Hurrah for Dame Judi Dench (Get off the sofa and learn your Shakespeare, Dench tells young actors, 28 April). The first requirement of an actor or broadcaster is TO BE HEARD. I am considering giving up attending provincial theatre, as I rarely manage to hear more than half of the dialogue – even when sitting in the front stalls. In the film Their Finest, Bill Nighy and Jeremy Irons were the only actors who were completely audible. Admittedly I wear hearing aids, but I am one of over 11 million people in the UK with some form of hearing loss, so this is not an unusual disability. At least with TV I have subtitles, but problems arise with radio, as many broadcasters are extremely difficult to hear – Sandi Toksvig, Melvyn Bragg, all the presenters of Classic FM except John Suchet and Charlotte Green – to name but a few. Interestingly, all the weather forecasters on BBC channels are completely audible – perhaps they could share their training system with the rest of the media?
Mary McKeown
Bedford
• Judi Dench is right that there is huge variation in actors’ speaking abilities but rather than trying to quash the variations, I’d recommend anyone challenged by the choices of creatives and technicians to turn to subtitles or captions. These are now ubiquitous on main terrestrial TV stations, and will soon be statutory on catch-up. If you pay for non-subtitled subscription services, lobby for them or withdraw. I wish Daniel Kramer and the ENO well in trying to make its subtitles better. They will do well to look at the work of Stagetext, whose captioning work now ensures that most grown-up theatres offer at least one captioned show. And it certainly changes lives. It might change yours: those who don’t suffer from hearing loss now have a 50-50 chance of doing so by the time they get to middle age. So why not prepare? Book a captioned show and make sure that every word counts.
Richard Lee
Leigh-on-Sea, Essex
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