Tuned to the Needs of the Deaf : Fledgling TV Network Is Born of El Segundo Family’s Frustrations

Her two deaf children believed that as adults they would be able to hear.

Another child said he didn’t like kids who could hear because they were mean.

Then there was the deaf girl who thought she would die when she grew up. Her reasoning: She had never seen a deaf adult.

Marianne O’Reilly had heard enough.

Tired of the bad self-images and mixed messages that deaf children receive and frustrated with the lack of entertainment available to them, O’Reilly and her husband, Eric, took out a second mortgage on their El Segundo home and started a television network aimed at the hearing-impaired. Launched in November, the Total Communication Network is one of the first program providers in the nation dedicated to those with hearing loss.

“These kids are not stupid, they’re deaf,” O’Reilly said. “I was sick of seeing them treated like that, so I did something about it.”

O’Reilly is the mother of four children, two of whom are deaf. By the time Loren, now 12, was 3 weeks old, O’Reilly said, she knew he was deaf because he would sleep soundly when his father played the drums. And when Lance was born three years later, she refused to accept that it was happening again; there was no history of hearing loss on either side of the family and doctors offered no explanation for the coincidence.

It was difficult back then, and O’Reilly said she often wondered if she was being punished for something. But these days she thinks of her children as a gift and believes that it is part of her destiny to bridge the gap between the hearing and deaf communities. The Total Communication Network is the road map.

“We want total communication for everyone,” O’Reilly said, “through whatever means people need to use to communicate.”

There are more than 30 million people in the nation with significant hearing loss, according to the National Assn. of the Deaf. Although closed-caption programming was mandated by the federal Americans With Disabilities Act of 1990, O’Reilly said most deaf people still miss 75% of what’s happening. She said children cannot read the captions quickly enough and adds that when you have to focus on more than the picture, the content of the show gets lost.

After nearly two years of planning, the Total Communication Network’s shows were immediate hits. Nearly 8 million homes nationwide have tuned in to “Grandma’s House” and “Happy Hands Kids Club.” Both 30-minute shows are produced in sign language with captions and are available on various public access channels and via satellite dish.

Although the network has paid off emotionally, the O’Reillys have reaped no financial rewards. They spent $60,000 to get the network started and have yet to see a dime. The O’Reillys run the network out of a mom-and-pop insurance company that they own in El Segundo and film the shows at their home. Most of their cast and crew members are volunteers.

Before the network was launched, O’Reilly tried to sell commercial spots, but no one was interested. She gambled by kicking off the network, and has since received interest from Mattel, which plans to advertise its toys on the two shows. O’Reilly hopes that the advertising revenue will allow the network to produce additional programs.

O’Reilly said the shows have made the grade with many schools for the deaf nationwide, which are airing videotapes of the programs. In addition, praise has come from officials at the Deaf Entertainment Foundation in Los Angeles, who report that they are ecstatic about the network, which not only has utilized many deaf actors, but also has also made television more accessible to the deaf community.

“We don’t have anything else like this,” said the foundation’s executive director, Ken Elks. “The Total Communication Network is making it possible for more people to enjoy television. We hope to see more stations like this in the future.”

O’Reilly produces the two shows with partners Kelli Tuck and Sheldon Altfeld. Tuck, who has a deaf brother, has worked with deaf people for more than five years, and Altfeld in 1979 founded the Silent Network, the first in the world for the deaf. It is still in operation as the Kaleidoscope network, but is not available in Los Angeles.

The three producers have created 13 episodes of the two shows, each with both sign language and sound, since many of the deaf characters can speak. O’Reilly said they did not want to eliminate the voices because that would exclude children who can hear. Exclusion, after all, was a catalyst in the network’s birth.

“Grandma’s House,” which is similar to “Mister Rogers” but with a character who looks like Mrs. Doubtfire, and “The Happy Hands Kids Club,” similar in format to “Sesame Street,” were originally made available by satellite dish, but O’Reilly said she is talking with as many as six networks now, including PBS and the Learning Channel, and hopes to piggyback on their stations this year. Both of the Total Communication Network’s current shows are geared toward children but the producers hope to eventually add programming for adults.

“Deaf children don’t have role models,” O’Reilly said. “We wanted these shows to show them that there are successful deaf adults in this world.”