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Draft:Cripping-up

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The term "cripping-up" was first adopted in mainstream media around 2010. It is the act of casting an actor without a visible disability into a role where there is visible disability[1]. It is a derivative of the word "crip" and is used to call out certain casting practices in stage, TV drama and film production. There is an academic discussion[2] around it as a theory, looking at the extent of the practice and the nuances in its interpretation, which extends to exploring the difference in acting between embodiment and impersonation, and how without the lived experience of disability, how most portrayals of disability by non-disabled actors do not get under the skin of what it is to be disabled. This issue was mapped out in the MacTaggart lecture delivered by screenwriter Jack Thorne[3][4] at the Edinburgh Television Festival in 2021.

A call against cripping-up has become part of the disability rights movement, and a vocal lobby of acting and creative professions[5][6][7] are actively engaged with the industry for more authentically and creatively when it comes to disability portrayal. This includes industry professionals such as the director of My Left Foot, Jim Sheridan[8] and others within the industry have joined this call for change.This has led to instances such as disabled actors and writers calling on the UK TV and film industry at BAFTA to be more proactive.[9]

As a result, there are more TV, Film and stage productions are casting authentically or incidentally, with organisations like Netflix and BBC Studios forming a disabled writers partnership[10], The Profile[11] was launched in 2021 which is casting resource created by the Royal National Theatre giving the industry access to professional disabled actor showcases. Channel 4 (UK) created new guidance for portrayal[12], and the Creative Diversity Network (CDN)[13] has developed the data platform Diamond[14], which is used by the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Paramount, S4C, Warner Bros. Discovery, UKTV and Sky TV to obtain consistent diversity data on programmes they commission which includes disability representation onscreen.

There are parallels with movement for better representation for Black and Minority Ethnic (BAME) communities which have led the way with colour-blind casting, that covers incidental portrayal. The emotion felt by disabled communities was summed up by Frances Ryan in The Guardian 2015.

"...disabled characters create powerful images and sentiments for audiences. They can symbolise the triumph of the human spirit over so-called “adversity”. They can represent what it is to be “different” in some way, an outsider or an underdog who ultimately becomes inspirational. These are universal feelings every audience member can identify with. And there is something a little comforting in knowing, as we watch the star jump around the red carpet, that none of it – the pain or negativity we still associate with disability – was real. Perhaps that’s part of the problem. Perhaps as a society we see disability as a painful external extra rather than a proud, integral part of a person, and so it doesn’t seem quite as insulting to have non-disabled actors don prosthetics or get up from a wheelchair when the director yells “cut”. But for many disabled people in the audience, this is watching another person fake their identity. When it comes to race, we believe it is wrong for the story of someone from a minority to be depicted by a member of the dominant group for mass entertainment. But we don’t grant disabled people the same right to self-representation."[15]

The call for change in industry practices has come from organisations such as 1in4 Coalition,[16] Equity UK,[17] TripleC,[18] UK Disability Arts Alliance[19] as well as disabled actors such as Kurt Yeager[20], Amy Trigg[21] and Liz Carr[22][23].

On Screen

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Disabled roles have been played by non-disabled actors going back to the silent era, with films like The Penalty in 1920, and City Lights 1931 an Frankenstein 1931, being early examples where non-disabled actors played disabled character on-screen.

There were few disabled actors before the 1990s available to play authentic or incidental roles, and the few examples were mostly covered by only 5 actors;

The majority of disabled roles went to non-disabled actors. With more disabled actors available, the number of instances of cripping up has dropped although there are still examples of where the practice of cripping-up still happens.

There was an announcement from the BBC in 2019 to produce a drama based on the life of Joseph Merrick, with Charlie Heaton in the main role. After receiving considerable public criticism,[32] instead of re-casting the role with a disabled actor, the project was cancelled.[33]

There are examples making headlines which are showcasing best practice:

On Stage

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Disabled characters in stage plays have a longer history stretching as far back as Tiresias in Oedipus, by Sophocles. There are many disabled historical disabled figures as well as disabled fictional characters such as Laura in The Glass Menagerie, Meshak Gardiner in Coram Boy, Colin in The Secret Garden, Captain Ahab in Moby Dick and more listed in Theatre and Disability, that whom, up until recently, have not been accessible to disabled actors. Like film and television, this has changed with mainstream theatre companies casting more disabled actors and enabling the disabled community to reclaim their stories.[37]

Tiny Tim

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It took until 2017 for the first disabled Tiny Tim to appear in a professional adaptation of A Christmas Carol. Lenny Rush was Tim at The Old Vic in London which opened-up the possibility to many young actors in productions around the world. In 2021 Mark Gatiss wrote an adaptation of the story, A Christmas Carol: A Ghost Story that ran 2022 to 2024 that tackled in ablism in the role as well as the casting, adding a clever twist that turns Tim into more than just the catalyst for Scrooge's guilt.

Richard III

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Another role that has been at the forefront of the Theatre and disability movement is Duke of Gloucester/The King in Shakespeare's play Richard III[38]. Arguably this is where change started, not just because the king himself had scoliosis, which is exaggerated in the play, but one of the key themes of the play is Ableism and the attitudes of his family and the court towards Richard, in part shaping whom he became and how he acted.[39]

Since 2004, King Richard III has been played by the following disabled actors:

Incidental Portrayal

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3% of the general public in the UK and US have a visible disability, despite the efforts of the industry there is a currently a lack of data on whether films, stage productions and TV dramas reflect this. The Creative Diversity Network has started tracking some aspects of disability inclusion in the industry but incidental portrayal of disability in casting for drama is currently not in scope.[51]

Incidental disability portrayal is different to authentic portrayal as it is about having the right to portray a role regardless of whether a character is scripted as having a disability or not. An example of this is Bridgerton series 3 on Netflix, 2024. Shondaland cast two visibly disabled actors, Sophie Woolley[52] as Lady Stowell, and Zak Ford-Williams[53] as Lord Remmington.[54][55] Neither of the characters were scripted as having a disability and yet one is a Deaf sign user and the other a bath chair user. There is no mention of their conditions in the series and Lord Remmington is viewed first and fore-mostly as an eligible bachelor and potential suitor to Penelope Featherington.

Progressive Condition Portrayal

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In 2014 despite his award-winning portrayal of Professor Stephen Hawking the film The Theory of Everything, the casting of Eddie Redmayne came under scrutiny[56] as to whether portraying someone with a progressive condition constituted "cripping-up",[57] as this raised questions and suggestions that included having two actors, or even using CGI. The practicalities where all theoretical until in contrast the BBC's 2022 drama production Better, cast the disabled actor Zak Ford-Williams in a role where at first he had to mask his cerebral palsy, and then unmask it after his character Owen survives meningitis. Ford-Williams used his experience as a physically disabled actor who has had to learn to walk again twice after medial procedures, which demonstrated the possibility of disabled actors playing progressive conditions.[58]

Disability Dramaturgy

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There is nuance, especially when a character has multiple conditions or where there is a mismatch between an actors condition and what is scripted, however the key element is that a visibly disabled actor knows what the lived experience is, and with the help of a Disability Dramaturg[59] the creative process will find the truth in the performance. A good example of that is The Real and Imagined History of The Elephant Man, which toured Australia and the UK with Daniel Monks and Zak Ford-Williams in the lead role as Joseph Merrick. Neither actors share the same condition as Joseph, however they both brought their conditions and experiences as disabled people to the role.[60][61]

Academy Awards

[edit]

Over the history of the Academy Awards, there have been 22 Oscar nominations for portraying physical and visible disabilities, and 9 winners.[62] Most of these occurred before the movement for change gathered pace, and they do serve as a useful reminder that stories about disability are interesting, and that creativity is all about making interesting choices.

References

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  3. ^ 2021-08-23T17:43:00+01:00. "MacTaggart lecture in full". Broadcast. Retrieved 2024-09-24.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
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  35. ^ Associated Press (2024-04-29). Arthur Hughes puts 'Shardlake' in the spotlight. Retrieved 2024-09-24 – via YouTube.
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