Staging Deaf and Hearing Theatre Productions

Andy Head (hearing) is Assistant Professor of Theatre at Rochester Institute of Technology, USA. He completed his MFA in Acting at Michigan State University and directs integrated deaf/hearing productions for RIT/NTID. Recent directing credits include Cabaret (2018), I and You (2019), She Kills Monsters: Virtual Realms (2021), Angels in America: Millennium Approaches (2021), Everybody (2022), and Thy Name is Woman (2023). His articles, "Equal Prominence: Directing a Deaf and Hearing Production of I and You" and "The Compositor: How Hybrid Productions Will Create a New Job Title in Theatre" both appeared in the scholarly, peer-reviewed journal Theatre/Practice. Head's research interests lie in creating productions that offer equal accessibility to deaf, hard of hearing, and hearing actors and audience members, as well as in the emerging field of digital theatre.

Jill Marie Bradbury (deaf) is Professor and Director of the School of Theatre, Dance and Performance Studies, University of Maryland, College Park, USA.. She received her PhD in English from Brown University. Dr. Bradbury is a five-time National Endowment for the Arts grant-winner, including $25,000 for a DeafBlind Theater Institute. This project resulted in the documentary video, Protactile Romeo and Juliet: Theater by/for the DeafBlind and the collaborative essay "Protactile Romeo and Juliet: Theater by/for the DeafBlind" (Shakespeare Studies 47, 2019). Other relevant publications include "Deaf Theater" (Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Literature, 2024), "Disability Embodiment and Inclusive Aesthetics" (Inclusive Shakespeares: Identity, Pedagogy, Performance, 2023) and "Audiences, American Sign Language, and Deafness in Shakespeare Performance" (Shakespeare Bulletin 40.1, 2022).