THAT Festival, which stands for Theatre, Humanities, & the Arts, Together, will take place at HH Stonewall Community Farm on October 7-8, from 10 AM - 6 PM. We will provide live music, performances, vendors, food trucks, coffee trailer, ice cream, and include activities such as face painting, hayrides, and pumpkin painting. Headlining the festival will be our workshop of Grimm’s Fairy Tales, an immersive production developed by 10 Deaf theatre artists this past June.

For our headlining performance, 10 Deaf theatre artists from various disciplines including acting, ASL translation, dance, and playwriting came together to innovate a way to make an immersive Grimm experience. From June 17th to 25th, the group gathered in Hartford. We rehearsed at Sea Tea Improv Studios and lodged at the Capitol Hotel, both on historic Asylum Street, named after the former location of what is now American School for the Deaf. Together, the artists combined six Brothers Grimm stories into an immersive escape room experience for all, The Four Realms. Come see it!

We hosted our first virtual workshop, “So You Want To Be An Influencer?” on February 24th with 50 people in attendance. We invited Rikki Poynter, Leila Hanaumi, and Arlene Ngalle to provide an informative, entertaining event that reached audiences of all ages and experiences. This workshop was structured to educate and illuminate about the experiences of Deaf individuals on social media and how to build your platform to attract followers and income as well as taking care of yourself in the process.

Later that year, CDT worked with Michelle Banks of Visionaries of the Creative Arts, a theatre organization in Washington DC and Monique Holt of Gallaudet University Theatre and Dance Program, two notable Directors of Artistic Sign Language and theatre artists in the theatre industry, to host “An Open Conversation with DASLs” on January 28. The virtual event was successful with attendees and hosts breaking into groups to discuss trends and themes within the industry and taking steps to compile guidelines and manuals for current and future directors to use.

Our theatrical production, A Not-So-Quiet Place took place on October 28, a Halloween-themed cabaret-style show with guests from all over the New England region. Hosted at American School for the Deaf, we had performers in ASL poetry, ASL storytelling, musical performance, comedy, and dance. We had a great turnout with a full house!

This past summer, we launched our Professional Development Series, featuring 14 videos from Deaf and Hard of Hearing theatre professionals, sharing unique knowledge useful for emerging and established artists.