Sue Sheehy was a waitress in a small restaurant when Robert Wilson created Deafman Glance at the University of Iowa in 1970. She had lived in Iowa all her life and had never seriously considered leaving it until she met Wilson. “Robert Wilson and John D'Arcangelo came into the restaurant where I was working,” she recalls, “and Bob said, ‘I want that girl to be in my play.’” Up to that time, she had never given much thought to becoming an actress. “Sure, they've got theatre groups in Iowa,” she says, “but you have to know somebody in order to do it, or have a background… It never really turned me on. I was always told I could never do it, there was no sense in trying.”

Being a part of Deafman Glance, therefore, was a new and fascinating experience. The play itself was unlike any she had seen before.