Six dancers slide across the stage at the Lowry in Salford. As a visually impaired person, I would expect to feel lost watching the dancing, but I know how they link their arms and roll their shoulders, how the light catches their sepia costumes. It is Lived fictionan inclusive contemporary dance work by Stopgap, with audio description as a key element of the performance.
I appreciate audio-descriptive theaterbut I wasn’t sure how that would work for dance, which, to me, seems so inherently visual.
Lily Norton, the access artist and co-writer of the show, is on stage throughout. Unlike the traditional form of audio description, I don’t have to awkwardly manipulate the volume on a headset because Norton broadcasts it to the entire audience.
Director and co-writer Lucy Bennett tells me how Stopgap wanted to operate this way after realizing the power of creative access in its online videos during the pandemic.
“We had simply ‘marked’ access in previous productions,” says Bennett. “There were disabled models on stage, there were people talking about the business being disabled, but access wasn’t mainstreamed. So how are disabled people going to go to the theater, discover our work and realize that it’s something they’re passionate about? It’s almost like we’re doing all of this, but then we’re performing in front of a group of non-disabled people.
I nod as Bennett talks about “tagged” access. Often, performances with audio description only happen for a day or two during a production, which limits when I can watch a show.
Bennett talks about the process of creating Lived Fiction’s audio description, written collaboratively by the company. “We started by describing movement and how the dancers felt themselves moving, as well as what they heard, saw and felt. Lily was in the studio, immersed in everyone’s descriptions. They would write things down and we would try things out. If the choreography was incredibly poetic, the audio description had to be made poetic.
Norton’s point of view comes through clearly. They are a character, their voices guiding the audience through each dancer’s movements – the arching arms, the sliding wheels, but also the sense of story. They sometimes share what they’re feeling, and this helps establish a connection between the audience and what’s happening on stage, a breakdown of separation. My husband, who is fully sighted, says it helps him understand the meaning of the choreography and follow the thread of what we are watching.
Access is built in in other ways, from Ben Glover’s creative captioning to the relaxed atmosphere. Each dancer’s costume makes noise with zippers or jingling keys, which helps me recognize who is performing. “Dougie Evans’ musical composition often represents exactly what the dancers are doing in terms of movement,” adds Bennett.
At the beginning of the performance, we are told that not everything matches our frequency, but they hope that everyone will find their own window into the work. There are some useful points for which Norton doesn’t give a description, but I don’t feel lost. The picture they have already painted combines with the music, and I let myself absorb the moment, without worrying about the intricacies of the movement.
I’m surprised that the description isn’t just a literal explanation of each movement – 90 minutes would be exhausting – but rather a description of the emotional resonance. When dancers Emily Lue-Fong and Nadenh Poan perform a duet, Norton describes the way their bodies curl together, skin to skin, their eyes lock, how one “glides like the water” on the other. I feel the tenderness of the dance, even if I don’t know every movement that is happening. The emotional weight is greater.
At the end of the show, I feel like I experienced something with everyone here. For the first time, I had access to dance.
