An outstanding comprehensive documentary portrait which has premiered at Sundance, Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore, directed by Shoshannah Stern, offers a magnificent volume of details about the personal and family life, milestones and activism of the first deaf actor to win an Academy Award (in 1987) and who became the center of national attention at the age of 21.
Part of PBS’s American Masters documentary series, the film is masterfully crafted. ASL is its primary language and the film has united Deaf and hearing team members covering the spectrum of roles in production and post-production. The scenes of Matlin and Sheen sitting comfortably on a sofa, both wearing comfy colorful socks like two longtime friends reminiscing about the actor’s career of four decades, nicely set up the documentary narrative. While it is packed with a large array of clips, recollections and interviews, the narrative quilt is stitched together beautifully, with lucidity and a rhythm that makes it easy for the viewer to absorb this exceptional chronicle. Its seamlessness befits the American Masters brand.
Matlin, who will turn 60 this year, represents one of the best case studies about the meaningful impact of celebrity activism in contemporary Hollywood, as an artist and as a community advocate. As the Not Alone Anymore portion of the title indicates, she was the most prominent Deaf actor for more than a generation. Finally, when Coda, a film that premiered at Sundance in 2021 and which Matlin successfully urged casting for deaf actors, it would go on to win all three of its Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Supporting Actor (Troy Kotsur, who appears in the documentary).
The treasure trove of home videos and behind-the-scenes footage from film and television including Children of a Lesser God, in which she won her Academy Award, and The West Wing television series where she appeared for seven seasons. Jack Jason, her producing partner and interpreter since the earliest days of Matlin’s career, appears frequently. Matlin also discusses her relationship with the late actor Wiliam Hurt, her drug rehab therapy, how she has viewed her advocacy and activism and the challenges of getting roles and making Hollywood more sensitized to accessibility. And, the actor explains why she will teach ASL to communicate with her first grandchild.
The documentary offers numerous examples but a couple are worth noting for their instructive value in Matlin’s story. In the years immediately following her Academy Award win in 1987, it was not easy to be cast for roles. Looking back at film critic Rex Reed’s criticism of Matlin’s Academy Award win, it has not aged well by any measure. However, she would be nominated for a Golden Globe for her work as a lead in the television series Reasonable Doubts (1991–1993), followed by an Emmy Award nomination for a guest appearance in Picket Fences (1992).
However, Matlin was pleasantly surprised when Jerry Seinfeld invited her to be a guest star in an episode titled The Lip Reader for his NBC sitcom which was the top-rated series during much of the 1990s. As Matlin recalls, the humor was perfectly pitched for her role as Jerry’s girlfriend, whom George Costanza wondered if she would use her ability to read lips to eavesdrop on a conversation involving George’s former girlfriend. Matlin did not see the fact that she was deaf as becoming the butt of the comedic premise in this episode. She appreciated the irony of Seinfeld episodes where Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer thought they were making fun of others but, in fact, they consistently ended up being the targets of the joke. Compared to the cringy clips of some TV interviews with Matlin on entertainment news programs during the same period, the Seinfeld episode stands out for edgy humor that has held up well. Matlin still looks positively back on that particular Seinfeld episode. Capping it off is how pleased she was to hear Seinfeld tell her at a party that the episode was one of his top ten favorites.
Matlin as celebrity activist is another illuminating angle. One of the most prominent early examples was when she joined students at Gallaudet University who were disappointed that the school had appointed a hearing person as the new president. They successfully pressed the point, leading to the president resigning and the school governing board appointing the first Deaf president for Gallaudet. But, one of the most impactful acts came years later, when Netflix’s decision to air The Wizard Of Oz, on its 70th anniversary, without captioning became a flashpoint for Matlin’s activism. Matlin, who had portrayed Dorothy on stage, was angered that she had been robbed of the opportunity to share the experience of viewing the 1939 classic with her daughter.
Matlin’s campaign on Twitter (now X) worked, as she encouraged others to share their grievances about the matter. By focusing on The Wizard of Oz, Matlin and others who joined the campaign effectively demonstrated how little effort would be needed to generate streaming captions just for one film. It wisely deflected Netflix’s contention that it did not have the bandwidth to generate captions for its entire library, which is why they could not caption this film. While The Wizard of Oz did not receive captioning when it aired. Netflix responded with a piecemeal approach to begin captioning some of its library. Eventually, Netflix was sued and the issue became the watershed moment for captioning to be available and accessible for all forms of broadcast and cinematic programing
Supported in part by Impact Partners Film, the documentary will be eventually aired on American Masters. For festival tickets and more information, see the Sundance website.