes about Cast Offs in November 10, 2009 issue of U.K.'s Guardian and asks whether the program will show a new side to the disabled population.

Lynn Elbe's AP story on Glee, a Fox TV program (U.S.) with a non-disabled actor in the role of a wheelchair character is picked up for publication in November 11, 2009 issues of USA Today and The Huffington Post. (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/10/glee-wheelchair-episode-u_n_352778.html)

There are many in our society who do not understand or are comfortable  with "the disability world." To learn more, check out Society for Disability Studies.

Media and Disability offers a realistic, refreshing perspective. Disability Studies Quarterly affirms our realistic existence.

Truth be told, my friends, we're as old as time. We've been around since day one. All the segregation terminology and so called "justifiable" discrimination in the name of art will not change the reality of who we are and our rightful place in society. We're part of your national identity.

Hollywood, Broadway, Madison Avenue and Wall Street set stereotype standards. When these standards are practiced and enforced, my colleagues and I are denied our rightful place in society.

"So what," you say?

Stay tuned,

Jane

Dear Colleagues,

On November 6, 2009, at Gallaudet University, Marlee Matlin testified at FCC. To see the full video program, click on this Federal Communications Commission link.

Marlee Matilin as the official spokesperson for the National Association of the Deaf represented NAD at the November 6th FCC hearing.

Kudos to Nancy Bloch, Executive Director of the National Association of the Deaf for "hearing" and opening NAD's arms to Marlee.

Without doubt, this is the kind of action Frederick C. Schreiber, the first Executive Secretary of NAD would say, is the way to go.

Not many people understands that Marlee does care.

Good job, Nancy.

Stay tuned,

Jane

Greeting Colleagues,

Confronting us at this time, is an issue that has recurred increasingly over the years, one that has consistently ignored "voices" from Deaf people who make their living in theatre, film and television. This particular issue is a bone of contention that has a direct impact on opportunities for Deaf professional  actors, producers, directors, writers, and design technicians. It also has a direct impact on the image of Deaf people and how "Hollywood"  defines us.

It is well known that opportunities for work on stage, film and television are few and far between and more so for Deaf people who are professionals and members of Equity, AFTRA and SAG. In a recent issue of The New York Times, there was a write up of a New York Theatre Workshop's rehearsal production of The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter. The lead actor, Henry Stram (hearing) plays John Singer, a deaf and mute character. The play by Rebecca Gilman is based on Carson McCullers's 1940 novel of the same name. It is important for us to understand how this article came about.

Upon learning of NYTW's production, "Deaf Hollywood" and New York City Deaf members of Equity, AFTRA and SAG immediately contacted each other through the Internet and in a matter of days, a shared distribution list was formed and discussion immediately ensued. One direct result of this discussion was this New York Times article. Be sure to read the comments, there are 75 of them. Other postings include The Clyde Fitch Report and The Huffington Post.

A thought occurred to me. I'm wondering if any part or phase of the development of The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter production was funded by city, county, state or federal government? Were rehearsals or meetings held in any facility supported in full or partially by public funds? Was Doug Hughes' Acting Company funded in any way with public funds? Did anyone affiliated with the development of the play and production receive support in any shape or form from public funds? Deaf people are taxpayers.

We are fortunate to have a strong core group of Deaf people and allies led by Linda Bove and Howie Seago. Both represent years of experience in theatre, film and television. In the core group are Lewis Merkin, DJ Kurs, Alexandria Wailes, Guthrie Nutter, Anne Tomasetti, Darren Fudenske, Sharon Jensen and Sindy Gordon.

We stand solidly behind them. We respect and support their handling of this issue. They know what is at stake. They have the expertise and the experience to address this issue.

Jane

Greetings:

Over a period of time I've developed respect for Bill Creswell's effort toward captioning one video at a time on the Internet. Having worked for the National Captioning Institute I've watched the captioning process and have a healthy appreciation for the amount of work that goes on behind the scenes. It's not an easy job. It's tedious and time consuming. I just had to find out a bit about Bill…

Jane: I think it would be interesting for people to read about you and understand the work you are doing…would you let me interview you?

Bill: If you would like to interview me that would be fine. I don't consider myself that interesting, but…

Jane: Well, we can take it one step at a time…How did you start captioning?

Bill: I worked for a theatre that installed MoPix in 2005, mostly on the initiative of Disability Advocates. We had open caption equipment, but the work wasn't well received, hearing people complained, and apparently nothing was heard from the deaf community in support. So I heard,  this happened before I started working there.

Anyway, I first started learning about the deaf in my recent history, because of a complaint by a deaf person on The Deaf Edge.

I started reading the blog and started thinking it was kind of crazy, that for all the MoPix movies, there were very few trailers (mostly by ITFC - I found them on a UK site and particularly not of the movies we were showing.

Other bloggers, like ProudGeek and Banjo talked about some captioning stuff on their blogs, so I tried it out.

Until this point, my blog was receiving 3 to 4 visits a week. I wasn't really doing much with it. After I published a few, Jared Evans of DeafRead offered to post my Caption stuff on DeafRead.

I got such a positive reaction, that I started to caption other movie trailers that we weren't playing, and then I started to try to caption the trailers for all subtitled movies.

I got the most visits, when I started captioning some of the stuff that Marlee Matlin did on Dancing with the Stars.

Anyway, now I have captioned about 250-300 videos, including captioning the 80th birthday of a woman's mother, that she had never understood what was said. (That took a very long time.)

Jane: Where are you located?

Bill: Grand Rapids, Michigan

Jane: Are you deaf? A signer?

Bill: Nope, I'm hearing. In fact. I wasn't aware that I knew of any deaf people before 2007. Grand Rapids used to be pretty well known for its oral deaf education, so I may have. I never realized this friendly guy at the gym was deaf, because his lip-reading of me seemed to work better than most people who hear me. I just assumed some hearing loss.

Jane: A signer?

Bill: I wish I had taken three sign classes at Deaf and Hard of Hearing Services and one at the Y. I'm really only proficient at saying "stupid" or "my sign is horrible." I try to sign the words I know when I sing in the choir; because it seems to enhance my experience-some people raise their hands- seem more logical to express language with my hands to extend my praise.

I'd like to be conversant in sign, but I think I need a different way to learn, definitely some videos to replay. I am also a little "conversationally challenged," in that with deaf or hearing, conversation does not flow easily for me.

Jane: How long does it normally take you to caption a teaser or clip?

Bill: A three minute trailer takes 45 minutes to an hour, depending on word density. The Marlee Matlin clip took two hours.

Jane: Do you also caption full length videos from the Internet?

Bill: I haven't.

Jane: What's the longest length of video you've captioned?

Bill: The longest so far was the private birthday party. The party itself was over an hour, but most of it was unintelligible conversation. The main interview to be captioned was about 20 minutes.

Jane: Do you add sound effects, e.g., dog barking, clicking of key unlocking a door, car honking?

Bill: Yes, that's the difference between "Captioning" and "subtitling," according to the sites that I had researched (openandclosed.org.wgbh.) Captions are also sometimes called subtitling for the deaf and hard of hearing usually in DVD production.

If there are a lot of captions in the surrounding, or they are too distracting and abundantly evident, sometimes I will leave them off.

Jane: Do you contact companies to ask for permission to caption their clips?

Bill: So far the only time I have done that is in the case of Sweet Nothing in My Ear. When the film was announced, there was no trailer, so I requested a "Screener" and made a fan made trailer, and when the official clip came out. I needed to download it and publish the trailer myself, so I contacted them, since I had the information already, they seemed grateful.

So far, I believe because I normally don't host the videos, it's not a legal thing. I have to avoid using YouTube for movie trailers, because they are a little too aggressive at pulling down possible copyright violations on movie trailers and other videos.

I've also seen other YouTube videos that have been up for years, pulled down after I put the captions on over stream, probably due to the really good search engine placement. (Search "Captioned Trailer" with any movie, and my stuff comes up.)

Jane: Are you a good speller? Is it easy for you to caption?

Yeah, spelling is good, although my typing isn't as fast as I'd like. Sometimes I have to listen to sections of audio over and over to hear them, because I don't have a transcript. I don't think hearing people even realize how many words they miss out on when there are no subtitles. (I watch TV with CC on when I can.)

My church is going to get captioning soon too. I'm happy about that.

Jane: Thanks Bill, for all that you do. I'm so glad to meet you and to know a bit about you and your work. Many people have thanked you and I'm delighted to add to the chorus.

Take care and thanks again,

Jane

Greetings,

Marlee Matlin receives her Walk of Fame Hollywood star. Marathon Pundit Blog captures the moment with a video shot by none other than our Deaf Read's Tayler Mayer. Great job Tayler. Many thanks for taking time to shoot and post the clip.

Does anyone else have a video of Marlee with the Star? Did she leave her hand and footprints? I'm sure many of us would like to see that also.

Stay tuned,

Jane

Greetings,

As many of us know, Marlee Matlin is currently on a book tour with I'll Scream Later and hitting major cities throughout the country. The book is published by Simon & Schuster.  Bill Creswell provided captions for Robin Robert's interview with Marlee on  ABC's Good Morning America.

Zimbio carries a series of articles on Marlee's discussion of abuse in her life.  In sharing, Marlee is inspiring many people to talk openly and seek help with abusive relationships and drug addiction.

Deaf Abused Women Network (DAWN) and Abused Deaf Women's Advocacy Services (ADWAS) are two of several organizations that provide services to abused deaf people and children. If you or someone you know are experiencing abuse, contact the above mentioned agencies for help in locating services in your area.

On May 6th, Marlee will be honored with her own Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. We're proud of you Marlee.

Sincere appreciation to Bill Creswell for his continuing efforts toward "captioning the internet one video at a time." 

Stay tuned,

Jane

Greetings,

Every year Gallaudet Alumni Office hosts a Charter Day program to celebrate the signing of the University's charter by Abraham Lincoln. For this year, the 145th year celebration of the charter was especially significant as it marked the Bicentennial Celebration (1809-2009) of Lincoln's signature. Even U.S. Congress took note of this special celebration.

As part of the day's event, the 40th year of the Gallaudet University Charter Day's luncheon was held to honor individuals for their dedication and commitment toward advocacy and service. Dr. Betty G. Miller, a prominent artist and a mover and shaker in the original De'VIA arts movement was one of the very few people chosen internationally to be recognized at the luncheon. Dr. Miller was awarded the LCCF Alice Cogswell Award for her valuable service on behalf of deaf people. Bettigee, as she calls herself is a warm and generous soul, a renaissance woman, a true visionary and artist. A woman of courage and conviction.

In the 70's Betty was a professor at the art department at Gallaudet. She left her secure position to join colleagues in pioneering a new venture, the forming of the legendary Spectrum: Focus on Deaf Artists arts group based in Austin, Texas. Clarence Russell, Dorothy Miles, Charlie McKinney, Chuck Baird, Sandi Inches, Sarah E. Val, Liz Baird and many other artists formed a group to support fellow deaf artists in all forms of art which included painting, theatre, dance, music and poetry. I spent a week one summer with the group and they confirmed my deepest conviction that while deaf identity, ASL and arts was being suppressed in the education system for deaf and hard of hearing people, it would not be possible to silence deaf artists.

I see her now in my mind, during the late 60's standing, laughing and signing in a theatre with fellow production actors and crew members, directing a production of the Hughes Memorial Theatre, a Washington, D.C. local deaf theatre group. Patrick Graybill, Freda Norman (my sister), Barbara Kannapell, Frank DelRosso, Jan DeLap and many others were involved among them was Gil Eastman, former chair of the Gallaudet University Theatre Arts department and co-host of Deaf Mosaic. This was a special time that lies buried and forgotten in the Gallaudet University Archives.

Betty has throughout her life expressed her thoughts and views "ahead of time." With her early art exhibitions, some of her work depicted deaf people as puppets with strings manipulated by the education system of the deaf.  The general reaction to her work then was shock and in some cases, shame. Some deaf people agreed that these things should be kept quiet and not aired as dirty laundry for the world to see. She dared to paint her vision of oppression of deaf people, and in doing so, she named the illness and tore off the mask of complacency and acceptance.

Betty and her partner Nancy Creighton can be viewed at Facebook and on their website. Every year Betty and Nancy put out a calendar featuring Betty's work. For the coming year, Nancy tells me, it's going to be a new edition.  Make sure you reserve your 2010 copy. They also make great gifts.

If you have a quiet and reflective moment on some rainy afternoon, do a search on her father, Ralph Miller. He was an also an artist. This is a case of how both artists influenced each other.

All these people are connected through generations and it is deeply moving to see Betty honored among the greats. In 2007 she received an honorary degree from Gallaudet. She is, without, question, a living legend.

Take care and stay tuned,

Jane

To cite: Norman, Jane. (2009, April 13). Betty G. Miller, A Living Legend, Reflections from a Deaf Lens. Retrieved (date retrieved), from http://www.deaflens.com/blog/?p=88