features
Battalion/Page II
July 22,1982
Thursday
'' 0 >C Summer Dinner 1'heater:Tickets are on sale at the MSC
r .. a
Monday
"'inner Theater: Meetixig at 8:30 p.m. to
- final preparation of “The Odd Couple” pro-
students are welcome.
v . ' : ' ■ ■
-
‘Shadows’ interpret dialogue
Deaf can enjoy the theater
United Press International
HOUSTON — A man dres
sed in black stands behind an
actor on stage during a play. He
doesn’t say a word, but wildly
moves his hands and arms, his
face reflecting the emotions of
what the actor is saying.
The man is “shadow play
ing,” or telling the deaf and
other hearing-impaired people
in the audience what the actors
are saying.
Shadowing is being intro
duced in Houston this month at
the Alley Theatre during two
performances of Agatha Christ
ie’s mystery, “The Unexpected
Guest.” The shadows are inter
preters for the deaf, and they
repeat in sign language the lines
of the actors.
Each major actor has a sha
dow, who will parallel the actor’s
performance.
When the actor is not in a
conversation, the shadow leaves
the stage. No more than two sha
dows appear on stage at the
Actors at the Alley ha ve
welcomed the shadows
overwhelmingly, and
are working with them
to make the perform
ance an enjoyable ex
perience for both the
hearing-impaired and
the listening audience.
same time, said Suzi Cravens, di
rector of special events for the
Alley.
“This concept will open up
Reporters, police reverse
roles in special workshop
theater to an entire new audi
ence, to a group of people that
has never been able to enjoy a
play before,” said Cravens.
“Acting and shadowing work
together so well because they are
both art forms.”
The shadowed performances
are scheduled for July 30 and
Aug. 1. People without hearing
disabilities also are buying tick
ets for the shadowed shows.
Shadowing was first tried in
Atlanta in 1976 by a group cal
led Stage Hands Inc. Debra
Brenner, president and founder
of the group, is planning to
come to Houston to train inter
preters.
The project is costing about
$8,500, which will be paid by the
Pennzoil Co., based in Houston,
Cravens said.
Actors at the Alley have wel
comed the shadows overwhelm
ingly, and are working with
them to make the performance
an enjoyable experience for
both the hearing-impaired and
the listening audience.
“I would be deeply honored
to have my performance sha
dowed in the way that has been
illustrated and discussed today,”
said actor Jim McQueen, after
an improvised performance by a
shadow and an actor. “I am very
Shadowing is being in
troduced in Houston
this month at the Alley
Theatre during two
performances of
Agatha Christie’s mys
tery, “The Unexpected
Guest. ” The shadows
are interpreters for the
deaf, and diey repeat in
sign language the lines
of the actors.
v
ASH
agan 1
“Pinocchio: Evviva!
the show will be perform
theater-in-the-round,
cannot be used. Butinterp!
will stand in front of a
section of 64 deaf chil(
they can “hear” it.
Cindy Koch, who is
is the mother of two
said shadowing enablestliil
actually to follow the jf anexis
rather than suffer theW v ' el ^ 1
pong effect of side-of-tbif 16 " ' on
interpreting. sc
“You need six pairs of?*^ ts ^
go back and forth towatejP 1 mac “
interpreters on the side p' sa '^
stage),” Koch said. Shei jp use
in amazement at the *
and said, for the first tinie® e 'y? ar
life, she understands Anna
much moved by this experi
ence.”
The Alley also plans to cater
to deaf children this summer
with two performances of
pie consider the theatei
citing.
The Alley has an ai
board of 11 hearing-imi.;
deaf people or interpreteii
advise on matters of k
handicaps.
“We don’t do anything I
out first discussing it wii
board,” Cravens said. “Afu
they know what they wam
Id in lii
United Press Internationa]
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — It was
a reporter’s dream come true: a
police public information offic
er breaking with tradition, hold
ing nothing back, telling all he
knew about a crime.
But the lucky “reporters”
scribbling down the information
were actually law enforcement
officials, who on this day found
themselves interviewing repor
ters acting out the roles of law
officers.
The police and the reporters
were all participating in what
may be the largest role-reversal
situation ever set up in the Mid
west for the benefit of the media
and law enforcement officials.
On a cool Saturday morning
in late spring, the Kansas City
Broadcast News Alliance staged
four scenes on the grounds of
KSHB-TV for “reporters” to
cover:
•The crash of a single-engine
plane apparently piloted by a
famous country-western singer;
•A meeting between police
and citizens angry about rapes in
their area;
•A robbery in which a police
officer apparently killed a sus
pect;
•And an apparent arson-
murder.
Officials from police and fire
departments from across metro-
ilit
politan Kansas City joined in the
event, called the “On The Spot
— Off the Record” workshop.
They were assigned as reporters
to either the mythical “Kansas
City Rag” newspaper, two radio
stations or a television station.
Their job was to cover one of the
The police and the re
porters were all partici
pating in what may be
the largest role-reversal
situation ever set up in
the Midwest for the be
nefit of the media and
law enforcement offi
cials.
four events and have their stor
ies ready by a 1 p.m. deadline.
Reporters were then assigned
duties as police and fire officials.
“I did notice, even though we
assumed roles (that) in many
cases we slipped into our old
roles,” said Sgt. Jim Treece, the
public information officer for
the Kansas City police depart
ment, and a member of Kansas
City Broadcast News Alliance.
Treece said he saw one inves
tigator who played a reporter at
the arson-murder scene go from
interviewing a witness to inter
rogating him.
And the “public information
officer” at the shooting scene
poured out all the information
she knew to the gathered “re
porters.”
During the critique period af
ter the deadline passed, Jim
Pritchett, Kansas City Broadcast
News Alliance president and
news director of WHB Radio,
admitted the real reporters
probably talked too much as
“officers.” He explained to the
police that reporters naturally
want to keep people informed
and so lapsed into roles they
wished real police information
officers would enact.
The pretend “reporters” also
found that when given the
opportunity, they fell into many
of the same traps that they claim
reporters often fall into. Take,
for instance, the easy and sensa
tional quote.
During the “homeowners”
meeting, erzatz Chief of Police
Jim Overbay (KCMO-TV news
director) calmly gave out crime
prevention tips, including a sug
gestion that residents should
keep on a porch light.
Treece, who had taken the
role of an irate citizen, said: “I
do not believe that a 75-watt
bulb will keep a rapist from my
house, but my .357 magnum
would.”
And the “reporters,” of
course, latched on to that angle
for their stories.
Treece admitted that in their
stories, the “reporters” did have
misquotes. And that was odd, he
added, because nothing upsets
the police more than being mis
quoted.
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“We short-change the media
people,” Treece said in his
assessment of what officers
learned, which also included
making stories fit the style of the
medium and feeling the press
ure under which the media
work.
Capt. Clark Sheckles, with the
Crimes Against Persons Division
of the Kansas City police depart
ment, said as a television repor
ter he gained an appreciation of
the cameraman’s job.
“I could identify with the re
porter, but I saw that the camer
aman was the nuts and bolts,” he
said.
Frame Special: Sale on Brass and w<
Frames 7.50-10.00
1983 Calendars are in. (Get them while they last!
Humorous, Nature, Animals
10-9 Mon.-Sat. 9-7 Mon.-Sat.
Manor East Mall Culpepper Plaza
822-2092 693-3002
Weather varies in small areas
United Press International
Climatologists have found
astonishing variations in wind
speed, temperature and humid
ity can exist in areas a few miles,
a few yards, even a few feet
apart.
In New York City, according
to Science Digest, the wind
velocity on one street corner was
25 mph, while a block away it
was only 5 mph. In an Ohio val
ley less than a mile long, scien
tists set up 109 microclimate sta
tions. The highest annual tem
perature recorded at each
varied widely: one registered a
high of 75 degrees Fahrenheit
and another of 113 degrees. In
autumn, they found that below-
freezing temperatures occurred
more than a month later at some
locations than at others.
McGill University resear
chers criss-crossed Toronto to
record the drops in temperature
between early afternoon and
late evening. At the lakefront,
the drop was 3.1 degrees; in a
low-lying section of the city, it
was 20.2.
Humidity can vary by as much
as 8 percent between a city and
its surrounding rural areas. In
general, urban air is drier in the
daytime and more humid at
night.
AGGADILLO
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