What does it take to make theatre more accessible to actors with disabilities? The answer: not much.
I thought I'd give a little window into a few of the solutions that were devised for me this past school year in plays or dance shows to meet some of the minor unique needs I came across in costuming, staging, or elsewhere in performance.
1. Warming elements for a cold pool shoot: In February, 2012, I performed in a dance theatre show directed by Janet Hayatshahi called The Rest is Silence. The show captured the death experiences of 8 female Shakespearean characters, and I played Ophelia from Hamlet (who drowns in the play). One element of the show was a video showing Ophelia (me) "drowning." We filmed the scene in an unheated outdoor pool in December, and since I can't feel anything below my chest and my body temperature does not regulate "normally" due to my spinal cord injury, the crew brought hairdryers, hot tea, and towels for me to warm up immediately after I exited the pool. (The non-paralyzed got freezing in the pool, too!) I was only able to stay in the pool for about a minute before the cold water was unbearable...it literally took my breath away. But we got the shot, and it was projected onto a shower curtain above a bathtub during the show.
2. Custom padded body suit for crawling across the floor: In the same dance show, all of the Shakespearean female characters advanced toward the audience in a line at the end. To enhance the imagery of me drowning as Ophelia, I was helped out of my chair onstage by a fellow dancer during in segment of the show, and then had to pull myself across the floor as the line of women moved. However, since I can't feel where the bony prominences of my lower extremities may have been banging, rubbing, or scraping the stage floor as I pulled myself, I requested that we add some padding to whatever I was wearing. brilliant folks at the La Jolla Playhouse costume shop measured my bony outcroppings on my hips, tailbone, knees, and ankles, and put padding into custom-sewn, stretchy undergarments (like Spanx) that I wore underneath my white dress to protect my skin. Amazing!
3. Umbrella attached to chair, rug over pool slats: In the fall, I played Feklusha in Ostrovsky's The Storm. I was supposed to be a traveling pilgrim, and they wanted me to have an umbrella. However, wheeling with your hands and holding an umbrella is quite difficult, so they attached a removable umbrella to the back of my chair. Additionally, the set was centered around a large 1-foot-deep pool, over which wooden slats were laid. To prevent my front casters from getting stuck in some of the wider spaces between the slats when I turned my chair, we put a rug down over part of the slats (below).
4. Set ramps: The masters-level set designers at UCSD are amazing, and often design complicated, multi-tiered sets that include stairs. They have therefore built ramps into the sets on multiple shows to enable me to access different tiers. Sometimes they are hidden, such as in Small Prophecies, below, where the ramp was behind the back wall.
Other times, they are stylistically incorporated into the set, such as in Gas House Baby (below).
5. Padding for period wheelchairs: In The Glass Menagerie, we decided to use a somewhat-period wheelchair (the show is set in the 1930s...we did not have a wheelchair from that time frame, so instead used one from approximately the 1950s that the La Jolla Playhouse had in its props stash). Any time I use a wheelchair that is not my own, it's a challenge. My wheelchair is custom fit to the measurements and support needs of my body, and so when I use a different chair, it's like a walking person switching out their legs! Therefore, I usually spend several hours backstage at the beginning of the process experimenting with pillows, cushions, and other padding for me to get to a point where I can comfortably, effectively, and safely wheel. Moreover, the chair we used for Menagerie was rather rusty, had a sling seat (which basically provides no spinal support for my paralyzed and already-unstable abdomen), had brakes that were basically ineffective, squishy rubber tires with no tread, and wasn't really meant to be self-propelled in the way that contemporary chairs are. So, it was a bitch to maneuver. But, after I hid cushions and pillows under an afghan on the chair, and greased the axles up with silicon, it was more workable. And it looked great!
6. Snaps to secure a shoulder shawl: In Blood and Gifts, I played an American Senator's wife, and was fortunate to wear a snazzy blue gown. The costumer wanted to use a shoulder shawl, but with the slick material it kept falling off my shoulders as I wheeled, and risked getting caught under my wheels and inhibiting the classy, smooth rhythm I wanted for the character. So, snaps were added to attach the shawl to the dress, and also secure it under my arms so it would stay put without my hands holding it. Voila!
Simple, accessible solutions brought to you by common sense and creative minds. :-)
I thought I'd give a little window into a few of the solutions that were devised for me this past school year in plays or dance shows to meet some of the minor unique needs I came across in costuming, staging, or elsewhere in performance.
1. Warming elements for a cold pool shoot: In February, 2012, I performed in a dance theatre show directed by Janet Hayatshahi called The Rest is Silence. The show captured the death experiences of 8 female Shakespearean characters, and I played Ophelia from Hamlet (who drowns in the play). One element of the show was a video showing Ophelia (me) "drowning." We filmed the scene in an unheated outdoor pool in December, and since I can't feel anything below my chest and my body temperature does not regulate "normally" due to my spinal cord injury, the crew brought hairdryers, hot tea, and towels for me to warm up immediately after I exited the pool. (The non-paralyzed got freezing in the pool, too!) I was only able to stay in the pool for about a minute before the cold water was unbearable...it literally took my breath away. But we got the shot, and it was projected onto a shower curtain above a bathtub during the show.
3. Umbrella attached to chair, rug over pool slats: In the fall, I played Feklusha in Ostrovsky's The Storm. I was supposed to be a traveling pilgrim, and they wanted me to have an umbrella. However, wheeling with your hands and holding an umbrella is quite difficult, so they attached a removable umbrella to the back of my chair. Additionally, the set was centered around a large 1-foot-deep pool, over which wooden slats were laid. To prevent my front casters from getting stuck in some of the wider spaces between the slats when I turned my chair, we put a rug down over part of the slats (below).
4. Set ramps: The masters-level set designers at UCSD are amazing, and often design complicated, multi-tiered sets that include stairs. They have therefore built ramps into the sets on multiple shows to enable me to access different tiers. Sometimes they are hidden, such as in Small Prophecies, below, where the ramp was behind the back wall.
Other times, they are stylistically incorporated into the set, such as in Gas House Baby (below).
6. Snaps to secure a shoulder shawl: In Blood and Gifts, I played an American Senator's wife, and was fortunate to wear a snazzy blue gown. The costumer wanted to use a shoulder shawl, but with the slick material it kept falling off my shoulders as I wheeled, and risked getting caught under my wheels and inhibiting the classy, smooth rhythm I wanted for the character. So, snaps were added to attach the shawl to the dress, and also secure it under my arms so it would stay put without my hands holding it. Voila!
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