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Documentary speaks for the deaf | CapeCodOnline.com
Imagine you're in a busy airport — say, JFK International in the Big Apple — but you don't hear a sound. No jet engines roaring into the sky. No security devices beeping. No announcements on the PA system or feet shuffling or the whir-and-click of the baggage conveyor belts.
This isn't an exercise in imagining some post-Armageddon "I-Am-Legend" world. Because even in that alternate reality, you'd still hear something.
I'm talking about a world of hustle-and-bustle enveloped in Silence, where Quietness isn't something you seek, but an inescapable daily presence — the kind of space inhabited by people such as Tom Driscoll, who began to lose his hearing when he was 8 and was deaf by the time he reached his early 30s.
These days, the 56-year-old construction estimator and adjunct professor at Cape Cod Community College has learned to look beyond limitations and even see an occasional benefit to life as a silent movie.
"I sit in airports sometimes and I think to myself: DAMN! It's QUIET in here!" Another benefit: "No Muzak in elevators."
Not that being deaf is easy. "It's a tough row to hoe. ... I do not have the options and opportunities that others have," he says, referring to finding a place to live or work, for instance.
And, there are other personal challenges.
"My case is a little different than many. My voice sounds just like yours — clear pronunciation. ... So when I say, 'I am deaf, I can't hear you,' I get some confused looks. I have gotten to the point where when I see that baffled look, I say, 'The voice works - the ears don't,' and have found people can actually get their head wrapped around the concept quicker."
Tonight, however, Tom is hoping a new movie playing at the Cotuit Center for the Arts helps more people wrap their heads around the concept of what it is like to live without their auditory senses. The movie (an award-winning documentary, actually) is "See What I'm Saying."
The film, set to be shown at 7:30 p.m., follows the lives of four deaf entertainers in their quest to cross over to mainstream audiences.
There's comic CJ Jones, who produced the first International Sign Language Theatre Festival in Los Angeles; drummer Bob Hiltermann, a member of the music world's only deaf rock band (Beethoven's Nightmare); singer TL Forsberg, a partially deaf songstress who struggles to record her first CD, titled "Not Deaf Enough"; and Tom's friend, actor Robert DeMayo, who was homeless and is HIV positive, trying to keep his head above water in the City of Brotherly Love.
Director Hilari Scarl, whose father lives in Falmouth, hopes the film helps audiences "see that deaf culture is vibrantly rich and filled with brilliant, creative, intelligent and inspiring human beings who share the same dreams and aspirations as everyone else." She also hopes to inspire Hollywood to cast more deaf actors.
It remains to be seen whether "See What I'm Saying" will inspire industry insiders, though it has already inspired critics. Writing for the New York Times, Jeannette Catsoulis praises Scarl's latest project as "all-but-essential viewing for hearing audiences," noting that it "educates without lecturing, and engages without effort."
It also happens to be the first commercially produced-and-released, open-captioned film in American cinema history (See What I'm Saying: The Deaf Entertainers Documentary | Official Movie Site). Open-captioning means the captions appear to all viewers, not jut those with special access. And, tonight's screening represents a first for the Cotuit Center for the Arts. In recognition of Deaf Awareness Month, the center is kicking off a series of programs in conjunction with the Wheelock Family Theatre of Boston focused on American Sign Language.
Another initiative is called "Hands," a new gallery exhibit with a focus on hands as a primary means of expression, which includes more than 30 original works by Barnstable High School students.
The center's executive director, David Kuehn, is smiling because these coming events have already brought the Cape's deaf and hard-of-hearing community together.
"Our mission is to serve the community and the community means the entire community," Kuehn said. "In April, I was in the Center with my friend and her deaf daughter, and a light bulb went off, which was that we had an opportunity to serve a part of the community that we hadn't been thinking about."
And isn't that the point of art? To bring people together; to inspire; to deepen our understanding of the human condition; to give us, as Tom says, "a glimpse into an invisible culture?"
Imagine you're in a busy airport — say, JFK International in the Big Apple — but you don't hear a sound. No jet engines roaring into the sky. No security devices beeping. No announcements on the PA system or feet shuffling or the whir-and-click of the baggage conveyor belts.
This isn't an exercise in imagining some post-Armageddon "I-Am-Legend" world. Because even in that alternate reality, you'd still hear something.
I'm talking about a world of hustle-and-bustle enveloped in Silence, where Quietness isn't something you seek, but an inescapable daily presence — the kind of space inhabited by people such as Tom Driscoll, who began to lose his hearing when he was 8 and was deaf by the time he reached his early 30s.
These days, the 56-year-old construction estimator and adjunct professor at Cape Cod Community College has learned to look beyond limitations and even see an occasional benefit to life as a silent movie.
"I sit in airports sometimes and I think to myself: DAMN! It's QUIET in here!" Another benefit: "No Muzak in elevators."
Not that being deaf is easy. "It's a tough row to hoe. ... I do not have the options and opportunities that others have," he says, referring to finding a place to live or work, for instance.
And, there are other personal challenges.
"My case is a little different than many. My voice sounds just like yours — clear pronunciation. ... So when I say, 'I am deaf, I can't hear you,' I get some confused looks. I have gotten to the point where when I see that baffled look, I say, 'The voice works - the ears don't,' and have found people can actually get their head wrapped around the concept quicker."
Tonight, however, Tom is hoping a new movie playing at the Cotuit Center for the Arts helps more people wrap their heads around the concept of what it is like to live without their auditory senses. The movie (an award-winning documentary, actually) is "See What I'm Saying."
The film, set to be shown at 7:30 p.m., follows the lives of four deaf entertainers in their quest to cross over to mainstream audiences.
There's comic CJ Jones, who produced the first International Sign Language Theatre Festival in Los Angeles; drummer Bob Hiltermann, a member of the music world's only deaf rock band (Beethoven's Nightmare); singer TL Forsberg, a partially deaf songstress who struggles to record her first CD, titled "Not Deaf Enough"; and Tom's friend, actor Robert DeMayo, who was homeless and is HIV positive, trying to keep his head above water in the City of Brotherly Love.
Director Hilari Scarl, whose father lives in Falmouth, hopes the film helps audiences "see that deaf culture is vibrantly rich and filled with brilliant, creative, intelligent and inspiring human beings who share the same dreams and aspirations as everyone else." She also hopes to inspire Hollywood to cast more deaf actors.
It remains to be seen whether "See What I'm Saying" will inspire industry insiders, though it has already inspired critics. Writing for the New York Times, Jeannette Catsoulis praises Scarl's latest project as "all-but-essential viewing for hearing audiences," noting that it "educates without lecturing, and engages without effort."
It also happens to be the first commercially produced-and-released, open-captioned film in American cinema history (See What I'm Saying: The Deaf Entertainers Documentary | Official Movie Site). Open-captioning means the captions appear to all viewers, not jut those with special access. And, tonight's screening represents a first for the Cotuit Center for the Arts. In recognition of Deaf Awareness Month, the center is kicking off a series of programs in conjunction with the Wheelock Family Theatre of Boston focused on American Sign Language.
Another initiative is called "Hands," a new gallery exhibit with a focus on hands as a primary means of expression, which includes more than 30 original works by Barnstable High School students.
The center's executive director, David Kuehn, is smiling because these coming events have already brought the Cape's deaf and hard-of-hearing community together.
"Our mission is to serve the community and the community means the entire community," Kuehn said. "In April, I was in the Center with my friend and her deaf daughter, and a light bulb went off, which was that we had an opportunity to serve a part of the community that we hadn't been thinking about."
And isn't that the point of art? To bring people together; to inspire; to deepen our understanding of the human condition; to give us, as Tom says, "a glimpse into an invisible culture?"