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One little spark that set it off
was watching this documentary and it was about a deaf couple.
The woman was pregnant and they wanted their baby to be born deaf
and then I kind of thought
"Yeah, but we all want our kids to display some sort of aspect of ourselves
because in a way there is some ego and vanity in having children
and creating your own dominion.
((upbeat string music))
Families, behind closed doors, they have all these rules
that other people just say, you know, would find incomprehensible.
So all of these ideas started to kind of turn around in my mind.
You know when you're writing at the beginning -
I don't even have characters names, I just have A B C D
and all these voices and that is the first scene that you see in the play - is just,
you know, partly voices from my family, partly uncles and aunts
you know, cousins - all sorts of people go into that scene.
So that was how it kicked off.
When I met someone who was an interpreter, who was hearing,
so she was bilingual in Sign and English, she's a child of deaf adults - a CODA
she said, "You know, it forces you to grow up really fast when you've got deaf parents
because often the phone rings and it's bad news - someone has died
and you as the eight-year-old having to break the news
to your deaf parents about what's happened."
I had a supper once and I invited this one guy who was -
he only signed
and it was fascinating to me to watch the interpreter
you know, interpreting for him and saying things in the "I" form.
He would go sign-sign-sign and she would say
"Well, I felt quite annoyed at my parents" whatever, so I thought
that's a really interesting theatrical dynamic
someone voicing for someone else, so that went straight into the play, of course.
I didn't sort of go through life thinking "Gosh, the plight of deaf people" you know
because essentially, you know, one is selfish and you don't think about these things
until you start to think about them, you know?
I always thought that sign language was fascinating
because you see people signing on buses and trains, and you know
so I was always interested in that.
The thing I wanted to put in the play is this very potent thing
where you love someone to bits and yet you can be slightly cruel
to them at moments and then, you know, how hard it can be to say "Sorry"
when you know that you've done that.
It is something that is there at the end of the play.
Yeah, so that is - that is partly from here. (laughs)
You know?
((upbeat string music))