C4's disability advisor Alison Walsh talks about her role at the channel and about her involvement in creating Cast Offs.
My role at Channel 4 is to encourage inclusion of disabled people across all areas of programming and to help develop disabled talent both on screen and behind the camera.
I manage various talent initiatives, including disabled places on our Diversity Production Training Scheme , and each year I commission a disabled talent series - in 2007 New Shoots, which gave 12 relatively inexperienced disabled documentary directors the chance to gain a broadcast credit, in 2008 The Shooting Party, which followed nine disabled filmmakers from first idea to finished short film and red carpet screening.
2009 was a bit of a breakthrough year for drama and disability on Channel 4. Hollyoaks cast disabled actor Kelly-Marie Stewart as Hayley, and Shameless cast a deaf actor, Louis Kissaun, as Danny, a role that won Best Mainstream TV Show Featuring BSL at the recent Remark Awards.
I wanted to go a step further and make a series that really showcased disabled acting talent.
I also wanted to take a little swipe at the BBC 2 series Beyond Boundaries , which in my view might have started off with laudable intentions and had some unexpected pleasures, like the extreme bitchiness between the participants, but ended up being a rather breathless (and pointless) account of all the injuries and medical emergencies that a trip involving wheelchairs, crutches, jungles, mountains and deserts inevitably throws up.
Joel Wilson and Jamie Campbell at Eleven Film immediately got the Beyond Boundaries spoof concept and they came up with Cast Offs.
They brought in Jack Thorne, former Skins and Shameless writer who has a disability and wrote a fine drama for Coming Up, called The Spastic King, also Alex Bulmer, a talented blind writer who'd written for radio but not for TV, and Tony Roche (The Thick of It). So we had our writers, two of them disabled; now for the cast.
I wanted a mix of experienced actors and new talent, but mostly the casting was driven by Jack and the sort of stories he wanted to tell.
The format of the show, where we flip between the island scenes and the characters' back-stories, and we focus on one character per episode, allowed Jack to build a beautiful cast of complex characters whose lives and personalities do not revolve around their disabilities. I wanted engaging drama starring disabled actors - not a disability drama designed to educate the ignorant non-disableds.
If the show was to deliver genuine exposure for disabled actors we had to come up with something that gets noticed in our crowded schedules. It would have to feel totally different, unlike anything you've ever seen on telly.
I think it succeeds partly because it's stylish and smart but largely because the scripts are funny, warm, sometimes quite dark, sometimes quite rude but above all real, so we believe in the characters. The directors Amanda Boyle and Miranda Bowen drew great performances from our actors and made it look stunning.
Well, it certainly got noticed! I'm delighted with the critical reaction and the comments from viewers of the first two episodes; I'd love to know what you think. And if it brings more work for disabled actors (and writers) in TV dramas across the industry, I'll be one happy disabled disability advisor.
