A group of stars and executives have signed an open letter calling out Hollywood for contributing to the “systematic exclusion” of disabled people.
Bryan Cranston, Danny DeVito and Mark Ruffalo are among the actors to urge Hollywood executives to cast more disabled actors and “embrace disability as a key facet of diversity”, in order to help “normalise” it and “erase the stigma that surrounds it”.
Edward Norton, Ruth Madeley and RJ Mitte are also among those to have signed the letter.
“Hollywood recognises that it can’t ignore diversity, but still ignores that disability is part of that diversity,” reads the letter, which can be seen here in full.
It also points out that many disabled characters are played by able-bodied actors.
“In the history of the Academy Awards, among the 61 Oscar nominees and 27 winners playing characters with a disability, only two were authentically portrayed by an actor with disability,” it says.
It is not uncommon for able-bodied stars to play disabled characters. In recent years, Bryan Cranston in The Upside, Sam Claflin in Me Before You, and Eddie Redmayne in The Theory of Everything have all been accused of “cripping up”.
