Sumida River in Sign Language brings the natural and human worlds together in a drama of physical gesture and facial expression.

Performed by deaf, unmasked actors, the play is suffused with the life of the river: pines bending in the wind, flocks of Miyako birds and mist swirling in from the bay. This poignant tale was reimagined by Benjamin Britten in his chamber opera Curlew River. It is spring, a time of growth; a ferryman waits for customers when a mother arrives in search of her lost son.