‘Children’ a virtual ballet of sign language

How does "Children of a Lesser God," Mark Medoff's 1980 Tony-winning play, fit as Barksdale Theatre's offering for the Acts of Faith Festival? Its title comes from a Tennyson poem: "Why is all around us here/As if some lesser God had made the world/But had not force to shape it as he would,/Till the High God behold it from beyond/And enter it, and make it beautiful?"

This captures the conflict of the drama. Sarah is a 26-year-old woman, deaf since birth, who is presented as a student to James, a young speech therapist. Mr. Franklin, the head of the school for the deaf where she has spent 21 years--and where she now works as a maid -- wants her to learn to speak. But Sarah doesn't want speech; she communicates effectively and passionately in American Sign Language and isn't interested in joining the mainstream James envisions for her.

But Sarah, as played by lovely Erica Siegel, challenges Landon Nagel's James with her stubborn independence, her unhappy biography and her intensity, and he falls for her. Through a prickly but quick romance, he wins her and marries her; she seems to settle exuberantly into married life. But her school friend Orin draws her back into advocating for deaf rights, while James keeps urging her to try speech -- it's the way, he believes, for her to bridge the gap to the hearing world, a function he fulfills for her through translation.

Director Bruce Miller directs with sensitivity and a pleasing sense of motion, using Katie Fry's spare set and Lynne M. Hartman's beautiful, scene-making lighting to good effect. Beautiful, too, is the virtual ballet of ASL that Siegel and Nagel perform, with translation and coaching by Bill Duncan, Helen Duncan and Catherine Dudley, with Caroline Lee Aquiline serving as sign master.

But most of the secondary characters are stiff and mannered, and while Siegel is transcendent as the passionate Sarah, Nagel does not match her ardor. To be sure, he has a Herculean acting task, speaking and signing all his dialogue and translating hers as well. He has the energy, the charm, the enthusiasm, but the sexual chemistry is lacking. "I need to be ingested by you," he tells Sarah, but the power is not there.

Still, there are poignant moments, as when James, a lover of Bach and Handel, tries to explain music to Sarah. Richard Gregory, as Orin, contributes much-needed realism and humanity to the political aspect of the drama.

And there is still much relevance in Sarah's message: Why does she bear the responsibility to cross the bridge to the hearing world? Isn't she complete and whole as she is?

Susan Haubenstock is a freelance writer and editor based in Henrico County. Contact her at .