Feature: HARD-OF-HEARING APPLAUD CAPTIONING at Elmwood Playhouse

Darren Carfano is a part-time actor in the Lower Hudson Valley who greatly enjoys performing on stage at theaters like Rockland County’s Elmwood Community Playhouse in Nyack, where he is an active member. 

There is something about his performances, though, that in the past has caused Darren a singular regret: He is a child of deaf adults (also known as CODA, an acronym that serves as the title of a 2021 movie that won the Best Picture Oscar). 

“My parents might have enjoyed the physicality of the shows and maybe get some idea of what the plot was about,” says Darren, “but they were definitely disadvantaged from experiencing the show the way it should be.”

Darren’s desire to have his hard-of-hearing parents “fully experience the shows I was acting in” set him on a mission to correct that disadvantage. 

“When I first joined Elmwood in 2023, having been cast in Pride and Prejudice, one of my first questions was if we could have a show accompanied by captioned dialog or by American Sign Language (ASL),” he says. “Their enthusiasm for this request was quickly shown, as they came back to me and said we could try out captioning for the first time.”

That green light led to another Elmwood member, Claudia Stefany, to locate a company called C2, which specializes in assistive technology that enables live captioning. The words heard by the audience simultaneously can be seen by the audience, thanks to an electronic panel perched on a wall above the stage that displays every word spoken, similar to an opera performance. 

A keyboard operator, known as a captioner, seated in the audience, manually enters exactly what is said, when it is said. The script for each show is downloaded in advance, and the captioner makes adjustments on the fly as the play progresses, precisely reflecting the live action on stage. If an actor’s spoken words don’t exactly match what is scripted, the captioner can adjust for that discrepancy, ensuring what is displayed matches what is spoken. 

Carfano serves as Elmwood’s main liaison with C2 to constantly monitor and maintain the quality of the caption service. As someone who has experienced the feature at Elmwood, for a 2024 performance of The Play That Goes Wrong, this observer can vouch for the seamless and effective use of captioning, whether an audience member is hard-of-hearing or otherwise. It truly is “assistive” in that it functions as a welcome aid without materially altering the traditional theater experience. 

“We have come to find that many others enjoy the captioning program,” says Darren. “Sometimes you miss a word, or you're accustomed to having captioning on your TV to aid comprehension.” 

Every production in Elmwood’s 2024-2025 season will have a captioned performance on the final Thursday of each show’s run. When someone views the ticketing page on Elmwood’s website (elmwoodplayhouse.com) to select a showtime, the captioned performance is clearly identified.

Darren notes, “We have an ASL interpreter present before the show to help any deaf or hard-of-hearing patrons.”

Elmwood cites New York State Department of Health statistics indicating that approximately 3% of Rockland County residents report partial or total hearing loss. That’s in line with the general population number of 3.5% who are hard-of -hearing (2022 Census). 

The captioned performance program at Elmwood Playhouse is made possible with funds from Arts Alive, a re-grant program of ArtsWestchester, with support from the Office of the Governor, the New York State Legislature, and the New York State Council on the Arts. 

Pictured is cast of Elmwood's 2023 production of Pride and Prejudice pointing to caption board above stage

To post a comment, you must register and login.