Category Archives: Theatre

Captioned Theatre at the Bristol Old Vic

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Last weekend, I had the fortune to go to the Bristol Old Vic’s first captioned performance, ‘Juliet and her Romeo’, which was basically a reworking of Romeo and Juliet with old people in the title roles and the younger members of the families raising objections, all set in a nursing home.

It was an interesting take on a Shakespearean classic, and I’ll admit it here – I sniffled at the final scenes of ‘Romeo + Juliet’ with Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes. After the play though, my eyes were watering for a different reason – watching the captions as the actors spouted line after line of Shakespearean dialogue, of which – this being Shakespeare – there was a lot.

Whilst it was great to able to enjoy a play here in Bristol, where captioning in theatres hasn’t really taken off yet, I got a crick in my neck from turning to look at the captions and a headache from all the speed-reading. Not to mention flicking my eyes between the captions (off-stage right) and the action, which felt slightly like watching two different things at once, so split was my attention.

Having said all that, it was a good play, with good actors, and some funny one-liners – the script was tweaked here and there to adjust to the change of scene from 16th century verona to modern-day geriatric antics. All of the actors were good, but I liked Juliet and the nurse. Romeo killing Tybalt was a bit drawn-out, what with the change of weapon from a dagger to a pillow, and the part where Romeo learns of Juliet’s ‘death’, rants at the unfairness of it all and rushes to her side was glossed over with some on-the-spot jogging from the elderly lead that impressed me with his levels of fitness. The acting was good, the actor’s memories incredible, and it was interesting to approach the classic doomed love affair from a completely different angle.

I merely have some suggestions for improvement – moving the caption screen to just below the stage a la TV subtitles style and making the screen longer so your eyes aren’t constantly snapping back and forth reading the lines. Apart from that, jolly good show from the Old Vic, and here’s hoping that having done it for the first time and discovered that it didn’t cause anything to blow up, and indeed that they sold out the audience, a significant percentage of whom were wearing hearing-aids, they’ll do it again. And again. In fact here’s to many more captioned plays at the Bristol Old Vic!

Carny Ville!

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Carny Ville is a whacked-out, Victorian-themed, 18+ rated extravaganza held over a weekend at the The Island, a former cop shop in Bristol with a beautiful courtyard and surrounding buildings. Hosted by the Invisible Circus and Artspace Lifespace, it’s a brilliant way to spend a night, with amazing performances, mad ‘stalls’ (such as the Pawnbrokers, prop. C. U. Cummings), ‘ladies of the night’ that barrack the crowd from above the stalls at street level, Victorian lamps that spew flame, street performers that mingle with the crowd and stay completely in character even as they’re being ‘arrested’ by the bobbies with flashing helmets, the swing band decked out in pink, the traditional circus acts held in the Carny Grand, it was all a great atmosphere and brilliant fun.

The idea of this blog however, is to to give my ‘deaf perspective’ on the world, and from this perspective, Carny Ville was fantastic. Example; on entering the venue we were given fake money – “five nicker: no gods we trust” – and a clue card, in my case “ask the pawnbrokers about the old times at the Carny Grand”. So I eventually made my way over to that stall, where they were in the middle of a staged confrontation with one of the fake bobbies and waited patiently until they’d finished, signing away with my friend. Bobby left, my turn, I waved hello and showed them the clue card. They’d clearly picked up on all the signals that I and my friend were deaf and proceeded to wave their hands about, pretending to carouse wildly, pretending to get in a fight and hit each other with things, basically doing a very good, very funny mime act of a wild night out, victorian style. Suitably amused and impressed, I moved on, when I was accosted by one of the street performers. Tried to wave him away, but he wasn’t put off and opened his coat to reveal watches and plastic jewellery and mimed offering me these riches. We mimed our way through a transaction and I came away with a plastic ring that he’d placed on my hand himself.

We got accosted by yet another street performer who began by trying to shout at us over the crowd noise. We indicated we were deaf, and far from putting them off, they began to sign at us! Basic level signing, sure, but good enough to tell us there was a knees up at the barn dance and invite us to join them later. It didn’t seem to matter who accosted us or who we interacted with – Carny Ville depends a lot on crowd participation and interaction with most of the acts – once whoever it was realised we were deaf, they immediately adapted, miming or pointing or gesturing to get their act across.

I loved Carny Ville for that.

That and the incredible finale in the courtyard which had fireworks, plumes of flame, two abseiling dancers that twirled around each other and occasionally danced in tandem, a wire act, a dozen fire twirlers dotted around the buildings’ balconies and stonking music.

Carny Ville finishes in Bristol this weekend, then it’s going on tour. I heartily recommend it to anyone who wants a great night out – hearing or deaf!

Rock on Carny Ville!