Back Stage highlights barriers for actors with disabilities

Theatre trade publication Back Stage wrote an article Feb. 14 that focuses on some of the barriers actors with disabilities face in trying to get cast in theatre, TV and film productions.

The article covers several theatre groups that give opportunities to disabled actors, such as Theater Breaking Through Barriers (formerly Theater by the Blind) in NY City and the Deaf West Theatre in L.A.

L.A.-based actor Teal Sherer, who is paraplegic, explained that there are few roles for wheelchair users, and many casting directors offices and acting classes are in locations that aren't wheelchair accessible.

"I auditioned last year for a commercial. They wanted somebody in a wheelchair, but the casting office wasn't accessible, so we all had to audition downstairs in the parking lot," Sherer said in the article. "It's like that with acting classes. I am so limited by where I can study because of the accessibility."

The article also highlighted the efforts by the Performers with Disabilities Committee of the Screen Actors Guild (SAG), which has been trying for 20 years to get actors with disabilities included in the annual Casting Data Report, released by SAG and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers. Performers with Disabilities national chairman Robert David Hall, who plays Dr. Al Robbins on the CBS TV show "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation," says in the article that "the absence of performers with disabilities from the report reflects Hollywood's reluctance to even consider writing roles for and casting these performers."

SAG released a study done by the National Arts and Disability Center in 2005 that specifically focused on performers with disabilities. The study found that less than 2 percent of TV show characters display a disability and only 0.5 percent have speaking roles. Also, performers with disabilities were much more likely to face workplace discrimination compared to people without disabilities.