Tribes

Tribes is about an intellectual family, mother is a writer and father is a professor.  They have 3 grown children who live with them.  Billy was born deaf, but can read lips.  He feels a bit left out when the rest of his family debates issues and he struggles to understand what is being said. His brother Daniel, has a mental difficulty because he hears voices.  He tries to drown them out by turning on the radio to have some background noise instead of the voices. Interesting, as I write this, I see one brother who can’t hear real voices and another who hears imaginary voices.  Their sister Beth is an opera singer who is struggling to get jobs. 

Billy, meets a girl on campus who had a cochlear transplant who can now hear and teaches Billy sign language.  Apparently in the deaf community there is a hierarchy of those who are truly deaf and sign at the highest and if one can hear or doesn’t know sign language, the lower you are in the hierarchy.

I found it interesting that sign language is a language in its own that can translate feelings through the motion of the hands, face and body.

Billy then becomes a “militant” deaf person.  He insists that his family learn sign language or he will no longer talk to them.  His brother Daniel is slowly spiraling out of control as the voices take over his life.  The only salvation was that Billy was always there for him and at the end, he pityingly stutters as he pleads for Billy to come back because of the need he has for him. 

I didn’t really care for the play for a couple of reasons.  First, it was hard to understand.  Not just because of the deaf actor saying words that were a bit difficult to hear. It was because the rest of the family talked with British accents.  What was the purpose for that?  Hello, why not have the play take place in Wisconsin instead of England?  The other problem I had with the play was that the kids who for whatever reason move back in with their parents.  They are grown and yes, okay, maybe life circumstances compelled them to move back.  The part I had a problem with is the extreme disrespect they had for their parents as they call them names such as “prick” or yell at them.  I would have thrown them out on the street with that kind of behavior.  I rant. 

So maybe there is a lesson to be learned here, but the annoyances were more compelling.