Actors With Disabilities Advocate for Safe, Inclusive Spaces at SeriesFest

As part of this year’s SeriesFest, SAG-AFTRA was a sponsor of the Actors With Disabilities Making Their Mark in Hollywood: What More Needs to Be Done? panel on May 7. Featured actors on the panel included Sue-Ann Pien (As We See It), Lauren “Lolo” Spencer (The Sex Lives of College Girls) and Madison Tevlin (Champions), with RespectAbility Entertainment & News Media Director Lawon Exum serving as moderator. 

The group spoke candidly about the industry’s continued efforts to bring more diverse stories featuring persons with disabilities to the screen. Topics ranged from the importance of offering varied roles to disabled actors and creatives, to advice from each performer on ways allies can help address biases and discrimination and create safer, more inclusive spaces and communities on set and beyond. 

“I feel like interacting with people with disabilities is not rocket science,” said Spencer. “Interacting and having a good time together, or even partying together, matters. It shows that our relationships [aren’t over] when the director says it’s a wrap.”

A recording of the panel was later aired on June 21 as part of the SAG-AFTRA President’s Task Force on Education, Outreach & Engagement programming. 

SeriesFest is a nonprofit organization that champions and empowers artists at the forefront of episodic storytelling by providing year-round opportunities for creators and industry experts to come together and discuss television’s current landscape. This year’s festival took place from May 5–10 in Denver. 

To find out more about SAG-AFTRA’s diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, visit sagaftra.org. Other video panels, interviews and webinars are available on sagaftra.org/videos.

Photo: From left, panel moderator and RespectAbility Entertainment & News Media Director Lawon Exum, Global Down Syndrome Foundation co-founder and Executive Director Michelle Sie Whitten and actors Sue-Ann Pien, Madison Tevlin and Lauren “Lolo” Spencer at SeriesFest: Season 9 in May. Photo by Bear Gutierrez. 

The views expressed by the guests are their own and not that of SAG-AFTRA. Any mention of products or services does not imply SAG-AFTRA’s endorsement.