How ‘CODA’ Director Siân Heder Used Oscar Win to Get ‘Being Heumann’ Made — And Why She Insisted on a Sex Scene

Résumé détaillé

“If it wasn’t my next film after CODA, I wasn’t sure I would ever have juicer power in the industry again to make it happen,” Heder told Decider.

After CODA won Best Picture at the 2022 Oscars, director Siân Heder grabbed a coffee with fellow Best Picture winner Guillermo del Toro, looking for advice.

“I was very torn between projects,” Heder told Decider in a recent Zoom interview. “He said, ‘Make the movie that can’t get made without you.'”

For Heder, that movie was Being Heumann, a biographical drama about disability rights activist Judy Heumann, which began streaming on Apple TV today, after a limited run in theaters.

“I knew in my heart that this was the one that probably wouldn’t get made if I didn’t push it forward,” Heder said. “And if it wasn’t my next film after CODA, I wasn’t sure I would ever have juicer power in the industry again to be able to make it happen.”

Being Heumann, as Heder pointed out, is not an easy yes for most Hollywood studios—especially given that the director wanted to do it right, with a cast of entirely disabled actors, who required a fully accessibly set, interpreters, special assistance, and more. But Heder had been hand-selected by the real Judy Heumann to direct the film adaptation of Heumann’s 2020 memoir, after the director cold-emailed the activist at the exact right moment (after seeing the 2020 documentary Crip Camp, whose director, James LeBrecht, is a producer on Heumann). Heder had already had multiple conversations with Heumann and forged a friendship.

When Heumann died in March 2023 at the age of 75, Heder felt a weight of responsibility. So, she made it happen. She hunted down the perfect cast, with Ruth Madeley, an award-winning actress with spina bifida, at the lead. She had an accessible set built. She immersed herself in the disabled community. And she made got the impossible movie made, telling the story of the activists who staged a sit-in in 1977 to get legislation signed that would change accessibility standards in the U.S. forever.

“It was important to me that the world know her name, and know what this small, raggedy group of activists in the 1970s pulled…

Th…

Début de l'article, extrait de New York Post. Pour lire la suite, ouvrez l'article chez le média.