Theater By The Blind, which has worked for 29 years to develop blind and vision-impaired talent for the theater, television and film, is
changing its name to Theater Breaking Through Barriers, remaining TBTB. The company continues its commitment to vision-impaired artists but has been including artists with all disabilities in their productions, and is preparing to announce its 2008 season: Romeo and Juliet and an American comedy, both performed at the Kirk Theatre on Theatre Row.
"We must include all artists with disabilities in our work," says Ike Schambelan, Co-Artistic Director, "As baby boomers age, more and more Americans will be dealing with disability. 52,000,000 of us, 18%, already do. Yet only 2% of characters on television exhibit a disability and only 0.5% are allowed to speak. TBTB needs to get the reality of our rich, independent lives in front of audiences."
Last year TBTB started intensive work to achieve this goal. Their first show,
A Midsummer Night's Dream, featured an actress in a wheelchair, which The New York Times said added "a most delightful extra layer of meaning in the production." The second production,
The Rules of Charity, was written by disabled playwright
John Belluso. The play's action centered on a man using a wheelchair; the company of six integrated a vision-impaired actress and an actor with Cerebral Palsy as well as a stage manager working from a wheelchair. The Times called it a "dark, scalding play [in] a sharp New York premiere."
TBTB's goal to become the home base theater for all people with disabilities – actors and audiences – has received generous support from Theatre Communications Group, the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, the
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Robert Sterling Clark Foundation, the New York Community Trust and the Emma A. Sheafer Charitable Trust.
For more information on Theater Breaking Through Barriers log onto
www.tbtb.org.
