Reframed - Episode 1 - Elvin Lam and Liz Wright

(Drumbeat into theme music, under...)

Jason Clymo 0:04

Jason, welcome to Reframed - the panel show that analyses all things disability in the media. (Music) My name is Jason Clymo. I'm one of your co-hosts. I'm a queer young person with disability who has dabbled in some modelling, acting, and I'm also a business owner. I'm fiercely passionate about the accurate representation of people with disability on screen.

Stephanie Dower 0:29

And hi, I'm Stephanie Dower. I'm a filmmaker and access coordinator, and also a keen traveller, and I'm really excited to talk all things disability on screen with today's amazing guests. So let's meet who they are. On the panel today we have Elizabeth Wright, also known as Liz. Liz is a triple Paralympic medallist for Australia in swimming, and is now a reporter for ABC sport.

Jason Clymo 0:52

Also joining us today is Elvin Lam, self described as born for family deaf in Hong Kong. Alvin is now living and working in Australia as a multi faceted performer. He is a dancer, theater maker, visual artist and silver medal winning figure skater, and with his sign singing, taking him to the screen and stage, Elvin uses Auslan across multiple platforms.

Elvin Lam 1:15  

Great. Thank you. Thanks for having me.

Stephanie Dower 1:18

Now it's time for our first segment, and it is called, Get Your Head in the Frame. I'll be asking our panellists three multiple choice questions about pop culture and media. So let's see what our panellists know. All right... first question, guys: what podcast genre has the largest percentage of listeners? A, sports, B, true crime or C, news. (Laughter, indistinct)

Jason Clymo 1:48

Elvin!

Stephanie Dower
So fast!

Elvin Lam

Got it. I thought I'd have a guess - I'll say news, because a lot of people are accessing news every day. It's a daily thing.

Stephanie Dower 1:59

You know what? You're right, absolutely!

Jason Clymo 2:02

Am I? Great?

Stephanie Dower 2:03

21% of all listeners. See if, if I was answering, I actually would have said true crime, because I'm like saying... 

Liz Wright

I was gonna say true crime. 

Stephanie Dower  2:12

You know what? That makes a lot of sense, because you're right. A lot of people get news from podcasts nowadays, so yeah.

Jason Clymo 2:17

I feel like the true crime listeners have become like a cult. (Laughter)

Elvin Lam 2:22

There you go. Yeah.

Jason Clymo 2:23

And it's sort of, in a way, part of news as well.

Elvin Lam 2:27

Yeah, 'tis. Well, yeah, yeah. News is a very broad genre. So that probably makes sense that it's the most popular.

Stephanie Dower 2:34

That's true.

Liz Wright 2:35

In that sense, then, wouldn't sport fall under news as well?

Stephanie Dower 2:39

Yeah, look, that's a good point. I feel I don't know what a specifically sport podcast is, but you know... I'm just going by what's in front of me. (Laughter)

Jason Clymo 2:49

I don't know much about sport in general, so...

Liz Wright 2:53

Maybe sport's bit of a cult as well. It's a very large cult.

Stephanie Dower 2:58

All right, guys, moving on to question two, according to GLAAD, in 2020, what percentage of actors on TV had disabilities? A, 16.8% B, 8% or C, 3.1%? Oh, I think that was Jason that time.

Jason Clymo  3:18

I'm gonna say say C, because I think it was the lowest, and I just think it's going to be really low because people with disability don't get hired.

Stephanie Dower 3:27

Sadly, you are correct. Yes, 3.1% of... actors on TV had lived experience of disability, which is a real shame, considering that we make up, what, 18% of the entire population? Yeah, there's a very big shortfall there. Yeah.

Liz Wright 3:43

It is depressing. And I'd actually wonder, out of that very small percentage, what disabilities are even being represented?

Stephanie Dower 3:51

That's a good point.

Jason Clymo  3:52

And you know, whether there's much intersectionality as well, or if it's kind of the most palatable version of people with disabilities that are being portrayed. Yeah.

Elvin Lam  4:03

yeah, yeah. And even with that, like, when they are represented, there may be in a small role. 

Stephanie Dower 4:09

Yeah. Well, that's exactly, right. That's just exactly, you know, they could be, you know, quite in the background - you know, I'm not, I don't think we're talking about 3% of leading characters, unfortunately. Yeah, so, all right, well, let's move on to something a little bit more fun now. The last question - are we all ready?

Jason Clymo 4:24

It's getting competitive, Elvin. (Laughter, indistinct...)

Liz Wright

Between you.

Stephanie Dow

Are you OK in the middle there Liz? Are you OK? (Laughter)

Liz Wright 4:30

And I'm the sports reporter... what's goin' on?

Stephanie Dower 4:36

All right. All right. Last question, everyone: who was almost cast in Hannah Montana over Miley Cyrus in 2004 - A, Victorious's Ariana Grande, B, Gossip Girl's Taylor Mompson, or C, Wizards of Waverly Place's Selena Gomez?

Jason Clymo 4:55

Jason - was it Ariana Grande?

Stephanie Dower 4:59

No, it was not Ariana Grande.

Jason Clymo 5:01

I just assumed because she could sing.

Stephanie Dower 5:03

Okay, so Jason's out... Elvin, Liz?

Liz Wright 5:05

I... look, I will be really honest here, I am showing my age. I probably really don't know any of these actors so well. So... I would have no idea.

Stephanie Dower 5:17

I'm kind of surprised that Hannah Montana was 20 years ago. But anyway...

Elvin Lam 5:21

Yeah, I'm in the same boat. I don't know as well - out of those three, if I were to just guess I'd go with B.

Stephanie Dower 5:26

Yeah, you're right, yeah, yeah. (Laughter)

Elvin Lam 5:31

There you go. Having a guess works out in the end. (Indistinct, laughter)

Jason Clymo

You beat me!

Stephanie Dower 5:35

Yeah. So there you go. Yeah. I mean, next time you're on a trivia night, you're all going to be smashing that question. (laughter)

(Music sting)

Jason Clymo 5:44

Now it's time for Show and Talk. Each one of our wonderful guests has brought in a piece of media.... and Elvin has gone above and beyond and actually brought two which I'm excited about... for us to analyse and review, the disability representation in. I'm really excited to get stuck into three pieces of media this time around... and let's kick it off with the one that Liz has brought in.

(Media excerpt) 6:07

(Male 1) My name is Marcus Marikovic, and I am going to be your basketball coach for the next three months. (Male 2) Nope. (Male 1) Wait, what? (Male 2) I said Nope. (bouncing) Is this something he normally does? (Male 3) Nope. (Male 4) That's Darius. He's our best player. (Male 3) I'm Johnny. I'm your homie with an extra chromie. (Male 1) Whoa!

Stephanie Dower 6:38

All right!

Jason Clymo 6:39

Love it. Liz, why don't you kick us off and tell us what you thought about Champions?

Liz Wright 6:45

I mean, obviously, being a sports person, I live for sports, and there is a severe lack, I think, of disability representation in sports films. And Champions is one that came out in 2023, it's a Bobby Farrelly film... so for those of you that may know the Farrelly Brothers? Definitely thinking of... the unfortunately named Dumb and Dumber and Shallow Hal and all those types of movies. So I have to admit, I went into this film, I guess a little bit anxious? (Laughter) You know, a tad nervous about what it was going to be like.

But.... I have to say I was... pleasantly surprised. I can say it certainly isn't a perfect film when it comes to disability representation, but I can see that... it's definitely a film that's taken some big steps forward in the fact that they actually used disabled actors for the disabled characters, so we didn't have a Rain Man situation going on with this film.

Jason Clymo 7:50

Thank God.

Liz Wright 7:52

Absolutely, thank God. I think, though, I guess my criticisms that would come about and where maybe they haven't shown enough progress is that I've really felt that the disabled characters were again, I guess that stereotypical premise of disability as the character is there to teach the main character a lesson. So we have Woody Harrelson, who plays Marcus. He's, you know, a basketball coach who has gone through a bit of a tough time, he's being out drunk driving and has been caught, and his punishment is to go and coach this Special Olympics basketball team. 

And again, just it's about how this team teaches him a few lessons, which I think the more interesting route would have been to completely flip it on its head and go, No, make these, these players the main characters. How does Woody Harrelson's character, you know, maybe teach them some lessons? 

Stephanie Dower 8:56

Yeah. I agree. I think I only watched Champions for the first time recently, because I too had some skepticism going in as like, Oh, is this going to be the feel-good disability film of the year kind of thing? I was pleasantly surprised with a lot of it. Like, I think it was a great assortment or diversity in terms of disability represented. But, yeah, and, you know, like, the chemistry between the characters and the players was really good. I loved when... what was her name, the female character?

Liz Wright
Oh, Constantino?

Stephanie

Constantine, or something, yeah, when she comes in, like, halfway through the film almost, and just like, puts all the guys in their place, kind of thing.

Liz Wright 9:44

She was the standout.

Stephanie Dower 9:47

She was great, she was very, very good. I will say, towards the end of the film, so... I knew how it was gonna end. Like, you know, we all know what's gonna happen. We all know. We all know that. You know, he's gonna choose them, blah, blah, blah, all that kind of thing. Spoiler alert. Everyone. But I will say they did call out sort of a rival, like a broadcast, no, no, another team wanting to poach the, like, Woody Harrelson character for like, to be a good PR story for them. And he called them out on that, or like, they called that, you know. So I do think, you know, they were aware of that kind of trope... but it still played into it very strongly as well. 

So I don't know again, like it's, I love films like this, where you know A, the representation is there, and we have the opportunity to dissect it and have these discussions. Because, as you said, like nothing's perfect. It's a solid film, I reckon, for disability representation.

Jason Clymo 10:47

Let's play the first of Elvin's clips. (music sting)

Stephanie Dower 10:49

(Male) OK, Ruby Rossi, looking at your application - aside from your involvement in the school choir and a very nice letter from Bernardo Villalobos, you don't have a lot of history with music. (Female) I don't want to just is there a question? (Song) Through the call for the storm, you're with me now...(Male) You're the girl with the deaf family. Everyone but you? (Female) Yeah. (Male) And you sing - interesting. (Female) I've never done anything without my family before. (Male) There are plenty of pretty voices with nothing to say. Do you have something to say? (Female) I think so. (Male) Miles is auditioning for Berkeley College of Music. (Indistinct) How do you feel when you say... (Female) I don't know. It's hard to explain. (Male) you will be required to have a hearing individual on board at all times. (Female) I want to... I can't stay with you for the rest of my life. (Music ends)

Stephanie Dower

CODA - Elvin, do you want to share your thoughts?

Elvin Lam 12:25

Yeah, before I start, I'd like to check in. Does everyone here know what the acronym CODA stands for?

(Others) 12:30

I do. I do. Yep,

Elvin Lam 12:31

Great. So it's a Child Of Deaf Adults, yeah. And the reason for this is, there are a lot of CODAs that... those children that live with parents that are deaf, perhaps even siblings that are deaf, and they see themselves as not only being a family member, but also having that facilitation of the hearing world, acting as that interpreter as well. So that CODA is sort of like an identifying mark that background, and here it just shows a person really stepping outside that identity and going into the hearing world in that sense of a world of song and singing. And that's where her parents, who are deaf, they don't come from that world. So there's a lot of cultural overlay and clashes there. 

And we could see opportunities there, where there's signing along with the singing, so that parents can feel proud of their daughter and being able to access the information. And this is really one of the first movies I have so many deaf actors in there, and has had a lot of raving reviews from the deaf community worldwide. I think the only small criticism out of that, is that with this CODA, the main character isn't actually a CODA, she hasn't come from a deaf family, so she's just an actor that's been cast into the role - and has learnt sign language a couple of months prior to acting the role. So because she's not a true, authentic CODA, there's that bit of... differing views on that. 

But this is where it's provided a platform where there's a lot more deaf people. I believe the father has won an award as a deaf actor. Truly amazing.

Jason Clymo  14:07

Yeah, I loved that movie, but that was the I think one of my only things was they obviously had people with lived experience throughout everything except the main character. And I just thought that was such a missed opportunity. But yeah, honestly, just watching that trailer or recap again, I was just like, Whoo!

Stephanie Dower 14:30

I mean, I think I've already geeked out over Marlee Matlin I'm sure today, but I'll do it again, like they are phenomenal actors, and then you have the son as well. And it's... so great again, like it's really, I love films like this where you see disability, like the dynamics of disability within the family cohort. There's such depth to the sibling relationship to the... child, and parent relationship... you know, because disability does impact those dynamics, and you know, when the parents are relying on the child, as you say, for interpretation and facilitation of the hearing world, that really impacts the relationship. 

But... overall, there's still a family, and they still have that love and that, you know, they're an average family, but they just have these extra complexities that they bring into it. So it's really, I love seeing that play out on screen.

Jason Clymo  15:31

Yeah, and doing a good job with it.

Elvin Lam  15:33

Yeah, definitely. I like the scene where you have the girl with her parents going to a doctor's appointment, and this girl's the only one that knows both languages. So essentially, she's put in a position where the doctor said you can't have sex for one week to the parents, and the daughter's in a position where she needs to interpret that you're going Oh, you can't have sex forever. And how she signed that was a bit of a misinterpretation there. Just shows that aspect of being a CODA I love.

Stephanie Dower 15:58

Yeah, because you want to have fun with it as well. Like, that is funny. Like, that's great.

Elvin Lam  16:02

Yeah, quite, quite a naughty moment of her. (Laughter)

Liz Wright  16:07

Is that something that would normally happen, like for a CODA, that that there would be that misinterpretation?

Elvin Lam  16:14

Yeah, I've, I've heard many stories so you get situations where parents will attend to school, and there's a parent teacher interview for the student, who's a CODA, and sometimes it might be a negative comment about the CODA and the CODA may... you know, put some colouring into that message. Parents aren't aware.

Stephanie Dower 16:35

I love it.

Jason Clymo 16:35

It's kind of horrible, but it's just classic kids being kids, right? 

Elvin Lam

Yeah, that's right. 

Jason Clymo

Moving on to our third clip, and Elvin's second clip. Let's get that one rolling now. 

(Music sting)

(media clip) 16:47

(Drumming, captions to Woman 1 signing:)  People find out my dad has money, and they're like "Your dad has a job? Youyr mom is a doctor?" Yes! What, you think we're all clueless, with no money and no house? Many people actually consider my family elite. 

(Music beats, song) Who's lookin' at me? Who's sad, lookin' at me?

(Captions to Woman 2 signing:) You have the "elite" group... their families have been deaf for four or five generations... 

(Woman 3 signing:) They all went to all-deaf high schools...

(Music, song) Who's that, lookin' at me? 

(Woman 4 signing:) My first language is ASL. My first words were signs. And that puts you in a higher status here.

(Woman 5 signing:) The "elite" clique, they're so fast to judge.

(Music) Who's that looking at me? Who's that looking at me? (beats)

(Music sting)

Stephanie Dower 17:41

This is really fun. This one, Deaf U. It's... just a really good just, I guess, would you call it a reality show?

Elvin Lam 17:52

Yeah. So this is essentially a documentary of deaf people in university. So in America, there's a deaf university where all deaf students can attend, which I think is a real cool concept, so that universities.... sort of provides like a mini community where it's just purely deaf, and it's a real cool environment, and it just shows the true lives of deaf ways and deaf culture just being on show for everyone to see, and it's a really good demonstration of, of that cohort. 

And with this, I do feel that there's... I would say it's reflective of all deaf people that are sort of affected party girls, and that's just one portion. And it's like it's, you know, in the hearing general mainstream community, you got different people have different passions and different hobbies. So this just shows one part of it.

Stephanie Dower 18:47

I think the... something that you mentioned, deaf culture... like, I don't think a lot of people from the hearing world are aware of what deaf culture is. And...

Elvin Lam 19:00

Yeah, so here it just shows that we have our own ways of being. So we have our own language. Yeah, a lot of people don't realise that we have that language, and as a result, they're not savvy to the communication there and what we talk about it. And... it's like you get like, a VIP pass if you have that language. (Laughter)

Stephanie Dower 19:19

Yeah, talking about... the hierarchy, you know, like, if you come from a family that's been deaf for generations, like you're elite.

Elvin Lam 19:27

Yeah, that is present, yeah. So true. There's that deaf cohort in the community, but then within that you got those subgroups, you got those that are sort of like real... you can describe it as, like, strong deaf that come from different generations. You get, like, the cool group and the trendsetters, and you got the others that are, you know, leaders in sports. So you got all these different subgroups.

Jason Clymo 19:49

It's giving Mean Girls... (Music sting) And now it's time for Ads Askew, where we check out an ad that represents disability and find out if it's on point or a little bit askew. So let's go.

(Music sting)

(media clip) 20:02

(Female 1) So how was the big wedding? (Female 2) At the end of night, everyone's on the dance floor really getting into it, you know? And say, This is my left wheel... and this is the bride's foot... (Female 1) yeah. (Crash) (Female2 ) Boosh. (Female 1) How awful. (Female 2) Well, wasn't all bad. Left with the Best Man's number. (Female 1) You are terrible. I'm not invitin' you to my wedding. You're off the list.

(Music sting)

Jason Clymo 20:34

I love Maltesers ads.

Stephanie Dower 20:36

Yeah, they're good. That's... my favourite that I've seen. I've not seen that before.

Jason Clymo 20:40

Neither.

Stephanie Dower 20:40

I feel like that's a UK based ad.

Jason Clymo 20:42

Yeah.

Liz Wright 20:43

It is. I've... 13 years living in the UK. I've seen this ad quite a few times. (Laughter) Yeah, I feel like I'm cheating, but....

Stephanie Dower 20:50

Okay, I will say it just shows that the UK is doing disability representation far and beyond what we're doing here in Australia.

Jason Clymo 20:58

Literally, yeah. I love that ad so much. For so many reasons.

Stephanie Dower 21:03

Well, it's fun, like, and it's, it's funny. I love that, you know, the physical comedy, like, that's really, yeah, on point.

Jason Clymo 21:11

It's the incidental inclusion, yeah, the fact that they also, in the same, like, 32nd ad, alluded to a personal disability, having a romantic relationship. Like, I'm like, tick, tick...

Stephanie Dower 21:23

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jason Clymo 21:24

Slay, that's all I have to say, slay. (Laughter)

Liz Wright 21:27

I think also it's the... I mean, I don't know about everyone else, but I do find a lot of humour in my disability, in my day to day life, right? Absolutely. And I think for her, it is that, like, well, you know, it was the bride's foot. And I was just like, finding the humour in, you know, I'm using my wheelchair, and, Oops, I've accidentally run over someone's foot.

Stephanie Dower 21:51

No, no, not just someone - the bride's foot. (Laughter, indistinct)

Jason Clymo 21:58

Poor bride!

Elvin Lam

And it's so funny, like looking at that for me, my first view of that I'm like as an advertisement for Maltesers. I'm thinking, Is that sort of demonstrating that Maltesers can easily disintegrate? (Laughter) What are they trying to portray with their product?

Stephanie Dower 22:13

They're won't support the weight of....

Jason Clymo 22:14

It's looking on the light side, because Maltesers are so light.

Stephanie Dower 22:17

Light and fluffy. Yeah.

Jason Clymo  22:20

There you go.

Stephanie Dower 22:22

I do like that's what you took away from there. (Laughter, Yeah...) So good.

Jason Clymo 22:29

Love it. Well, I think we're all fans of this ad, so I would say that this one wasn't askew. I'd say this well done Maltesers in the UK, really.

Stephanie Dower 22:38

Teach Australia. (Music sting) Okay, so before we wrap up today, we're gonna just get some speedy suggestions from our panel. And this could be anything they recommend you go watch. Could be recommendations for life in general, life hacks. So we might start with Elvin down the end of the... in the hot seat. What's your speedy suggestion?

Elvin Lam 23:00

Two come to mind. One, I'd really want all movies to have open captions, so it's not just an add-on for deaf people, but just for people who have English as a second language, they can enjoy that. So having that open captions is really important. Having closed captions in a form where it's an add-on cannot be as accessible as we need. Thinking about my second idea... in regards to narratives, it's important to have that new narratives and perspectives in movies that show authenticity. 

(Others: Yes, yep).

Stephanie Dower 23:34

100%. And Liz?

Liz Wright 23:38

For me, I guess because I am quite often in front of the camera at work at the ABC, I would love to see in more media organisations, more disabled people actually behind the camera, of all places, because I actually think we need more disabled producers, more disabled storytellers, more disabled scriptwriters... because that is where we'll actually get, you know, thinking back to Champions and some of the examples we've spoken about, actually having from the beginning of the production stage of any show, that disability perspective is so important.

Jason Clymo 24:13

Yeah, like that Maltesers ad tells me that there was a person with disability behind it to make fun of that situation and to actually understand it.... obviously got someone with lived experience like, deliver it in that way, so...

Stephanie Dower 24:27

100%.

Jason Clymo  24:27

Unless it's just like a real story that she's drawing upon. (Laughter)

Stephanie Dower 24:31

Who knows? Who knows?

Jason Clymo 24:33

My speedy suggestion is just for any wheelchair users. I don't know if I can, like, show these off a little bit. Hopefully I can, but just these amazing pants from Jam the label, because they've got, like an elastic back. They're so comfy, very comfy. Jamthelabel.com... (indistinct)

Stephanie Dower 24:51

Little plug, right there. The model, Jason, the model is coming out now.

Jason Clymo 24:54

That was my speedy suggestion.

Stephanie Dower 24:56

And my speedy suggestion to wrap up is actually a Christmas movie that I've loved for many, many years... and from my perspective, I think the representation is quite good. It's called The Family Stone. It's an American film from probably 20 years ago now... but one of the characters in the family is deaf, and you see the family sort of signing as they're sort of talking, and like, you know, interacting with the character. And it just for me, like his deafness is not like pointed at, like at all, really. It's just, it just feels very natural within the family dynamic. 

And I think that kind of taps into what we were talking today about CODA. So again, I love seeing that interact with the family dynamics. And... yeah, The Family Stone, one of my go-to Christmas movies.

Jason Clymo 25:48

Love it, yeah. So check it out.

Elvin Lam 25:50

It is a good Christmas movie.

Liz Wright 25:51

Lookin' for it this Christmas on Stan.

Stephanie Dower 25:55

Well, thank you both so much for coming on today's show.

Jason Clymo 25:59

Thank you.

Stephanie Dower 25:59

We've loved chatting with you...

Elvin Lam 26:00

Thanks for having me.

Stephanie Dower 26:01

Thank you. And thank you for everyone watching at home. We hope you've enjoyed today's episode. As Jason said, jump onto our social media channels and let us know what your thoughts are on today's media pieces, and we'll see you next time on Reframed.

(music) 26:22

(music out)