For almost 40 years, actress Marlee Matlin Have shown how some may consider a disability can actually be made a strength. Won 1986 Oscar Award For best actress for her fantastic turn in “Children of a Lesser good”, Matlin became the first deaf artist who received such award and quickly rose as a representative of the deaf community at large and promoting the implantation of closed cutting and serving as a celebrity ambassador For disability with ACLU. Her film And television career has also continued to flourish and recently participated in 2022 best image -winning family drama “Coda.” To honor her work, American champions ordered on PBS one documentary On her life, but before he agreed to log in, Matlin had any regulations.
“I was contacted by American Masters at PBS to make a movie about my life and I said:” Sure, absolutely, “and I have a condition that it must be directed by a deaf person, a deaf director, a woman, “Said Matlin in an interview at SundanceS IndieWire Studio presented by Dropbox. “And so I offered Shoshannah’s name. And her was the only name and the rest is in principle. “
Like Matlin, Shoshannah Stern is a hearing impaired actress, but their connection to each other goes very deep than that. Both trained at the International Center of Deafness, The Arts & Education (Icoda), where a chance meeting brought them forever.
“I had won a competition and then I went to Icoda and it was the first time I was away from my family,” Stern told IndieWire. “I felt very lonely and I went to Icoda and there was this woman. She just glowed. She only had this aura of heat. She came to me and she took me under her wing and adopted me for the day, and it was Libby Matlin, and it was Marlee’s mother. And so I just felt that our lives had intertwined our way. “
Stern’s hope of making the documentary “Marlee Matlin: not alone” is that not only shine on what deaf artists must face, but to do something “as beautiful and as powerful” as its subject. In the same way, Matlin hopes that people are looking at more than just a story about her life and career.
“I hope people will see this movie, listen, watch and give other people in the deaf society the opportunity to do what they want to do, what they deserve to get in their lives,” she said.
Stern echoed this feeling and pointed to the work that Matlin has done not only favorable to the deaf society, but for everyone.
“When they had to install ramps on curbs, were everyone who, ‘why? Why do we have to do it? “But now we have all suitcases, we have all the strollers,” said Stern. “Everyone uses the ramps on curbs. Accessibility builds a better world, and it’s really time we stop resisting it. “
“Marlee Matlin: Not Alone longer” premiered at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. American Masters via PBS will broadcast the documentary later this year.
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