Deaf West Theatre brings Teater Manu, Norway's professional sign language theater company, to the U.S. for the first time. Directed by Magne Brevik, the U.S. premiere of Sjalusi ("Jealousy") by Esther Vilar gets a limited 2-week engagement April 24 - May 4 at [Inside] the Ford.
A black comedy, Sjalusi stars Anne Line Kirste, Ipek D. Mehlum and Teater Manu founder/artistic director Mira Zuckermann as three women living on different floors of the same luxurious high-rise. Although they have never met, the trio is inter-connected by their secrets, a man and a feisty email conversation. It's a story as truthful as life, love and jealousy itself, filled with forbidden emotions, desire and passion.
Teater Manu first staged Sjalusi in 2009 for Clin d'Oeil, Europe's largest cultural festival for deaf people held in Reims, France, and for Culture Days for Deaf People in Oslo. In order to make the production accessible to an American audience, Deaf West sent a team of ASL Masters to Norway to translate the play into an International Sign Language/American Sign Language hybrid. The actors will be voiced in English. "Most people don't realize that not all sign languages are alike," says Deaf West artistic director David J. Kurs. "Because of our facility with body language and non-manual expression, an area that deaf actors truly excel at, we're able to learn other sign languages quickly. I'm grateful for opportunities for cross-cultural learning and exchange that allow us to expand our understanding of deaf people and their place in other cultures. Ipek Mehlum previously appeared in our co-production [with the Fountain Theatre] of Cyrano in 2012. Our actors learned so much from her instinctual and heartfelt style of performance, and I hope she took something home to Norway after three months on our stage."Videos