Stage-to-screen review: Grounded

I didn't so much miss Deafinitely Theatre's revival of Grounded when it played at Park Theatre as actively choose not to see it: Not out of any dislike for the company, but because it was only two years since I'd seen the UK premiere of George Brant's monologue, and I knew there was no chance I could realistically watch another version without comparing it to Lucy Ellinson's extraordinary performance. Even another five years down the line it's hard to feel entirely unbiased towards Paula Garfield's production, despite it inevitably having its own identity because it makes the one-woman show a two-hander, or perhaps two one-woman shows happening concurrently: As part of Deafinitely's aim to produce shows that can be enjoyed together by D/deaf and hearing audiences, Nadia Nadarajah performs The Pilot's lines in BSL, while Charmaine Wombwell provides the English language version.

Theatre review: Two

The title of Jim Cartwright's Two refers to the number of people in the cast, one man and one woman playing, between them, everyone who goes into a small local pub in the course of an evening. So the fact that the new production at Southwark Playhouse features four people on stage may seem paradoxical. But this is the latest show from Deafinitely Theatre, the deaf and hearing-impaired company that performs in both English and British Sign Language, and hopes to appeal to both a deaf and hearing audience. So Andrew Muir's production gives Cartwright's play a new conceit: Matthew Gurney and Paula Garfield play the landlord and landlady, Sophie Stone and Jim Fish all the customers. The former pair communicate entirely in BSL, with the latter speaking an English translation. And for the scenes with the customers, the situation is reversed.