PARK

CLYBOURNE

Photo the 2018 Purdue University production of Clybourne Park mid-scene, with a young Black couple seated nervously on a sofa watching two white couples and a white priest in conversation in a lavishly decorated 1950s home living room.
Photo of Betsy and Karl Lindner of the 2018 Purdue University production of Clybourne Park. Karl is a tall white man in a tan suit, and Betsy is a blonde white woman, pregnant, with a gold box hearing aid pinned to her blue blouse.
Photo the 2018 Purdue University production of Clybourne Park mid-scene, with characters engaged in conversation in a lavishly decorated 1950s home living room. In front of the stage are two ASL interpreters signing to the audience.
Photo of Bev and Russ Stoller of the 2018 Purdue University production of Clybourne Park. Russ is a white man in a loose shirt and slacks sitting in an armchair looking at Bev, a white woman with red hair in a teal patterned house dress and apron, wh

Clybourne Park was written by Bruce Norris as a companion to Lorraine Hansberry's 1959 play A Raisin in the Sun, a monumental piece about a Black family’s experiences of housing discrimination and racism.

While its contemporary counterpart is wry and contemplative, Norris’ controversial writing of a Deaf character compelled director Amy Lynn Budd to invite Hayden to work with her on the April 2018 production at Purdue University. Below is the article he included in the production’s playbill.

Reader:

I was tasked with the reinvention of Betsy Lindner, the deaf expectant mother in Clybourne Park. While Bruce Norris’ script is smart and surprising, the character of Betsy is disturbing: her lines are written phonetically to parody a deaf voice, and she is almost completely absent from conversation, being little more than a dumb and vacant deaf stereotype. Everyone involved in this production knew this needed to be corrected.

To start, I asked the team to brush up on Deaf history.

Between 1880 and 1960, American Sign Language was banned in deaf education due to the popularization of oralism, a philosophy of deaf intervention sponsored by Alexander Graham Bell that required speech and verbal instruction for deaf students. The oralist movement sought the erasure of sign language, a modality considered inferior to spoken language. Eugenicists believed dissolving sign language communities would result in fewer pairings of deaf couples and fewer deaf children.

My interpretation of Betsy was shaped by these historical contexts. In this production, American Sign Language is minimal, Betsy uses an old Zenith hearing aid, and she relies on lipreading, as would have been required of her in an oralist education. Minding these adjustments, I still felt that she deserved to be present and prominently Deaf: you will see Betsy command the room to give her sightlines for lipreading during conversation, advocate for herself and insist on accommodation from others, and share some meaningful moments with other characters in sign language.

Another note of importance: a non-disabled actor playing a disabled character is almost always cause for concern, but here, Betsy is portrayed by a hearing actor who worked tirelessly to deliver a sincere performance, including working with me to replace the offensive style of Betsy’s lines for a more genuine deaf voice, which has been adopted with great sensitivity and respect.

I am thrilled with this interpretation of Betsy Lindner, and hope that as we see gains in progressive representation of women, people of color, and LGBTQ people in theatre and the arts, we begin to prioritize Deaf and disability representation, histories, and communities, too. This production of Clybourne Park is every bit as startling and clever as Bruce Norris intended, but we have challenged the script to ensure the Deaf representation is accomplished with dimension and integrity.

H. M.

Photography courtesy of the Patti & Rusty Rueff School of Design, Art, and Performance at Purdue University.