I'm not (nor have a desire to be) an actor or anything; just saying there doesn't need to be preferential treatment for someone that has that disability to fill that role. (Imagine how hard it'd be to fill the role for Helen Keller the Musical.)

I'm legally blind but still have sight (just not the greatest) so it's not just the audial experience for me. The only musicals I've got any interest in are Avenue Q, Book of Mormon, and Camelot (the only one of the three I've seen). I guess Blues Brothers borders on a musical, and I'm a big fan of that, too. My two favorite shows I've seen live are Blue Man Group in Chicago and Cirque du Soleil in Las Vegas, though some of the visual stuff was probably lost a bit on me vs others.

To give you an idea about theater, I'm a teacher who decided to transition to special education and got a job as a teacher's aide to visually impaired and blind students. It's more of a resource program for the kids and they usually stay within 2 rooms with some having mainstream. However, we did have one of our blind students be in a musical. Granted she couldn't dance, but the kid has a great singing voice, so she made it to the background singers and they placed her with another background member as her guide. Well one of our fellow blind students wanted to go enjoy the play. I ended up sitting with this student and a more experienced aide. We sat towards the back under some speakers and the aide asked if I was gunna give audio description. I said sure but had never done it before. I just gave a quick description during scenes on who was on set and what they were doing. As it was my first time doing that stuff, I did forget a bit but the student said I did a fine job either way.

Also, maybe contact some of those working blind actors directly. I've never heard of the play you're doing, but you did mention that it has some unfortunate stereotypes about blindness. I have no idea how bad they really are, but it's perhaps possible that a blind actor was offered the part, and turned it down. Is that a thing that actors do? I wouldn't know. :-)

I'll start with your last two questions first, because they're quicker to answer.

I still have central vision in my left eye, so I don't need to use audio description at the moment.

The only time I can recall seeing blindness portrayed in film or theatre is an episode of CSI perhaps 15 years ago. I’m not big on film and haven’t been to the theatre in 15 years. I wouldn't mind going to theatre shows, I just don’t have anyone to go with. So I'm afraid on both those questions I'm not much help.

As for employment for people with disability, people with disability have a lower employment rate than the general population. I'm in Australia, so I'll be using rough figures from here, but the labour force participation rate (so the percentage of adults in or looking for work) is a little under 70%. When we look at people with disability, it’s about: 60% for vision impairment; 50-55% for hearing impairment; 40-45% for physical disability; and intellectual disability is the lowest.

We should also consider that a little more than 14% of Australians associated with having a disability. Yet, when you look at various employers, they are overwhelmingly underrepresented in the workforce. For example, the Department of Social Services (Federal Government department that deals with welfare etc) workforce comprises about 10% people with disability. My current department, the Department for Communities and Social Inclusion (South Australian state government department, deals with disability services, social housing, etc) only has 4.5% of its workforce associating with having disability. This pattern repeats in the private and non-government sectors.

So why does this under-representation exist? I would argue there are three factors: inaccessible career pathways; inaccessible careers; community perception.

Inaccessible career pathways is probably the most complex issue. We're talking about failures to: identify suitable career pathways; connect people with disability with those pathways; support people with disability through those pathways (e.g. providing accessible materials etc).

For example, in the 80s or 90s the university I later attended considered the issue of wheelchair users attending the uni. They found there weren't many wheelchair users attending the uni, so it didn't warrant the funds to put in an additional lift (elevator). Thing is, the campus is on a hillside and there are lots of stairs. So t wheelchair users weren't attending the university not because they weren't getting in, but because they couldn't physically access the campus.

Another example, relating to putting children/younger people with disability in contact with suitable career pathways: I am on the board of a not-for-profit blindness organisation. Our manager attends the graduation ceremonies for the blindness (primary) school here. He was reporting to us how all the kids were talking about what they wanted to be when they grew up. Pretty much all of them were saying careers that just weren't going to happen e.g. firefighter, policeman, etc.

Those are just a couple of examples. Connecting people with disability to suitable career pathways needs to start young, and be frank. Then, when possible pathways are lined up, those pathways need to be accessible to people with disability. This accessibility isn't just the responsibility of the organisation responsible for the education/training like my ramps and lifts in my uni example. There needs to be accessible and adequate public transport, there needs to be funding support (most uni students work part time in retail or hospitality, those industries aren't necessarily suitable for people with disability), etc.

The second point, accessible careers, is a bit more straight forward. Again though, it is wider than just the employer. Transportation is a pretty big deal. For example, here in Adelaide go North-South or East-West, not problem. But public transport converges on the CBD, so heading South-East, or West-North, etc is very difficult.

Then, in the workplace, you need employers that provide an accessible way to apply for a position, and proactively make adjustments to the workplace and work tasks so they are suitable for the candidate. For example, many jobs advertise they require a driver's licence when in fact they don't, so people unable to drive are excluded.

The third point ties into this latter part of the second, because community perceptions could see a candidate struck out because the employer doesn't think they can do the job as adequately as others because of their disability. For example, I've a friend with cerebral palsy. He was employed for a time with the disability employment service provider (i.e. organisation that helps you find work) doing data entry and admin type tasks. When he started everyone was very iffy because they thought he wouldn't manage the tasks. This perception led to them always commenting "wow, I'm really surprised you managed that so well" and the like. The guy has an honours degree and was putting numbers in cells in a spreadsheet and paper in files then into filing cabinets.

An employer might consider their work tasks, consider "ok, this is how I'd do them", and so when a person with disability shows up for an interview they're thinking "ok, to the do the tasks you need to do X, but this person would be impaired because of Y, so I don't see how it will work out". When, in reality, the person with disability will adapt alternate strategies to complete the task or utilise different tools and technology.

Overcoming this issue is the most difficult, because it is not just a case of throwing money at a problem and putting in tangible solutions. The best way to address the issue is having organisations employ people with disability. The story is the same with any organisation that employs someone through the Disability Employment Service program here in Australia (the program that funds the disability employment service providers to find work for people with disability): those organisations that employ people with disability do not look back. People with disability work harder, are more reliable, and are far more enthusiastic at work.

My favourite success story goes as follows: a factory is looking for a new work health safety officer. All the previous hires haven't stuck around and haven't been very good at getting people to follow proper work health safety procedures (e.g. wearing ear and eye protection etc). So they go to the local disability service provider and they come up with this guy with a moderate intellectual disability. They're hesitant, but they put him on and he turns out to be the best work health safety officer they've ever had. Why? Because he's always super cheerful and friendly and no one can say no to him. So a bloke isn't wearing his ears? He comes up, tells him to put on his ears, and the way he conveys it is so jovial and amusing the guy can't say no.

So where does this leave us for the acting industry? I have no doubts the interest and ability is out there for potential actors with disability. Next, they needs to be connected to the career pathway of acting. E.g. the teacher at school notes they like drama, they note that desire down. That identification needs to lead to an accessible education or training opportunity. Perhaps a theatre has a program specific to encourage people with disability into the industry with one on one case management to identify challenges that person with disability might have in completing education/training tasks and support them to develop solutions. There might also be a philanthropic contribution for the person, or government providing a pension.

Once that education is complete, there needs to be an accessible application process for roles. Perhaps a talent agency that has a specialty in people with disability. They might identify suitable roles and put their talent in contact with the theatre/ studio. They might also go further, and advocate for suitable roles. E.g they get a script, read it, and say "hey, have you considered that this character might be enhanced if they had disability?" Consider the representation of non-heterosexual characters in film and theatre. It's like every bloody show has to have one or more! The same thing happens with Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CALD) groups. Why not disability? And why not have those characters with disability actually played by people with disability? The final step is making sure the theatre/studio etc, is accessible for people with disability and supports exist to case manage that and put solutions in place.

I don't consider it an impossible task, but it's not going to be done overnight. I also strongly oppose the use of quotas. You should select someone because they are the best person/fit for the role, not "just because". Regarding pension payments, it might be unique to Australia (?), but disability pensions for people with sensory, physical, and intellectual disability should *not* be means tested.

This may sound crazy, but they encourage "min-maxxing". For example, the person with disability could take that entry level trainee job, but they'd lose their pension. Problem: they'd lose part of their pension payments which mean they'll earn less overall. So to advance, they have to take a risk and lower their standard of living (hopefully only temporarily). The only type disability pension in Australia not means tested is the blind pension. Now, there are historical reasons for that, but when you see that the engagement of vision impaired people in the workforce is the *highest* of groups with disability, that clearly shows not means testing is not a disincentive for work. Basically, not means testing reduces uncertainty and encourages economic participation.

I do hope that was interesting and that you read it all. The TLDR really is that it is a complex issue that won't be resolved overnight.

No problems. As I mentioned, I only worked with him briefly, another coworker did more work with him (I had some scheduling conflicts. Plus, I had no clue who he was at the time :P ). I don't recall anything really surprising him. I recall he was really attentive and listened to everything we said, but never took notes. From what I saw of him in the TV show, though, he was fairly accurate. Only two things I noticed that were a bit off. In one scene, he jumped off a building to another building. That is highly discouraged (but obviously, it's for TV). In another, he is teaching someone else how to use the cane and explaining how to use it. He mentions that there are lines cut into the curbs for the blind to navigate, but those particular lines he was mentioning are actually designed for water drainage. They are often used still for people to navigate, that's just not their primary purpose. Although the new detectable warning systems they are putting into curbs ARE designed specifically for cane and shoe detection.

I believe the studio contacted someone in the organization, who then got a hold of my boss

I don't know quite how to describe it. Some people just *sound* cool. The last guy that i dated had sort of a deep, dreamy voice.
Btw voice acting is a cool career/hobby :)