In 1987, 21-year-old Marlee Matlin won the Best Actress Oscar for her role in “Children of a Lesser God.” She is still the youngest person to ever receive the Best Actress award, and, until 2022, was the only deaf person to ever receive an Oscar, period.
At that very young age, Matlin was thrust into the spotlight and asked to represent the needs of an entire community. In the new documentary, “Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore,” filmmaker Shoshannah Stern explores the ups and downs in Matlin’s life, including her advocacy, like her campaign for closed captions; her relationship with William Hurt, whom she accused of physical and sexual abuse back in 2009; and her journey to feeling less alone.
Stern’s film is one of the better celebrity documentaries to come out in recent years, in part due to Matlin’s willingness to be raw and vulnerable. Unlike most talking head interviews, Stern is not off camera, but sitting on a couch with Matlin. Stern, who is also deaf, speaks with Matlin in American Sign Language. This means that long stretches of the film play in complete silence, giving hearing audiences a peek into the experience of someone with different capabilities.
Read more at Rough Draft
