[Changzak Gonggam: Directors] Director No. 1 Kim Mi-ran’s This May Be a Failure Story; the Original Title is Into the Unknown(Mi-ji-e-se-gye-ro, No Elsa)

Kim Mi-ran, whose directorial credits include the highly sophisticated productions I Do Like You and Young-ji, gets “Changzak Gonggam: Directors” off the ground. Two actors who use different languages are brought together on stage. Park Ji-young’s first language is Korean Sign Language, while Lee Won-jun’s first language is Korean. They start off by sharing an awkward conversation, and go on to learn more about each other, going back and forth between the past and the present in search of common ground. Ji-young and Won-jun do what they can do together, infusing a sense of rhythm into language and communicating with texts. The pair invites us to join their journey to find the answer to the question, “What kind of theater can we create?”

SYNOPSIS

A deaf actor and member of Handspeak, Park Ji-young is given the task to create a play about herself—together with Lee Won-jun, a hearing actor and member of the NTCK during the previous season. The two actors who use different languages search for a new way of communication, so they can put on a play together.

100 Q&A questions

Balance game  

Drawing faces

Playing badminton

Bingo

Shooting reels…

And Shakespeare.

Will they be able to create a play together?

Changzak Gonggam: Directors

Launched for the purpose of developing original plays with leading directors in the field, this program presents three new productions following the Sharing the Creative Process stage. In 2021, directors Kim Mi-ran, Jin Yeob Lee, and Kang Bo-reum explored the timely theme of “Disability and Art” and developed their own creative process by engaging in free discussions and experimenting with various forms. The three new works—staged consecutively in Theater PAN—showcase diverse modes of communication between disabled and non-disabled people, including an encounter between people with hearing loss and hearing people, participation from audience members relying on the senses of touch and hearing, and a search for “misfit” with both disabled (visual, hearing, brain lesion) and non-disabled actors.

*Misfit: Something that occurs when the material arrangements of the individual and the environment are mutually inconsistent

Arranged and directed by Kim Mi-ran

Kim Mi-ran is a member of the theater club Sogu. Recently, she’s been interested in the documentary theater genre. Kim aims to create works that allow the audience to focus on people and stories rather than mise-en-scène.