Actress Marlee Matlin keynotes 2022 Convention & Education Expo

On Board Online • November 7, 2022

By Eric D. Randall
Editor-In-Chief

Mixing personal history with inspirational exhortation, actress Marlee Matlin told school board members at NYSSBA's 2022 Annual Convention & Education Expo that their duty to foster the success of all children includes those categorized as having special needs.

Matlin, 57, is the youngest winner of the Academy Award for best actress (for the 1986 film Children of a Lesser God) and one of several deaf actors in the highly acclaimed 2021 film CODA (an acronym for Children of Deaf Adults).

With the aid of her longtime interpreter and film producing partner, Jack Jason, Matlin was the keynote speaker at a three-day event that attracted about 1,900 attendees. She used American Sign Language, along with an impish smile, energetic gestures and theatrical expressions, to recount her journey from suburbia in Illinois to Hollywood. She said her experiences have prompted her to become an author and advocate fighting the "isims" that plague modern life: "racism, sexism and, more importantly, ableism."

She recounted being cast as a judge who happened to be deaf. When she noted that, for realism, it would be necessary to have an interpreter in the courtroom, the offer instantly evaporated. The producer said, "That won't work."

"If it happened to me, an actress with an Oscar, who else has it happen to?" she asked. The producer "demonstrated a lack of awareness that we were in the 20th Century."

She drew laughter when she looked at Jason and said aloud, "I'm still pissed off about it."

She said that film critic Rex Reed panned her as DOA - "deaf on arrival" - in a review of Children of a Lesser God, which was her first film. "Today it's 35 years [later] ... and I am still here."

She credited her parents for rejecting "experts" who wanted her to attend a special school after her profound deafness was discovered at 18 months. She said she enjoyed a normal childhood thanks to her parents' confidence that she could thrive at home and mainstreaming, in which her local public schools accommodated her needs related to her deafness.

School board members are in a position to help students who face obstacles of all kinds, she said.

"As a product of public schools, and the mother of four, all of whom graduated from public schools, I am eternally grateful for public schools and what you do for the nation's public school students," she said.

Especially after the pandemic, she said it's important to "never let barriers stand in our way . so we can all be our best."

She said her philosophy can be summed up in three words: "Courage. Dreams. Success." In a nutshell, have the courage to pursue your dreams, and you and those around you will enjoy the fruits of success.

Growing up in Morton Grove, a suburb of Chicago, she was about nine when she made her stage debut in a production of The Wizard of Oz staged by the Children's Theatre of the Deaf. Actor Henry Winkler met her in Chicago when she was 12, and that was the beginning of a lifelong friendship. Matlin recalled how Winkler and his wife, Stacey, had her over for dinner when she was a young actress. She became "the guest who never left." She moved into the poolhouse, and her taller dates would help Winkler change light bulbs in the ceiling.

As her career progressed, "I was determined not to allow Hollywood to define me." When she was invited to present the best actor award a year after winning her best actress award, "I decided I would sign and speak the name of the award winners, and I must have said the name correctly because the right person, Michael Douglas, came up to get the award."

She said that only 5% of roles of deaf characters are played by deaf actors. "It should not be about us without us," she said.

To sum up her beliefs, she quoted a letter she wrote in 1985 to Ann Landers, the advice columnist:

Deafness cuts you off from people only if you let it. If this were not true, we would not have successful deaf doctors, lawyers, educators, scientists, business people and actors. There is even a deaf Miss America. We drive cars and have families. We sign, speak and read lips. Some of us can even hear a little. It may be true that life is challenging when you are unable to hear, but believe me when I say the real "handicap" of deafness does not lie in the ear, it lies in the mind . We all have challenges in life of one kind or another, and I'm sure you will agree that we can achieve much more if we focus on our abilities rather than indulge ourselves in our perceived "disabilities."

Thanks to today's technology, "the playing field has been virtually leveled" for countless people with disabilities, she said.

"That's where you all come in," she said. Worldwide, 90% of children with disabilities do not attend school, but the United States can be an example of how much those with disabilities can achieve, she said.