A couple of months ago, I decided I wanted to take my husband to a performance of Clue at a local theater. I wasn’t sure if it would be the type of show where hearing would be a challenge, such as a musical. I decided to do some due diligence to look into accessibility options.

The theater showing Clue (Fox Cities PAC) sometimes uses GalaPro app for captioning and also offers open captioning for specific perfomances. When I looked into options for Clue, the accessibility website informed me that there would be no GalaPro option for Clue, but the matinee would have open captioning.

I wanted to make sure I could enjoy the performance, so I decided to attend the matinee. I had not utilized open captioning at this theatre before, and I did not know where the caption bar would be located. The accessibility website said to call to purchase seats to view captioning, so that is what I did. When I called, they only offered me seats in one area, the orchestra. Now, I typically do not want to pay the high prices of an orchestra seat, but I wanted captions, so I decided I would spring for it. They assured me multiple times that the seats were very good. I felt frustrated, though, that I had to pay a higher price for accessibility.

When I arrived to see the show and walked to my seats, I was dismayed to realize the seats they gave me were absolutely horrible for using the captions. While the seats were close to both the stage and the caption bar, the seats were so close that I had to turn my head left to see the stage and right to see the caption bar. There was no way I could read the captions at the same time as watching the show. That literally defeats the entire purpose of captioning.

I went to the ticket office and asked them if they could move me to a different seat where I could actually use the captions. They said that they could not, but informed me that I could use the GalaPro app on my phone for captioning (despite all their marketing claiming otherwise). So I quickly got the app loaded.

Meanwhile, I also attempted to hook into the theatre’s hearing loop so the sound would be sent directly to my hearing aid. The hearing loop did not work at all. Though I am inclined to think if it had worked, I would have ended up turning it off as the show had many loud sound effects like thunder that would have overwhelmed my hearing aid.

After this frustrating experience, I decided to reach out to the theatre describing my experience. I really didn’t want the next person with hearing loss to have such a horrible experience at the theatre. I was very impressed when the Director of Productions and the House Manager called me within a day to make sure they understood the accessibility issues and correct them for the future. After our extended conversation, I am very hopeful that next time will be a better experience.

I did really like the GalaPro App captioning experience where I could read the captions on my phone. I think I am likely to do that in the future if possible so I can purchase tickets anywhere and guarantee I can see the captions. This theater places the caption bar house right. I am deaf in my left ear, so I typically like to sit on the left side so my hearing ear will have the best chance of catching the sound.

It was definitely super frustrating that I did all my research and still had to fight to have the assistance I needed to enjoy the show. But I was reminded by my experience how incredibly important it is that we speak up and let people know where situations are inaccessible in order to benefit the entire hearing loss community. Here’s hoping the next experience is a better one!