Key Points
- Australian disability rights advocate and writer Hannah Diviney has announced she will feature in her first film.
- Ms Diviney rose to prominence after calling out slurs described as ableist by stars, Beyoncé and Lizzo.
- The 100-minute feature film, Audrey, was announced by Screen Australia on Monday and will be released this year.
Hannah Diviney is both puzzled and in awe at where she has landed at an unlikely crossroads in her career.
The 23-year-old Australian disability advocate has now flipped the script as she heads to the big screens after announcing she will be cast in her first feature film.
"[It feels] like I must have accidentally made it to Mars. What am I doing here?" she said.
The young woman was thrust into the international spotlight last year when she called out some of the world's biggest stars to change the lyrics she described as ableist - and they listened.
Ms Diviney, who lives with spastic diplegic cerebral palsy, highlighted the harm of using the term .
In June, Lizzo heard her calls and . And in August, following the release of Beyonce's album Renaissance, .
The 100-minute feature film, Audrey, announced on Monday by Screen Australia, is a dramedy that follows the mother of a disconnected family with two daughters, one of whom Ms Diviney plays.
Following an incident with the eldest daughter, Audrey, that lands her in a coma, the family dynamic is tested.
Hannah Diviney is the first woman with a disability to act in a sex scene on Australian television, in the SBS TV series Latecomers. Source: SBS News / Renata Dominik
A 2016 study by Screen Australia revealed that, despite 20 per cent of Australians living with a disability, only four per cent of characters on Australian TV reflected that reality.
She said more representation of people with disability on screens is critical because she grew up without it.
"Representation is important, not just for the people who are finally seeing themselves as being represented, but it's also a great way to show everybody that like, disability ... is nothing to be afraid of," she said.
"It's not something to turn away from, it's not something to speak quietly about in hushed tones, it's not something you pretend doesn't exist, or equally, to feel sort of overly inspired by either."
Hannah Diviney is an Australian disability advocate who lives with spastic diplegic cerebral palsy. Source: Supplied / Hannah Diviney
"I would love to get to a point where, if I were to play a character, disability doesn't have to be a central part of their storyline, or it doesn't have to be all that they are," she said.
"I'd love to play characters where the storylines are more nuanced, and where I get to be other things other than the disabled girl."
Audrey is one of nine projects Screen Australia has allocated more than $7.4 million to create, in association with Screen Queensland and supported by the Melbourne International Film Festival.
The film is set to be released later this year.
