“I am the perfect girl next door,” says fashion model Madeline Stuart. “People say I am as sweet as a button, kind, considerate and the most loving human. I work hard, I do not drink, smoke or swear. I think I am a good role model.”
I have asked Madeline how she feels about being taken as a role model not because she is an internationally experienced fashion model, although she is one. In 2015 she followed a dream to take to the catwalk, and is now the focus of Swedish documentary Maddy the Model, directed by Jane Magnusson. I have asked the question because, at 25 years old, Madeline is the world’s most famous fashion model with Down Syndrome.
“As far as being a fashion model,” she adds, “every day I work is a good day. I don’t actually see it as work, it is just another opportunity for me to meet new friends and make people smile.
Madeline with a young fan. Source: B-Reel Films
“In the beginning it was hard, I had a few meltdowns and did not always do the right things, but that was a long time ago. Now I just want to work hard and prove to the world I am a professional.”
To create Maddy the Model, Madeline and her mother Rosanne were tailed by a camera crew over three and a half years. To relate their experience of making the documentary and the story it captures, Madeline and Rosanne agreed to be interviewed via email, the best method to allow Madeline’s thoughts to be expressed with Rosanne’s assistance. Given the differences in experiencing the world with Down Syndrome compared to without, the idea of being followed around by cameras for several years sounded like a daunting experience.
“Madeline says it was amazing,” explains Rosanne, “[but] tiring sometimes. Being filmed for long periods of time can be exhausting, but she does love a microphone and even though people don’t always understand her, she has a lot to say.”
“I myself always found it uncomfortable. I didn’t like to speak for Maddy but because she has a hard time getting people to understand her, she needs a voice and it was the only way.” Rosanne explains how difficult this tension can be while noting Madeline was approached to deliver a Ted X talk on three separate occasions.
Maddy with Rosanne. Source: B-Reel Films
“I explained to the organisers that words did not come easily, and maybe we could do a story through photos, but people do not like to look outside the box.” After Rosanne reluctantly undertook one talk, she vowed not to ever do so again. “I did the Ted X, which I look at now and hate as I was just so nervous. I’m now on a speakers’ platform for ‘in conversations’ only.”
One thing that the documentary showcases is just how much Madeline and Rosanne’s lives have changed. Rosanne again: “When this documentary started, we went from being average people that went shopping once a week, and a night out was the cinema, to a life where we were flying all over the world, living in hotels nine months of the year, meeting Presidents and celebrities, doing more in one day than we had done in a month previously, sleeping very little, and fighting for acceptance every day.”
“I think the hardest thing for Madeline was she did not always get the concept that a runway model should have no expressions; they are there to walk the catwalk and be a moving coat hanger. That did not gel with her, she was having fun and wanted to celebrate that.”
Maddy. Source: B-Reel Films
“I remember she walked in New York Fashion Week in 2015 with one of the most famous Victoria’s Secret models, Adriana Lima. Adriana was getting paid $40,000 a minute and she walked up and down the runway and no one blinked. The next thing, Maddy walked out and everyone was on their feet cheering and high-fiving her. It was that night she was the most tweeted about person at New York Fashion Week.”
While the Internet helped propel Madeline from life in Queensland to a global stage, it has been a double-edged sword. “I think social media is what made Madeline’s career,” says Rosanne, “or at least gave her the foundations she needed. She went viral for about 18 months, she was on the landing page of Yahoo so many times, every time I opened Facebook there was this little notification that said ‘Madeline Stuart is trending on Facebook’. With that came the trolls, the nastiness, the ugly things people would say, the death threats, and the horrible images people would send you. That was hard and it changed me, it made me harder in one way and it broke me a little.”
Madeline, however, remains focused on her career. “My dream is to be happy, to travel. I miss travel so much. I miss New York every day, I miss the catwalks and all the friends I made overseas. I miss working every day, I really miss life before March last year. My dream is to be able to advocate internationally again when things are safe.”
On the catwalk in ‘Maddy the Model’. Source: B-Reel Films
As for Rosanne, “my dream has always been the same: [Maddy’s] happiness and health is what matters to me. If she tells me she wants to travel, we will travel. If she tells me she wants to stop, we stop. I promised her before this ever started that this was her journey, and I will never break that promise.”
So, what do Madeline and Rosanne want viewers to get out of the documentary? “I want people to see the struggle,” says Rosanne. “The documentary is very raw. It was so hard for me to watch at first, I cried a lot, I have cried many times since, and I still cry every time I watch it. The struggle I am talking about is not that I have a daughter with a disability, as that is a blessing, it is the struggle that people don’t take notice of her or anyone with a disability. Society even now looks away. It is not comfortable for them. There is not enough acceptance. There is not enough understanding that these beautiful humans must be part of our society. I want people to take that away from this documentary, I want people to open their hearts and their minds and do better.”
“Madeline wants people to understand she is capable, worthy and strong. She wants them to know she loves life and deserves to be in it.”
Maddy the Model is available for a limited time at SBS On Demand:
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