Wash-CAP finalizes theater settlement
The Washington State Communication Access Project (Wash-CAP) and Seattle Fifth Avenue Theatre have amicably resolved their lawsuit, and signed off on a settlement that will bring captioned theater to that venue beginning this season.
The agreement calls for Fifth Avenue to offer at least one captioned performance of each of its seven productions during the 2009-10 season. Because Fifth Avenue has not finalized its schedule of productions, it hasn't identified dates for the captioned performances. However, the agreement calls for at least some captioned performances to be on the weekend, and some to be during the evening. Fifth Avenue will offer season subscriptions to the captioned performances. Fifth Avenue will set up a specific link on its website to order tickets for the captioned performances.
Wash-CAP and Fifth Avenue tentatively agreed to such a resolution last August, and have been working out the mechanics and the details since.
Fifth Avenue will continue to offer Assistive Listening Devices, which benefit patrons with mild hearing losses, and lighted scripts for patrons with more serious losses. Those will be offered at all performances. The combination of lighted scripts and captioned performances, along with sign-language interpreted performances, makes Fifth Avenue the most accessible live theater in Western Washington.
At Wash-CAP's request, Seattle's Paramount Theatre began offering one captioned performance of each of its Broadway-type offerings beginning last August, and has presented four captioned performances to date. The captions, containing both dialogue and notations about sound effects, are prepared in advance and presented in synch with the performance by c2net of Boston, which will also caption the Fifth Avenue shows.
