The Office producer Ash Atalla has spoken about jokes he and Ricky Gervais made about his disability and said he has considered in recent years whether “I was right to do that”.
Egyptian-born Atalla, 53, who uses a wheelchair, told Gervais to make it clear he was not on stage because he had “won a competition”, when they picked up an award at the British Comedy Awards in 2001.
In another award acceptance speech, comedian Gervais, 64, who was co-writer and star of the UK version of The Office, compared Atalla with theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking, saying: “You’re just the same… but without all the clever stuff.”
Asked how he felt about the jokes, Atalla told BBC Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs: “I felt good about it at the time. The joke that people remember, the first one, was a line that I gave to him, because I said to him, ‘Make sure they know I haven’t won a competition to be here’.
“Because I was suddenly concerned at the optics of… people in wheelchairs weren’t on stages back then.
“And he did that joke at the British Comedy Awards. There was this huge roar, and that kind of started the double act of that material on stage.
“I tried to make the point a couple of times that it’s about nuance, and because I think I play fast and loose with the rules around my wheelchair, I’m really happy to use it when I want to, like, I haven’t queued at an airport in years, and then other times I get annoyed that other people might even bring it up.
“I’m a producer, and people don’t normally notice the producer, but there I was on stage, and I got a profile, a lot because of the stuff that Ricky and I used to do on stage.
“I think when I look back on it, maybe I realise, or I feel I sold a bit of myself in that moment, I put the wheelchair front and centre because I knew it was something that would set me apart in that instance. Set me apart in a good way.
“And, just in recent years, as I’ve thought about it, it’s made me consider whether I was right to do that.”
Atalla contracted polio as a child and the disease left him unable to walk.
The producer considered whether it is right to have able-bodied actors playing disabled people and said it is “a complex issue”.
“I think it’s a very simple rule now to have… just make it a 100% rule, and nobody will get hurt,” he said.
“Disabled people should only play disabled people on television. It’s a complex issue.
“You can make an argument to justify why an able-bodied actor should do a disabled role, like you can construct that argument.
“It’s just that, for me, it’s an argument that falls apart really quickly.
“And so I could make the case to you, I won’t, but I could make the case for you, but it’s just not one that I believe in.”
Atalla was series producer on The IT Crowd and an executive producer on Cuckoo, Stath Lets Flats and Big Boys.
Desert Island Discs broadcasts at 10am Sunday on BBC Radio 4 and is also available on BBC Sounds.
