Cinemability: Tonight on TCM

Tonight on TCM, “Cinemability: The Art of Inclusion” tells the story of disability representation in films, followed by some classic, if not consistent with current standards, examples, including “Freaks” (“You’re one of us now!”), “Hunchback of Notre Dame,” and “Johnny Belinda,” with Oscar-winner Jane Wyman as a young deaf woman.

For many years, it seemed that the most reliable way to get an Oscar was to play someone with disabilities. In addition to Wyman, actors who have won Oscars for portraying disabled or ill characters include Dustin Hoffman (“Rain Man”), Daniel Day-Lewis (“My Left Foot”), Colin Firth (“The King’s Speech”), Geoffrey Rush (“Shine”), Al Pacino (“Scent of a Woman”), Jamie Foxx (“Ray”), Tom Hanks (“Forrest Gump”), Tom Hanks again (“Philadelphia”), Matthew McConaughey (“Dallas Buyers Club”), Marlee Matlin (“Children of a Lesser God”), Jack Nicholson (“As Good as it Gets”), and Eddie Redmayne (“The Theory of Everything”). Of those, only Matlin had the real-life disability she was portraying. Increasingly, Hollywood is being urged to cast disabled actors to play disabled characters, which will open up opportunities to talented performers and provide more meaningful authenticity to the representation we see on screen.