Livsfarligt på allvar is a murder mystery and comedy that creates a new aesthetic of accessibility
A co-production between DuvTeatern, Svenska Teatern and Theatre Academy explores how sign language, audio description and Easy Language can be fused to make an artistic whole.
Thursday, 10 October, marks the premiere of Livsfarligt på allvar! – ett svårtolkat mordmysterium on the Amos stage at Svenska Teatern.
The method used in the co-production between DuvTeatern, Theatre Academy students and Svenska Teatern is creative accessibility. The aim of the working group for the performance has been to include accessibility solutions in the artistic work so that the performance experience is more equal among diverse audience profiles.
“This means that accessibility becomes part of the expression, part of the artistic vision,” Managing Director for DuvTeatern Sanna Huldén says.
From the very beginning of the process, this ideal was pursued through workshops led by expert consultants. Silva Belghiti, a Deaf actor who graduated from the Theatre Academy, and Ellen Hoang, asign language interpreter, conducted workshops to help the working group integrate sign language into the play. Both also appear on stage in the performance: Belghiti plays a Deaf character named Järvenpää, and Hoang performs a bilingual role as her cousin.
The performance incorporates sign language as a natural part of fiction. In the performance, Belghiti and Hoang also have other roles where they convey the spoken content in sign language through artistic means.
It is clear how this approach differs from the conventional accessibility strategy: Often, a performance strives towards accessibility by welcoming the audio describer or sign language interpreter in the process only in the final stages of the project. In those cases, the interpreter serves as an intermediary between the actors and audiences with hearing or visual impairments, but they are not familiar with the artistic choices and vision of the performance in the same way as the working group.
In Livsfarligt på allvar, accessibility is approached through the lens of the opportunities it brings, rather than limitations. The goal has been to explore how sign language, audio description and Easy Language can be fused to make an artistic whole.
“We’ve been working on the concept of accessibility for a long time: what is the spectrum of aspects it could entail?” says Mikaela Hasán, director of the play and artistic director for DuvTeatern.
The diversity of voices has been apparent in the working group’s rehearsals. Everyone is on equal footing, and everyone’s ideas are heard. Besides the director and actors, even lighting, sound, set and costume designers look for accessible solutions in their work, and accessibility plays a key role in the show’s marketing materials, too.
One of the actors in the play is Vega Adsten, who studies acting at the Theatre Academy. The production has made her reflect on the multitude and depth of the learning opportunities it has given her. Among other things, the members of the working group have learned to think about audio description and sign language interpretation in completely new ways – and that they can provide it on their own, without an intermediary.
The production has offered the entire group new perspectives on communication and many other things that hearing and sighted people do not always think about. The members of the working group see the clear value of this kind of accessibility work in performing arts education.
Adsten mentions how working on this production has also highlighted the importance of many fundamental tools for actors. One of these tools is listening. During the first week of working, it was exhausting to focus intently on listening in a multi-voiced group, striving for shared understanding.
“Exhausting, but educational, first and foremost,” Adsten says.