BBC officials were so impressed with a new thriller called The Silence, they decided to give it during a primetime broadcast slot. It will run in four parts sometime later this year. Filmed on location in Dublin, the drama was lead by Dearbhla Walsh, an Emmy award winning Irish director. Deaf actress Genevieve Barr plays the lead role of a young woman who has recently been fitted with a cochlear implant. A graduate of Edinburgh University, she was teaching in an inner London secondary school, giving up her career to take on the role. Barr had to learn sign for some scenes with deaf actors who do. Adding to the complications, the interpreter on set came from Britain and used BSL rather than Irish sign. In the film, the girl witnesses the murder of a policewoman. The Silence attempts to show what cochlear implant users hear and Walsh made that experience central to the story.
Monday, May 10, 2010
The Silence
BBC officials were so impressed with a new thriller called The Silence, they decided to give it during a primetime broadcast slot. It will run in four parts sometime later this year. Filmed on location in Dublin, the drama was lead by Dearbhla Walsh, an Emmy award winning Irish director. Deaf actress Genevieve Barr plays the lead role of a young woman who has recently been fitted with a cochlear implant. A graduate of Edinburgh University, she was teaching in an inner London secondary school, giving up her career to take on the role. Barr had to learn sign for some scenes with deaf actors who do. Adding to the complications, the interpreter on set came from Britain and used BSL rather than Irish sign. In the film, the girl witnesses the murder of a policewoman. The Silence attempts to show what cochlear implant users hear and Walsh made that experience central to the story.
