Barrier(s) is a powerful and intimate love story that ultimately dissects itself and becomes a joyfully iconoclastic critique of deaf representation on stage. I designed a claustrophobic set for it, with two screens enclosing the action like the titular barriers, enabling rapid location changes through projected hand-drawn backgrounds that shift between different times of day or night, or provide different angles on the same rooms. Interludes were accompanied by animations – again all hand-drawn. There were also hand-drawn animations for the interludes and montage sequences.
Deafinitely is deaf-led, and this show was mainly in BSL, but their work is always accessible to hearing audiences, so captions were also integrated into the projections, sometimes very simply and sometimes as text messages.
Barrier(s) opened at Birmingham Rep, and then toured to Home in Manchester and Camden People’s Theatre, London. There’s more about it here on the Deafinitely website.
I thought it might be nice to share some of my drawings for the projections, along with Becky Bailey’s production photos, but first, here are the credits:
Writer: Eloise Pennycott
Director: Paula Garfield
Associate Director: Lynn Stewart-Taylor
Dramaturg: Rio Matchett
Set, Costume & Video Designer: Paul Burgess
Lighting Designer: Tom Mulliner
Sound Designer: Marie Zschommler
Assistant Costume Designer: Sophie Barnard
AV Programmer: Jasper Mattel
Cast: Em Prendergast and Zoë McWhinney
Photographer: Becky Bailey
First off, here’s the artwork for three locations: Alana’s living room (day and night), a street and a bar. They were created with enough width to show the room from different angles. Windows were transparent so I could put different skies behind them. The figures in the bar were also on a separate layout so they could be faded out, enhancing the intimacy and intensity of the two characters’ date.
And now, some of Becky’s excellent photos. I hope this play gets a lot more life. It’s got some great observational writing, but it’s also kind of meta and pretty punk too. But I’m being careful to avoid spoilers.
Paul Burgess 