I have one fun fact to share with all of you. Since my story focused mainly about me and kept the story about my family to a minimal(s?).
Marlee Matlin, the deaf actress who won the Oscar for Best Actress for her role on the film, "Children of a Lesser God". She graduated from Center on Deafness. CoD deafness is broken up in 4 catagories. Education, Theraputic, Art and Drama. I did all 3 except Drama. I got the major stage frights. LOL
After Marlee left CoD and landed a part of a stage play of the same name. The play was held in Chicago, but there was also other cities that had the same play. New York, LA, etc. One of the directors from Hollywood saw the stage play in LA and he liked it alot. So he wanted to do a movie based on it. When he found out other cities was doing the same play. He sent some people out to check out the other actresses and interview them as well taking pictures of them.
The director then sorted out the information and he liked the one from New York and Marlee from Chicago. So instead of calling them since he was aware both of them are deaf, he sent an overnight express mail telling them he is going to do a film base of the stage play and he asked them to come to Hollywood so he could do a screen test for each one of them.
When Marlee got the mail, she couldn't believe what she was seeing and she called her mom over and had her read the letter to make sure she wasn't seeing things. Mom told Marlee it reads what it said. So she and her family packed their bags and flew to California expense paid by the company that the director worked for.
Marlee and her competitor both did the screen test. They were told to come back the next day for a final answer. So they did. As you know the ending, Marlee got picked. Boy she jumped up and down and screamed like there's no tomorrow.
Then one success lead to another. She appeared in more films as well as television movies. She also had a short lived television series, "Reasonable Doubt" who she played as a deaf attorney with a hearing partner who investigates the cases. Sorta like Perry Mason, but with a twist.
She still appear in various television programs, commericals and some movies from time to time. She also shows up at the deaf theater in California to help teach other newly deaf actors and actresses learning the trade.
She just had a new baby, a 10lb baby boy. You can see her new baby at her website here.
Here's a good profile here.
The CoD moved from Des Plaines, Illinois to Northbrook, Illinois now. They got a much bigger building and the new home dorms are absolutely fantastic. Much improved over the years. They deserved all they got and the hard work paid off.
Marlee did not look like how she appeared in the first film Children of a Lesser God, in fact, she's really a redhead and wore those goofy looking glasses at the time. Her hair was also curly. Very curly. LOL. But Hollywood transformed her alot and she is more beautiful now than what she was back in 1985.
I dated her girlfriend for a while. She and Marlee are best friends and still are to this day.
