A wonderland for disabled artists

In 1989, five students at the Boettcher School for Crippled Children in Denver, Colorado, living with disabilities, a passion for theater, and an immense collective frustration with being overlooked for roles, founded their own theater company with the mission to be a creative home for artists with disabilities. They called it the Physically Handicapped Amateur Musical Artists League, PHAMALy (pronounced “family”), later renamed simply Phamaly Theater Company without the limiting and outdated terms of the original acronym. In 2019, a wheelchair-using rapper born with osteogenesis imperfecta ran for mayor of Denver; she won a respectable 2.5% of the vote on a shoestring budget and generated myriad discussions on social media and local news outlets about representation and marginalized communities, for which she has long advocated. In 2021, the company found the emcee, and their magic combined.

Over its 32-year lifespan, Phamaly has continued to exclusively cast actors with disabilities, expanded from physical impairments to the full spectrum of disability, and has grown from a single musical theater production annually to multiple musical and non-musical shows across multiple stages including local tours, workshops, original productions, and a recent tour in Japan. Its most recent endeavor was an adaptation of Lewis Carroll’s classic Alice in Wonderland, with a script written for the company and original music by Denver-based experimental hip hop group Wheelchair Sports Camp. The result is something to which only a group so deeply shaped by the lived experience and social weight of disability could fully give life.

All the classic characters and sequences are here, from size-altering potions and a flood made of tears, to a delightfully labile Mad Hatter, to the sinister Queen of Hearts. But instead of the nightmare of a 19^th century English girl, this Wonderland forms in the modern day as Alice’s hospitalized, post-panic attack fever dream, demonstratively introduced by a White Rabbit who lives with generalized anxiety and ADHD. Instead of a nonsensical tale originally told for the amusement of three sisters, this Wonderland shows its Queen as a sort of omniscient narrator: she reveals to Alice that a school test invoked the panic attack, and she serves as an embodiment of Alice’s internal psychological pressure. Alice fights back, as she always does, but the context frames that struggle as one against being caged or defined by our challenges and differences –a struggle which resonates with adolescents, the disability community, and humanity in general.

The commentary is intentional on all levels. It nods at the absurdity of the current healthcare system in the United States. It proclaims identity without restrictions and invites audience members to relate to that in their own way. And as it has always done, Phamaly leans into disability representation on the stage. This is not social service theater. This is an atmosphere in which disability becomes an active part of both the art and the artmaking. Director Regan Linton, who lives with a thoracic spinal cord injury, tells me that the script continued to evolve after casting to individualize movement, dialogue and even character to the actors. Kalyn Heffernan, the rapper who leads Wheelchair Sports Camp, plays the head of the Cheshire Cat, which is split into a head, body, and tail with three different personalities. Utilizing a power wheelchair and glowing LED ears, she moves through an otherwise darkened set in a manner too eerily smooth for even the most graceful dancer, adding further aesthetic to a psychedelic Wonderland and to the surreal musical backdrop of her own making. The Caterpillar, who lives with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy, paints with a wheelchair-mounted bubble machine rather than hookah smoke. The Red Queen is blind but being assisted in all mobility by her underlings is perfectly fitting for the character, and she is ushered close to Alice so she can smell the newcomer. And they populate a Wonderland inhabited, like our world, by people with autism, mood disorders, sensory impairments, genetic conditions, musculoskeletal conditions, limb differences, movement disorders, and neuromuscular conditions. Rather than seeming forced or artificial, the incorporation of each individual’s unique circumstance adds to and enhances the experience. It’s what Linton refers to as “disability aesthetic,” in which accommodations, adjustments, and access represent “not just a circumstance but a culture” affecting the artistry and the process.

Phamaly has had 32 years to practice, grow and evolve that aesthetic, and has done so in a way not quite replicated anywhere else with the combination of full-budget, mainstage content, full-spectrum disability representation and casting of only actors with disabilities. However, a secondary goal has long been to demonstrate to the larger theater community the artistic potential of the disability community and, indeed, disability itself. Linton and Heffernan, among many others, have taken their skills and advocacy to other places, other groups, and other avenues. Linton recently co-directed the documentary Imperfect, chronicling the making of Phamaly’s award-laden 2019 production of Chicago along with the lived experience of its director and cast, which as of writing is making the rounds on the film festival circuit. I am in part a product of Phamaly’s culture and the lessons of its champions, having spent high school and college sharing my love of the stage every summer with people much wiser, and often facing much more, than me. We take those lessons wherever we go, and the ripple effect is working: as it is on the screen, disability representation on the stage is improving, if ever so slowly. To get further, Linton says, we need to lean into the idea that disability can enhance rather than compromise the quality of entertainment. Creativity is essential in implementing this, but let’s face it, one would be hard-pressed to find a bigger concentration of creativity outside of the performing arts community. Most of all, there must be a push to cast actors with disabilities, especially those at the intersection between multiple marginalized groups. Companies exist that will exclusively cast artists with disabilities, but until we see access across every skill level, in every city, state and country around the world, precious and wonderful talent will be wasted.

Of course, you’re reading this in a medical journal. Why is this relevant to you? What can you do? Reach out to local theater organizations at the grade school, university, community, and touring levels. Lend them your expertise on adapting spaces and performances for artists and audiences with disabilities whether that expertise is through training, experience, or living. Support those companies with long experience in disabled theater; start conversations and take those conversations into your communities. Art is one of humanity’s universal languages, and we all win when it represents all of humanity.

Inclusive and disability-centered theater organizations remain uncommon, but a growing number of communities have access to such groups for artists across all levels of experience and commitment. Partial lists can be found at https://www.ameridisability.com/post/9-theater-companies-putting-actors-with-disabilities-center-stage and https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theatre_and_disability. Professional-caliber companies working across the disability spectrum include Phamaly Theater Company in Denver, CO, USA (https://phamaly.org/, https://www.youtube.com/user/PhamalyTheatre), Theater Breaking Through Barriers in New York, NY, USA (formerly Theater by the Blind, https://tbtb.org/, https://www.youtube.com/user/TBTBtheater) and Graeae Theatre Company in London, UK (https://graeae.org/, https://www.youtube.com/user/GraeaeTheatreCompany). For more information about Imperfect, please visit https://imperfectfilm.com/.

If you participate in or know of a disability-centered performing arts organization in your region, please share them with us by emailing E-mail: jprmst@gmail.com.. We hope to curate an updated resource list to share with the JPRM community.