Published: October 30, 2012
Lydia Callis, left, a sign-language interpreter for Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s news briefings, has picked up a following.
The stories of devastation and destruction on the local news lately have not provided much in the way of relief — unless, that is, you happened to catch sight of a sign-language interpreter named Lydia Callis.
And she was pretty hard to miss. Ms. Callis has been a fixture at Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s news briefings, gesticulating, bobbing and nodding her way through the words of city officials as she communicates for the hearing-impaired.
Her expressiveness has caught the attention of the news media, and evidently the mayor himself, who now thanks her before almost everyone else as he prepares to give New Yorkers the latest updates on the storm.
Official news conferences in New York are often attended by sign-language interpreters. But they generally go unnoticed, blending in with the aides or elected officials that surround a mayor or a governor at such events.
Ms. Callis’s form makes it all but impossible not to notice her. With her smartly coifed short dark hair and sharp suits, she literally throws her whole body into signing, from her head to her hands to her hips.
She has inspired a tribute Tumblr page: Lydia Callis’s Face for Mayor, which has compiled images of her expressions as she signs. In one photo, Mr. Bloomberg looks on from behind, seemingly fixated on her hands.
New York magazine’s Web site called her “ a legitimate reason to smile” amid all the grim news about the storm. Someone on YouTube set her signing to music, her gestures and jabs punctuating each beat.
On Twitter, she has been called hypnotizing, mesmerizing and a rock star. “I could watch her for hours,” one admirer wrote. “She needs to do sign language interpreting for everything everywhere forever,” another wrote.
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