![]() “It’s such a beautiful language, and when you see someone do it really well, it’s very intimidating because you wish you had the time to learn. “I was just learning the dialogue for scenes,” the three-time Tony winner says. Meanwhile, Lane, who didn’t know ASL, had about six weeks to become competent for his wrenching scenes with Caverly. “He wrote me a list of potential Scrabble words for this sexy game - each one made me laugh harder, and he would write them in one email, one word at a time.” “Steve Martin tends to write me one-sentence emails on a daily basis with ideas - it’s the greatest thing about this job,” Hoffman says. Martin and Ryan’s silent rapport allowed for some saucy flirtation when their characters play Scrabble, the words they put down on the board - including “wet” and “hard” - sparking sexual attraction between them. So I let the actors know, ‘You can make sound - there’s just no dialogue.’” I think sometimes the silence was literally - people felt like they couldn’t make any sound. “I had to give them the freedom to speak on some takes,” Dabis says. But that still meant losing one of the series’ principal pleasures, which is its rich banter. Meanwhile, Hoffman and episode writers Stephen Markley and Ben Philippe worked to ensure that Oliver and Mabel, who do some clandestine sleuthing, and Charles and potential love interest Jan (Amy Ryan), who are on their first date, were placed in believable dialogue-free scenarios. We shot wide-angle close-ups on him, so that we really were with him emotionally and we would feel his distress.” I decided I wanted Theo’s point of view to feel a lot more subjective and intimate. “James said to me, ‘How is the Deaf community going to know that we’re in Theo’s point of view versus the hearing world?’” recalls Dabis. I know that’s a radical thought - right now, everyone’s multitasking on phones - but that is the leap I’m hoping you’re willing to take.’” “There was a very gentle conversation creatively with the executives: ‘But we’re still going to hear that dialogue, right?’ I said, ‘No, the audience will need to be paying attention and looking at the television screen. “They read the script and there was dialogue, but it was all ASL with subtitles,” Hoffman says. ![]() Hoffman was insistent that the episode avoid gimmicks, but his first real test came when he presented the script to his partners at Hulu and 20th Century. ![]() In all of Theo’s scenes, there’s almost no audible sound - just a slightly muffled ambient noise - while in the other scenes, the hearing characters don’t speak. “The Boy From 6B” reveals Theo’s heartbreaking backstory and the dark secret he and his father have kept hidden for years, but on a technical level, it required some unconventional storytelling. But as Cherien Dabis, who directed the episode, recalls, “They pitched me doing a silent episode of television, and I thought, ‘If I wasn’t in before, I’m definitely in now.’” However, to focus the series’ seventh episode, “The Boy From 6B,” on Teddy’s son Theo (James Caverly) would be challenging considering the character is deaf. ![]()
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