Marlee Matlin said it was “necessary” that the person who led his documentary, “Marlee Matlin: not alone anymore”, was also deaf. So when producers of the American Masters suggested his long -standing friend Shoshannah Stern, who created Sundance Now’s “This Close” – the first TV series created, written by deaf artists – Matlin knew she was in good hands.
“Having her on board I knew I could trust her 100%,” Matlin told Thewrap via an ASL interpreter at Thewrap’s Sundance Studio presented by the World of Hyatt. “She followed her instincts all these years by us who knew each other, I knew she was perfect.”
The 59-year-old actress, who was the first deaf artist who won an Oscar in 1987 for his role in “Children to a minor God,” said, “It was absolutely necessary that I had a director who was deaf, and I knew someone Deaf as I myself had the same lively experiences with ‘deafness’, to make a movie authentic, to bring it to life on the screen, to know how to frame the story. “
Stern told Thewrap that “Marlee’s story was so clear” to her because she identified so strongly with Matlin. “I saw myself on the screen for the first time when she won her award,” said Stern, who also played the lead role in “Children of a lesser good” at Döv West Theater in Los Angeles.
Matlin had previously written a biography 2009 called “I screams later”, but explained, “I knew there was much more to my story than what was written in the book, and I also knew it must be told visually.”
She credits Stern to choose what details in her life focus on. “You learn more about me in the documentary than people knew, and it was Shoshannah who put everything together,” she said. “I had no part in what Shoshannah chose to edit, no part in doing so. She did everything. I am one of these people out there who are now watching just like you, to learn about myself. And I lived it! “
Stern added, “as someone who has had to map and navigate in a map or a country that has not been mapped before, you must have good intuition, instinct. You must have a good true north, a good compass. Marlee is ahead of her time in so many different ways. And I think the documentary really shows it, and the fact that Marlee believed in me, that I could do it, that I had strength and trust. “
Matlin explained that she never intended to be deaf or represent the deaf society, as a “burden”.
“I’ve always wanted to say: ‘Get on board. Share with me. the. Let’s collaborate. Let us all work together, ”she explained. “I hope this movie will tell people that it’s ok, that we get to work together.”
Look at Matlin and Stern’s full interview with Thewrap in the video above.
