It bugs me somewhat. What bugs me a LOT is when hearing people play Deaf people using a couple of signs that they've kinda sorta learned. There are other Deaf actors besides Marlee Matlin--find some.
Oh yeah. Didn't even think about that one cause I don't think I've ever noticed it before. I mean I know a handful of words in asl from, you know, worship songs in church and stuff, but I'm well aware that that in no way compares so actually knowing the language!
Cripping-up for film, TV or Cinema is a complicated issue. Personally I do think the blacking-up comparison is valid (I had a senior BBC executive take issue with me in his blog earlier this year for comments I made to that effect about 'Dancing on Wheels', and that was solely for its voyeuristic attitude, even though it was using real disabled dancers paired with Z-list celebs), but there are also some very real problems with simply saying disabled roles should be played by someone with the appropriate disability
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"Cripping-up for film, TV or Cinema" '...or theatre', that should be.
And of course in theatre one of the major disabled roles is Richard III, and the portrayal of him as disabled is based on Disablist portrayals of him by Tudor propagandists, one of the earliest and most perniciously successful uses of the "disabled=evil" meme. Should we be campaigning for a disabled actor to play the role, or for it to be rewritten as non-disabled? (Which would actually count as a fairly minor change in comparison to some productions of Shakespeare).
I'm trying to work out if it would be possible to have a non-disabled RIII without altering the text. You can't rewrite the play to make him non-disabled, it would be like rewriting Othello and making him white, but I have heard of a production of Othello where they decided that skin colour was being used as a symbol for Otherness, and had him played by a white woman instead. Random note: apparently playing RIII can be hazardous to the health, Simon Russell Beale slipped a disc due to how he was playing him and had to take time off from performing. Anyway, there are probably ways of staging RIII that do highlight the problems of the text, including the disabled=evil propaganda. For instance, I wonder what it would be like if everyone in the cast showed some sign of disability, and RIII was just the one where they fussed about it? Gormenghast springs to mind, where no one is pretty and huge numbers of people have some sort of impairment
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I think we can't ignore the significant history behind minstrel shows that makes crip drag and blackface two somewhat similar but ultimately entirely different things. Minstrel shows existed to perpetuate racist stereotypes, even if they were later somewhat subverted by black performers. They also were partially used to keep black performers from the public eye. (I admit, I prefer crip drag because there is less of a sense of 'apples to apples' to it than there is with 'cripping up'.)
While crip drag CAN perpetuate ableist stereotypes, it doesn't always. I do think it currently can keep disabled actors from getting appropriate roles, so the comparison to theatrical crossdressing is a good one.
>> You can't rewrite the play to make him non-disabled, it would be like rewriting Othello and making him white, but I have heard of a production of Othello where they decided that skin colour was being used as a symbol for Otherness, and had him played by a white woman instead. <<
Othello's 'otherness' is something that is fundamental to the plot, I'm not sure the same can be said for Richard III's supposed disability. And liberties have been taken with the text of Shakespeare on a regular basis so that shouldn't be too much of a limitation.
>> cripping up (if that's the term we're going to use) <<
It's the term we've used on Ouch! (one of the other communities I'm active in) when we've discussed the phenomenon and 'blacking-up' is familiar enough a term to get the meaning across to many non-disabled people who haven't otherwise thought about the issue.
>> A white actor is never going to be black, and it's very obvious when they wear make-up ... )
Sure, liberties are taken with Shakespeare every time a play is performed, but I think that one would be on the same scale as the 18th century version of King Lear which had a happy ending. I don't think that writing the problem out of a text is the way to solve it. Addressing it forthrightly, acknowledging it as a problem instead of politely ignoring it or trying to cover it up, tends to be better. If you were to make RIII non-disabled, or make everyone else disabled or what have you, you can't just change a line or two and pretend you didn't do it, you have to deal with it. Shakespeare's plays are full of language which equates physical illness with moral illness, it's an ongoing problem. Troilus and Cressida in particular, and while I am crap with the history plays, I've a feeling that Henry IV's decline into some unnamed icky disease is thoroughly laid out as his just deserts for deposing and murdering the previous king. Writing something out of a text is also a form of censorship. I've seen enough people trying to write
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I've just watched the film, and it was delightful! Roland's disability was used as a way of teaching the audience at times, but fair enough, they handled it well and it really is needed. As you said, they didn't just lump the bigots in a corner as unsavable unmentionables, they included the main character (and by implication the audience) making a daft mistake, and they did it with a nice light touch rather than harping on it in the way some people will spend five infuriating minutes apologising to you for using an idiom which mentions disability
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Oh, and another cute bit: when Mary meets up with Dean again, and he introduces his boyfriend, and she bravely says, "Your life partner?" and he says, "Er, my prom date."
yeah, I thought the whole thing was really well done and I feel bad that I'm using it as an example to point out thinks that are NOT okay!
I liked that scene too, where Roland said he wanted to be with a girl because he wanted her, not because she didn't mind him. I like that it wasn't overdramatized, just, you know, acknowledged and dealt with accordingly.
Romantic comedy that acknowledges that couples have to work through stuff and manages to be nonchalant about it. Where will it all end?!
Incidentally, I also like the way Mary was still close to her ex even after his revelation, that it wasn't presented as something simple of the "dump him now and never look back" variety. I'm queer and an atheist from a Jewish background, so I was latching onto the outsiders in this film in particular. I have just been reading the Amazon reviews, and have noticed that while practically everyone loved it, Roland rarely got a mention and was usually described as "wheelchair-bound", while a few kind souls helpfully remarked that the explicitly non-Christian characters were Christians really because they showed such lovely Christian virtues. Oh, and there was the person who was thoroughly disapproving because the homosexuals were let off so lightly. Grr.
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And of course in theatre one of the major disabled roles is Richard III, and the portrayal of him as disabled is based on Disablist portrayals of him by Tudor propagandists, one of the earliest and most perniciously successful uses of the "disabled=evil" meme. Should we be campaigning for a disabled actor to play the role, or for it to be rewritten as non-disabled? (Which would actually count as a fairly minor change in comparison to some productions of Shakespeare).
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While crip drag CAN perpetuate ableist stereotypes, it doesn't always. I do think it currently can keep disabled actors from getting appropriate roles, so the comparison to theatrical crossdressing is a good one.
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Othello's 'otherness' is something that is fundamental to the plot, I'm not sure the same can be said for Richard III's supposed disability. And liberties have been taken with the text of Shakespeare on a regular basis so that shouldn't be too much of a limitation.
>> cripping up (if that's the term we're going to use) <<
It's the term we've used on Ouch! (one of the other communities I'm active in) when we've discussed the phenomenon and 'blacking-up' is familiar enough a term to get the meaning across to many non-disabled people who haven't otherwise thought about the issue.
>> A white actor is never going to be black, and it's very obvious when they wear make-up
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I liked that scene too, where Roland said he wanted to be with a girl because he wanted her, not because she didn't mind him. I like that it wasn't overdramatized, just, you know, acknowledged and dealt with accordingly.
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Incidentally, I also like the way Mary was still close to her ex even after his revelation, that it wasn't presented as something simple of the "dump him now and never look back" variety. I'm queer and an atheist from a Jewish background, so I was latching onto the outsiders in this film in particular. I have just been reading the Amazon reviews, and have noticed that while practically everyone loved it, Roland rarely got a mention and was usually described as "wheelchair-bound", while a few kind souls helpfully remarked that the explicitly non-Christian characters were Christians really because they showed such lovely Christian virtues. Oh, and there was the person who was thoroughly disapproving because the homosexuals were let off so lightly. Grr.
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