Halifax Explosion play created for blind, deaf people explores disaster's cause

The Halifax Explosion was the largest mass-blinding event in Canadian history, and a new play aims to tell part of the story in a way that's accessible to blind people and to the deaf community.

Ben Stone is the director of At This Hour, a docudrama investigation into the causes of the Dec. 6, 1917, disaster. It debuts Friday at the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic and runs until Dec. 12.

More than one in 50 people in Halifax were blinded or suffered serious eye injuries due to the shattered glass and flying debris from the explosion, which followed the collision of two ships in Halifax harbour, one filled with war-bound ammunition. 

The play is based on Janet Maybee's Aftershock and transcripts of the legal inquiry held in the explosion's aftermath to investigate the causes of the collision.

Stone said it started when Zuppa Theatre hired an inclusivity/accessibility expert with a background in theatre. They pointed out that as the Halifax Explosion played a critical role in creating the Canadian National Institute for the Blind, Zuppa had a chance to really engage people who are blind or partially sighted today. 

"We did a series of work-in-progress demonstrations with clients of the CNIB," Stone said. 

They incorporated that feedback over a two-year period to create something like a live radio play that would work well for audiences with and without sight. But then they realized they'd made it rather inaccessible for deaf people. 

"We hired an ASL dramaturge to translate the English script into ASL," Stone said. "And for the past four weeks, we've been working with a cast of deaf actors to create a simultaneous blind and partially sighted version of the show that's sound-based and a deaf version of the show that is ASL-based."

Those actors are part of the amateur theatre troupe Signs of the Maritimes, and the actors who are deaf and the actors who are blind will deliver a merged, simultaneous version of the play. 

Stone, who has full vision and hearing, said he directed with his eyes closed at points to maximize his understanding of that version. He said grappling with the ASL version proved to be a bigger challenge for him, and literally "opened my eyes to a whole new world."

"I never really appreciated how ASL is its own language," he said. "If you decide to do a show in two languages, simultaneously, time needs to be given to both."

Zuppa first hired Phillipa Colman as a writer and consultant, as she holds a university degree in creative writing and is partially sighted. 

Colman said she became so involved in the play she ended up becoming an actor. "It's a little bit overwhelming, but it is fun," she said. 

She works with actor Alan Williams, who is with Signs of the Maritimes, to deliver the same performance for the full audience. 

"It shows people that you can have an accessible show and still be interesting," she said. "Everyone's kind of having the same experience."

Zuppa Theatre offers touch tours before the show for anyone who wants to walk around and feel where everything is before the performance begins. They're using surtitles, which are words projected above the stage, to emulate the sound design or transcribe the play for people who don't know ASL. 

MORE TOP STORIES