Theater Review - The hearing world

Children of a Lesser God proves the adage that you should talk softly if you want to attract attention. Mark Medoff’s play about the hearing-impaired features characters who scarcely speak aloud, yet whose dialogue in American Sign Language can fill a volume. At the beginning of a Sunday matinee of Aurora Theatre, the audience’s careless chatter soon fell away as they watched the unfamiliar play of words across fingers.

Originally staged in 1979, Children rather closely fits the formula of the “therapist” plays of the same period, like Equus and Agnes of God, as well as such explorations of disability like The Miracle Worker. But though the play has creaky elements, the production of the Duluth playhouse shows its commitment to verisimilitude in the casting of some genuinely hearing-impaired performers, a choice that proves extremely effective.

Children is in part a love story, as James Leeds (Lee Look), a new speech therapist at a school for the deaf, becomes entranced by one of the residents, Sarah (Kalen Feeney). A former student working as a maid, Sarah is highly intelligent but refuses to learn to read lips or speak, preferring to assert the value of life outside the “hearing world.”

James and Sarah’s encounters evolve from classroom confrontations to dates at Italian restaurants. They fall in love and get married at the end of the first act. Their relationship generates jealousy from speech student Lydia (Kacey Rozelle) and resentment from another named Orin (Clint Johnson), who’s dedicated to the cause of “deaf rights” and implies that Sarah is becoming the hearing-impaired equivalent of an “Uncle Tom.”

As in the Oscar-winning feature film with William Hurt and Marlee Matlin, when James and Sarah converse, he repeats nearly all of her sign language-conveyed lines back in spoken words. That device has always struck me as a narrative shortcut (probably unavoidable) for the benefit of the hearing majority, as if the play is “close-captioned for the sign language-impaired.” Some of the most arresting moments are the brief exchanges that have no simultaneous translation.

During one of their arguments, James accuses Sarah of insincerity, saying, “You didn’t sign that with enough conviction.” That points to what’s unique about seeing performances so largely in sign language. An English-speaking audience can appreciate, say, the subtitled acting of Benicio del Toro in Traffic because Spanish also is voiced aloud.

With sign language, the arms and hands become as crucial as the face, and seeing Feeney and the other hearing-impaired players emoting their lines, whether through letters or symbols, is like a fascinating blend of conventional acting, mime and watching the fingerwork of a master craftsman. The production, directed by Rachel May, required the use of a sign language interpreter at rehearsals, and if we can’t understand some of the spoken lines, their meaning is always clear.

James calls Sarah “the most mysterious, attractive, angry person I’ve ever met,” and the fierceness of Feeney’s portrayal lives up to that description. Feeney, a physical trainer from Oregon, gives Sarah not just anger and bitter humor, but tenderness and wit, including an amusing moment in which she displays the different settings of her new blender. Her climactic speech about her life without sound might seem like a contrived theatrical moment, but it’s still a fascinating one.

Plus, not having to deliver some of Medoff’s weak turns of phrase may give Feeney an advantage here. Look is saddled with James’ penchant for weak jokes and weird bits of fanciful imagery, and it’s at these points that the script is most off-key. But Leeds proves credible as an idealistic teacher and likable where he needs to be — and one can’t help but notice that the actor’s sizable ears seem particularly suitable to a character whose hearing is so crucial to the action.

Monica Williamson plays the lawyer who agrees to aid in Orin’s crusade for “deaf rights,” and she gets some laughs by shouting unnecessarily to the hearing-impaired characters. Anthony Rodriguez, in the antagonistic role of the school administrator, delivers nearly every line with such hostility that the part, one-dimensional to begin with, seems inexplicably villainous. He seems to loathe students, teachers and the hearing-impaired so much you can’t imagine how or why he runs a school.

In depicting the fate of James and Sarah’s marriage, Medoff’s script proves more ambiguous than the film’s happy resolution. Their rift develops in part because Sarah wants deaf children, and he doesn’t, and the play’s exploration over the cultural validity of deafness is its most intriguing aspect. At one point, Orin refers to the dishes at an Italian restaurant as “Hearing Food,” a notion that baffles James.

Although Children of a Lesser God doesn’t seem to want to take sides, Medoff clearly believes that Sarah’s isolation is wrong. But when Feeney, as Sarah, expresses what she gains through her soundless life with a gesture that suggests a plant blooming from her fingertips, you can’t help but wonder if she’s attuned to something that the hearing audience cannot know. Aurora Theatre’s respect for that mystery gives its production a silent resonance.

Children of a Lesser God plays through April 21 at Aurora Theatre, 3087-B Main St., Duluth, with performances at 8 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. and 2 p.m. Sun. $18. Call 770-476-7926.??