As the show started, the lights shut down. Kim Kilpatrick, a woman with around 10 years of storytelling experience, was sitting right in front of the crowd, in the dark. Kim is not scared of the dark. In fact, born blind, she has lived in it for all her life.
When the lights turned on a few minutes later, I think that a good part of the crowd let their eyes stay closed, trying to experience Kim’s life. What followed had nothing to do with sight.
In her first one woman show, Flying in the Dark, Kilpatrick brings us for one flight with her, in her universe filled by smells, textures and sounds. She travels with the audience into her childhood, telling with humour and ingenuity her adventures in her dark but beautiful world.
Little adventures like reaching the convenience store alone or drawing and giving life to a dragon were part of the first half of this show. Told with imagination, these small quests became real journeys where Kilpatrick succeeded with courage and happiness.
Kilpatrick also explained that she was not always understood by her peers. Peoplehave underestimated her because of her blindness.A lot of people tried to make her feel more disabled then she really was in reality.
Hearing the applause when she came back from the intermission, Kilpatrick mentioned with humour that she was happy that we all had stayed for the second part. In this half of the show, Kilpatrick described how she had been able to overcome people’s prejudices toward blind people. Trying to find a model for her life, she talked to us about Beethoven and Terry Fox. Preparing this show was also for her a demanding experience, and integrating the work that she had to do to get ready into the show itself was a brilliant move.
During her performance, Kilpatrick always seemed happy, but we understand during her performance that she passed through difficult moments during which she might have wished to be sighted. “I’m glad I’m blind,” she repeated at the end of the presentation. “It permits me to read, at night, sneaky under the blanket.” I really understood her happiness when she told how she had once run on the beach, her dog at her side and the wind blowing her face and her hair. Kilpatrick really knows how to bring emotion into her listeners.
When Jan Andrews and Jennifer Cayley founded Two Women Productions in 2009, they wanted to promote the storytelling, especially for adults. Two Women Productions will present two other storytelling shows this season at Market hall. “The Brothers Grimms” will feature a master storyteller and a folk musician who will tell the life of the Brothers Grimm who released their first folktale collection 200 years ago. A Scandinavian tale named “Dragon’s Gold”, will finally close the season in April 2012. This time Jan and Jennifer will share the scene with Katherine Grier to tell us a story that inspired the famous world of Tolkien.
