Hello and welcome to Philosophy of Directing podcast. My name is Natalie and in these podcasts I will be sharing my thoughts about theatre and practice as a director. I am creating this show to record my reflections as part of a module on the Directing course at ALRA North. I hope you enjoy.

Hello and welcome to the final Philosophy of Directing Podcast episode. This week we have been exploring accessibility in theatre. As well as talking about accessibility, I've decided to explore ways that I can make this podcast more accessible, so in the show notes, you'll be able to find a link to a video where you'll be able to see me featuring captioning as well. You will also find a link to the transcript for the podcast. Additionally, I will be describing myself and my settings for the listeners who are not watching the video or are visually impaired.

So first of all my name is Natalie I have medium-length kind of slightly wavy but normally straight brown hair that's parted in the middle. I've got quite big eyes. I've got quite pale skin.  I'm wearing a light blue cardigan that's buttoned up with a black top underneath. Behind me is a white wall with two prints on the back, two pictures that are in black frames. One is a map of Prague and the other one is a nice colourful print that represents Copenhagen.

So the first thing that I wanted to talk about was embedding tools for accessibility in a theatre show rather than satelliting the experience. So I really enjoyed looking at graeae’s work because the captioning is very much integrated within the work for example. Instead of just captioning at the bottom that is maybe removed from the stage somehow, the captioning is within the space that the performers are in. It's responsive to the volume they're speaking, the feelings they’re having, so font and size and things like this are used. Which I think is an incredibly creative and interesting idea. And I think that by embedding accessibility tools, it gives you more space to be creative and it not only serves an excellent purpose of accessibility but it can also add to the atmosphere, the feelings, and the story of the show.

I think as well something to consider when talking about accessibility is that it can benefit everyone, even those who don't identify as disabled. Everyone processes information in different ways, and so I think that having things like captioning or audio description in your show but integrated in the show and kind of having that as a director as something to think about and something to use to your creativity is is really interesting. And I think will help a lot of people process the show and the information in ways that best suits them. So I think it can only benefit us to… to try and be more accessible and to  think about it in our work.

I think that the industry currently isn’t accessible enough but I think that is purely from well… I think it's maybe two things. One I think that people just forget that it's a thing. They think that if they’re disabled it's not something that comes to mind. The other thing I think is possibly there's worries about funding and prioritisation when budgeting. But I think if you make the tools for accessibility integrated into the work, integrated into the creativity automatically it becomes a priority and it becomes just as important as the set design, it becomes just as important as the lighting. And I think that is something that we should be considering when budgeting for our shows whether you decide to integrate accessibility tools or not.

I wanted to also talk about Ramps On The Moon and talk about venues in particular. I think Ramps On The Moon is a really great consortium, and I'm glad that it exists and that there's an agent for changes within institutions. I just want to… I would just be curious to know which venues have had an agent for change and what changes have been made already. Because for example, I know that Nottingham playhouse works with ramps on the moon, but having worked there as an usher, I think there’s a lot of changes that need to be made in terms of accessibility. So I would be interested to know what they have discussed with ramps on the moon and what the community of Nottingham still feels needs to be changed because ultimately the venue is there to serve its community. So in these conversations, people who identify as disabled need to be the ones that we’re listening to. So for example, it would be all very well and good me saying oh um Nottingham playhouse needs more ramps around the building, but actually it might be that the community of Nottingham has a more pressing issue that I’ve not even thought about because it's not an issue that I personally have faced, but that doesn’t mean it's not an important issue. So I think it, just like with any conversation, having a conversation with the people that are actually the ones being affected is the most important thing and the most important way to lead.

I also really enjoyed learning about the silent approach when completing this work. Because I think that's another important consideration to have is how can we make the rehearsal room more accessible. I think as directors in general a really big and important part of our job is being responsive to the space and the people in the space. And so I think that if you come in with really set ideas of how to run your rehearsal room and you run every rehearsal the same for different casts, different creative teams, and different groups of people, you'll get a different outcome because everyone will respond to your methods in different ways. So it might be that one show you do that particular cast really responds well to you, and that’s great, but you might find yourself getting confused that another cast doesn't seem to respond to you as well. And so I think that actually being a director… in my opinion to be a successful director you need to have empathy and you need to want to get to know the people that you're working with. You need to be doing your research. You need to be talking to them and finding out what their needs are and then accommodating to that as best as possible.

Obviously as well you need to accommodate to your own needs. You need to be able to create the best work that you can create as well. But I think that it's a balancing act and I think that you know you don't want to give too much of yourself away but you also need to be aware what's going on in order to get the best out of your group. And so yeah I would be really interested to observe the silent approach and take part in the silent approach. Because watching the videos was great but I don't think it gave me a rounded view of how the silent approach works. For listeners who don't know what the silent approach is, it's a rehearsal technique that when nonverbal communication is used exclusively. And I think that's really exciting because I think I am quite a physical person. I think that generally when I communicate anyway I use hand gestures and I'm quite expressive in my face. And I think that so much of communication comes from movement and the body anyway. So it's something that I would like to experiment with and explore myself.

And then the final thing that I wanted to talk about was that I think that having awareness training is really important and I think that it's something that our industry is lagging behind on. I think that not enough people have disability awareness training and understanding what accessibility involves and that it is more than just captioning. I think a lot of people don’t necessarily know what, including myself in this, I don't think everyone necessarily knows what is defined as a disability. So I think that is something that our industry needs to address in order to You know not only benefit its audiences but also benefit its workers and the industry as a whole.

That was the last episode of Philosophy of Directing podcast. Thank you so much for joining me across all of these podcasts and I hope you enjoyed it. Take care!