In 'Elephant Shoes,' a Groundbreaking Musical Theater Experience Takes the Stage
A trailblazing theatrical event premieres this week in Red Bank: an original musical that integrates spoken word, sung music, projected text, and American Sign Language all neatly within the world of the show. In Elephant Shoes (mouth those words and one looks like they are saying “I love you”), Two River Theater partners with Los Angeles’s Deaf West Theatre on a modern-day romantic comedy adaptation of Cyrano de Bergerac, where assisted communication holds new meaning.
American Sign Language (ASL) interpretation has happily become a regular occurrence at many theaters. More often than not, though, these accessibility-focused programs are for designated performances only–sign language interpreters translate the text near the action onstage. Open captioning and assistive devices offer alternative ways for deaf or hard-of-hearing audience members to experience shows. But theater–especially musicals–designed with these audiences in mind is another experience entirely.
Deaf West Theatre is a Leader in Accessibility
Deaf West Theatre, a pioneer in this space, has received critical acclaim for shows like their Tony-nominated 2015 Broadway production of the musical Spring Awakening, which fused a beloved book and score with text projections and ASL. This additional sign language and text was not retrofitted to provide access for the deaf and hard of hearing, but incorporated into the storytelling—creating a new, more tangible interpretation of the 1891 story about profound communication breakdown between generations and young people’s lack of voice.
However, Spring Awakening and other Deaf West Theatre musicals were productions of existing works. Creating an original musical was an important venture for the theater company. DJ Kurs, Artistic Director of Deaf West, signs through an interpreter, “We’ve put deaf people in the process, so script revisions, workshops always included deaf actors in the whole process–in reframing the story to figure out what works, what doesn’t work, and also acknowledging that the world that we live in currently is not only deaf people. Sometimes there is a bubble of deaf people where hearing people don’t see that every day, but we’re still in the community. So it’s very reflective of the real mix of existence of bilingual, bicultural experiences all in one, and that’s kind of what we wanted to show with Elephant Shoes.”
Of course, no community is a monolith. “I wanted to explore every form of communication,” says book writer Ivan Menchell. Menchell, along with music and lyrics writer Caroline Kay, are both hearing, so they relied heavily on input from Kurs, members of the cast and creative team, and outside members of the deaf and hard of hearing community. Cyrano is famously a story of assisted communication, so its adaptation offered ample opportunities for characters to interact in different ways.
In this version’s love triangle, Cy (Cyrano) is deaf and often communicates in ASL through his childhood best friend, Chris (Christian). Chris is a CODA (child of deaf adults) who has spent much of their life interpreting Cy’s signing into speech. Now an adult, Cy works in tech and has an interpreter at the office, a theatrical convention that both allows hearing audiences to understand Cy’s ASL and fits tidily within the story’s framework. It is at this office that he meets Roxy (Roxane).
“Chris is a CODA, so he sings and signs depending on who's in the room with him,” explains Menchell of one of the many ways communication is presented in the show. “We even have a song where one person is dictating text and the other one is texting back.”
American Sign Language is a language all its own, not a visual representation of English, so ensuring that all forms of the script were accurate and in sync was a significant task. “We have the most incredible ASL choreography team led by Colin Analco and Bridget Berrigan,” says lyricist Kay. “They are geniuses at what they do because not only are they trying to translate the English into ASL, but they’re also thinking about: ‘Is this sign going to be age-appropriate for this character?’ ‘Does it make sense for their personality?’ ‘Does it make sense in the setting?’ ‘Is it going to be legible to deaf folks who are further back in the audience?’ And then they're also incorporating sign language rhymes… using similar hand shapes.”
With multiple languages being used throughout the rehearsal process and performances, Elephant Shoes has also provided an opportunity for Two River Theater’s team to create what Artistic Director Justin Waldman calls “radical access.” “Inclusivity, diversity, equity, and access is who we are–a very, very deep, deep-rooted part,” says Waldman. “We started biweekly ASL classes for the staff–both full-time and part-time staff–in January. So, everybody who wanted to in the building has been participating and learning basic ASL… It’s an example of radical access. Of saying, ‘It's not your job as a deaf performer to always figure this out… because we have the ability to meet you halfway.’”
While access is at the center of many conversations, the creation of Elephant Shoes is about making great art. Kurs explains, “Deaf West was founded by a group of actors who didn’t want to make deaf theater, they wanted to make good theater. Period.” Waldman says his experience in the audience of Deaf West’s 2024 production of American Idiot was overwhelming. “It’s like watching something in 4D. You're hearing, you're seeing, it's dance, it's movement, it's communication, and everything is embodied by all the senses and fully through the body.”
This will be the biggest production in Two River Theater’s history. Waldman says the organization has “ambitions to tell a beautiful story for this audience and hopefully another one a couple of miles north.” Elephant Shoes is already generating buzz across the river through a February 2026 New York Times article naming it one of sixteen “Shows to See in the U.S. This Spring.” Whatever the musical’s future may hold, its creative team is excited to get it off the ground. “We’re all here to make something beautiful. We're all here to work our butts off, and to create something that has never been done before,” says Waldman. “And I think that, in 2026, to be able to say ‘never been done before’ is really exciting.”
