Manuel Harlan Photograph: Manuel Harlan/Johan Persson
Who would have thought that the new Sohoplace, from the outside so glossy and commercial-looking, would quickly start to push against theatre boundaries? EastEnders star Rose Ayling-Ellis’s triumph in Strictly caused a rush of people to enrol in sign-language classes. As Celia in Josie Rourke’s production of As You Like It, in which she uses a mixture of British Sign Language and sign mime, Ayling-Ellis – and Gabriella Leon, also deaf, who makes a striking debut as Audrey – should help us consider what we think of as stage language. We may also be obliged to realise how things are skewed for some spectators. You usually have to squinny to see surtitles, as if you shouldn’t really be looking; in a small but significant change, at sohoplace they are displayed around the auditorium lower down, far more evidently.
This is not the first time that a deaf actor has taken the role on the London stage. Four years ago, at the Globe, Nadia Nadajarah delivered Celia’s speeches in British Sign Language, in a beautiful collaboration with her fellow actors, who occasionally provided spoken translations. Though engaged and engaging, Ayling-Ellis’s influence on the company is less precise and pervasive. Yet as she moves, sometimes flexed like an archer to unleash a gestural arrow, she is crucial to a production that, intimately staged in the round, is propelled by the idea that Shakespeare’s comedy is pliable, multi-vocal, often musical. Composer and pianist Michael Bruce is on stage; a Forest of Arden theme is played to produce a version of pastoral; occasionally lines are sung rather than spoken.
