Podcast Ep191 Jenna Bainbridge
Didrik Johnck: Before we get into this episode, just a quick announcement. Our host Erik Weihenmayer invites you, yeah you, to join him for the What's Your Everest event. What is it? Well, once a year people gather and hike up a mountain. What's the big deal, you ask? Well, this is for everyone, regardless of ability or background.
Some might call it an adaptive hike. Ever see a wheelchair climb a mountain? At What's Your Everest, you will. You'll join a team with a common purpose, inspire people to turn their challenges into changes, tackle obstacles head on, and work together to get to the top. This year the hike starts at the foot of the Flatirons outside of Boulder, Colorado on September 7th.
Learn more at NoBarriersPodcast. com and click on events. Now onto the show.
Welcome, welcome to the No Barriers podcast, everyone, hosted by Erik Weihenmayer. Now let me give you a short preview of today's episode, then I'll hand you over to Erik and our guest. We're going to dive into the life and trials of somebody who truly exemplifies Living a No Barriers life. Our guest, the remarkable Jenna Bainbridge, is breaking conventions and bridging gaps on Broadway and beyond.
She's performing in the Broadway musical Suffs, a retelling of the suffrage movement's diverse history. It is a relentless schedule with eight shows a week, plus rehearsals, and we are so lucky to nab her for a conversation. Jenna is a New York City based actor, singer, and disability rights advocate that has been performing since she was 12.
She was the first wheelchair user to originate a role in a new musical on Broadway. We'll touch on how she approaches auditions, fashion forward mobility, overcoming barriers in theater, being a voice for change, why representation matters, and much more. This episode promises insights that are as profound as they are empowering.
I'm producer Didrik Johnck, and this is the No Barriers podcast.
Erik Weihenmayer: It's easy to talk about the successes, but what doesn't get talked about enough is the struggle. My name is Erik Weihenmayer. I've gotten the chance to ascend Mount Everest, to climb the tallest mountain in every continent, to kayak the Grand Canyon, and I happen to be blind. It's been a struggle to live what I call a No Barriers life.
I've to define it, to push the parameters of what it means. And part of the equation is diving into the learning process and trying to illuminate the universal elements that exist along the way. And that unexplored terrain between those dark places we find ourselves in in the summit exists a map. That map, that way forward, is what we call No Barriers.
Hey everyone, this is Erik Weihenmayer with the No Barriers podcast. I'm psyched to be talking today to Jenna Bainbridge. We've been waiting for this interview for a long time and partly, Jenna, because you're a little busy right now. yeah. You're, you're performing in Suffs, which is on Broadway.
I'm a super fan boy here.Exciting to, to be talking to you and having you squeeze us in. Cause I know you have a performance tonight.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yes. Yes. Thank you for, for having me. for having me and for being patient with me during scheduling. Um, yeah, it's no joke being on Broadway. We have eight shows a week.
The only day we have off is Monday, which then becomes a frantic, get your life back together and clean your house kind of day. Um, so thank you for being patient with me and I'm so excited to be here.
Erik Weihenmayer: Yeah, so, I mean, that must be such a grind, right? Like, like a, a, a movie or something, you know, you, obviously you rehearse and then you do the scenes and everything, but this, you're doing it every night, man. I always think, like, Broadway's gotta be so hard on actors.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yeah, it's kind of relentless, is the word that I use for it. because, I've done this before, you know, regional theater, You do a similar schedule where you have eight performances a week, but there's something different about Broadway.
And part of it is that you never really know how long you have. Yeah. So you're giving your all to it every night and also not knowing you know, is the show gonna run for six months? Is it gonna run for 20 years? And so it's very exciting, and it's also a little exhausting. Um, so we're starting to get into more of a balance now.
Um, now that we're kind of through awards season, and through opening, and all of that, we're getting into the rhythm now, and it's been so rewarding, and Feel like I'm finally getting my head above water and feel like I know how to maintain now for the rest of, for the rest of the run, however long I'm with it.
Erik Weihenmayer: Well, you speak to a lot of groups as well. and I do too. And so like, sometimes I get off the stage and my manager's like, that was great. And I'm like, no, I suck. That was horrible. I screwed up 18 times. You're human, right? So it must be like that for acting too, right? Like, Some nights you're just in the flow and then other nights you're like, Oh, that was horrible.
But probably the audience doesn't really even know the difference. Only you know the difference.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yeah, I, my, one of my friends explained it to me, this was years ago, and I had said something about like, oh I'm just having a horrible night,I was sick at the time, and I was just, I felt like every single thing I did was wrong.
I felt none of my laugh lines were landing, all of my singing sounded bad, and my friend was like, we as actors, we see ourselves as like, when we're doing it well. We're like, yeah, I'm at a 10. And on days where we feel like we're doing it poorly, we're like, oh gosh, I'm at a 5. But the audience is seeing it as the difference between a 10 and like a 9.
Right. They, it's a small difference. And like, they might be able to tell like, oh, you might not be at a hundred percent, but it's still you know, professional performance. So we're very hard on ourselves, but I try to, it gets easier, honestly, in an eight show week because you don't have time to think about it.
By the time that you've processed, oh, I didn't feel great during the matinee. Sorry, got another evening show today. You got to just get right back into it. Exactly. It also is nice because it gives you a chance to like, reset where I get another crack at it. If I felt like I didn't do well this afternoon, guess what? I'll be doing it eight times this week. So hopefully one of them will feel good.
Erik Weihenmayer: It's Groundhog's Day. you're like, oh, I got another chance tonight to, to do it differently.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yes. Weirdly, I had a friend who was in the musical version of Groundhog Day, and She said it was like very, it was very meta.
You're just like, I'm literally doing Groundhog Day and also it feels like Groundhog Day because I am doing the same thing constantly.
Erik Weihenmayer: Well I'll say you guys were nominated for a bunch of Tonys and then you Want a couple Tonys, and you're at the Music Box Theater, currently, I encourage everyone to go out and see it.
I can't wait to see it when I come to New York City. I, that's gonna be so exciting. I get a couple opportunities to get to the city, and, uh, we'll, we'll be there cheering,
Jenna Bainbridge: Yay! Oh, please let me know when you come. Um, it's, it's always a very fun experience. Our audiences are amazing. And as we're stepping ever closer to an election, it's also interesting because the show is all about organizing and gaining the right to vote. So it's been really fascinating seeing how it's shifted
Erik Weihenmayer: Tell me a little bit about the play. So it's about this lady Alice Paul a real historical figure, And in 1913, she had this march. She organized a march on washington.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yes,
Erik Weihenmayer: like what an amazing, story that somebody I mean It should be taught more in history.
So i'm so glad somebody pulled it out of history and said this is an important Stuff that we need to focus on And it can be entertaining, of course, as well.
Jenna Bainbridge: Absolutely. And when I first auditioned for Suffs, I knew nothing of this subject matter. I, if I knew about women's right to vote, I was like,I've heard of, Seneca Falls and Susan B. Anthony, but that's about it. I have kind of a gap in my knowledge between when that happened and when the right to vote was finally passed in 1920, when the 19th amendment was passed. It's a gap of history that we don't, really focus on in, in, in our history classes. And
Erik Weihenmayer: No, we don't even know about this mass march. It's like one of the first march It was the first. Yeah. March on Washington, and organized by women. And I'm blown away because how did it happen? it's, it's, it almost, if you're thinking about it, as a fictional play, it's like improbable because A lot of dudes are pigs, and they don't want to open the door to a whole group, a whole new community of voters.
Somebody had to open the door, you know what I mean? Somebody had to be listening, because women had no voice at that point. And so they had to create a voice, and a collective voice. I find that really amazing.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yeah, what I love about our show is that it focuses on, you know, The different approaches within the movement, and I think this is a tried and true method that we've seen.
in countless movements throughout history, there are always multiple groups coming at an issue from different angles and different viewpoints. And so our show really focuses on Alice Paul was kind of the more radical approach and she organized the first ever March on Washington, the day before the inauguration of Woodrow Wilson.
and thousands of people marched down the street all the way to the Capitol. Then there was also, they had silent protests in front of the White House. They also had, they were arrested and um, did hunger strikes in prison. These are really dark parts of history, exciting parts of history, things that we are still seeing these protest tactics today.
But Alice was the more radical one. On the other side, you had, Carrie Chapman Catt, who was a protege of Susan B. Anthony's, and she, her approach was, all about being quote unquote ladylike. And, she had these mottos like, state by state, slow and ready, slow and steady, not before the country's ready.
And her approach was, we are showing people that, We are, are nice ladies and we are gonna vote just like our husbands. So don't you want two good votes instead of one. Isn't that a great technique, a great tactic? And so they were really opposite in their approaches. And together is really how they worked, right?
Being approaching an issue from two different sides. I think that the movement really needed both. I agree with one tactic more than the other, of course. Um, but,it is a really beautiful thing to see that there's no wrong way to fight for equality and to fight for what you think is right.
Erik Weihenmayer: But I love the way the play kind of focuses on that what approach do we take as What approach do you take as a woman as a collective movement? Do you try to be cordial and work within the system or do you just be a rebel? And obviously there's a song that's tons of attention. It's all over the place and it's American Bitches. I love that song It's so great and
Jenna Bainbridge: Great American bitch.
Erik Weihenmayer: It reminds me of like How, art is so, uh, relevant to, what we're experiencing right now. And obviously you don't want to make it so overt that it's, obvious and predictable, but You can't help but think, And again, I'm touching on politics here, but, like, Trump's You nasty women, and then women started putting the, You know that on their t shirt as like a point of pride, So yeah, American bitch is like, yeah, I'm an American bitch and I'm gonna get the vote right? It's I love that edginess
Jenna Bainbridge: Yeah, I think it's all about, like, reclaiming words and feeling empowered by, you know, if someone tries to knock you down, you can oftentimes take that to think, like, I've, I have grown from this.
I am stronger because of this. And Great American Bitch is all about, they take all of the nasty things that they have been called.
Erik Weihenmayer: Right.
Jenna Bainbridge: And they go, No, I'm proud of that. I'm going to wear that as a badge of honor.
Erik Weihenmayer: I have a friend, Mark Wellman, who's a good friend of mine. He was the first paraplegic to climb El Capitan. 7, 000 pull ups in eight days to get to the top of this 3, 000 foot monolith.
Jenna Bainbridge: My gosh, I can barely do one.
Erik Weihenmayer: But he loves the word GEMP for that same reason. And I'd never even heard that word because it was like something maybe people said in the 70s. And he was like, GIMP power, man. we're all GIMP team, and for him that was like a, like a weird point of pride, like, Hey, we've overcome and faced a lot of challenge, and I'm gonna wear that on my sleeve.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yes, I completely agree. I think that, you know, sometimes people want to drag us down with the words that they choose, and we don't have to let them. we can take this and reclaim them. Yeah, and that's, I feel the same about like cripple. I personally identify as cripple. I think it is my word. Um, it is how I identify and, I think that's, it's an interesting point. Yeah. to, how, how are words used and how do we feel about them?
Erik Weihenmayer: Yeah, and you started performing at 12. Uh, so at a young age and obviously now, you're so successful and you're, you know, I don't know life is like a fairy tale, but when you read about it, it looks like a fairy tale.
It looks like an amazing success story that, you know, you've earned. But in the beginning, you're like, you're a girl, and you're in a wheelchair, and there must have been just massive barriers and discrimination in those early days. And, I remember applying for a summer job as a dishwasher, and, every manager I applied to told me the reason why I could never do this job. Every disabled person has those stories that sting. And, Yeah. yeah, tell me about that early part of your life.
Jenna Bainbridge: So I always loved sports as a kid. I was very athletic and,played a lot of sports. And so I have a spinal cord injury and I sustained that when I was 18 months old, 16 months old.
And so I have, my entire life, had a disability. And I am able to walk. I'm an ambulatory wheelchair user. And as a kid, it was definitely, I didn't really use my wheelchair very much. And part of that was, internalized ableism of myself feeling like the goal was walking and having pride and being able to walk and thinking of using my wheelchair as a weakness, which I have unlearned that, thankfully, I love my wheelchair.
My wheelchair is incredible. It represents freedom to me. And I love that I have these assistive devices that make my life easier. But as a kid, I hadn't accepted that yet. So I, I primarily walked and when I walk, I have a very pronounced limp and I tend to walk pretty slowly. but I still, with all that loved, loved, loves playing sports.
And so I played softball and I played volleyball and I got my black belt in karate when I was 12 and I was, I loved sports. I loved teamwork. I loved being active. And as sports, you know, when you're a kid, sports are for fun, primarily, right? Like it's a way to get out of the house and be active and maybe get some sunshine and make friends.
And as I got older and sports became more competitive, teams were less willing to have me on their team, regardless of, If I was good at the sport, it became a really, a negative and toxic environment. And the,one of the final straws was when I was playing volleyball. I heard this story later, I did not recognize it at the time, but, apparently a, I don't know if it was a coach or a parent, but an adult from the other team said, Hit it to the crippled girl.
And, My mom heard this and, you know, props to her. She didn't show anything. I didn't know it happened. We finished the game. We won, by the way,we finished the game and my mom started saying, Hey, like you love singing. How would you feel about like maybe auditioning for a choir or for a play?
And she very smartly realized that like sports were not going to be a super healthy environment for me. Right. and opened the door to other, similar activities. And I auditioned for a choir and, um, started working with a couple theater companies and just completely fell in love. But, similar to in sports, as theater became more and more professional, there was so many moments where people would say like, Oh, well, you know, we can't cast you in this show because of your access needs.
And sometimes it was the physical access needs, it was our theater is not. ADA compliant, or we don't, we've never worked with somebody who uses a wheelchair, so we don't even know what questions to ask, so therefore we're just not even going to cast you, or even talk to you about it and find out what your access needs are.
And there was also much more, like, blatant discrimination. I remember auditioning for college programs and asking for feedback at one of them, and they said, I, my audition for this program had been, I sang a song. That was it. Just a single song. And I went and asked for feedback when I didn't get in, and they said, oh, you know, we, we loved your audition, but we really, we felt that you could not complete the dance portion of our requirement.
And I was like, you never saw me dance. You just assumed that because I, I used a wheelchair, that I wasn't a dancer. And joke's on them, I'm now dancing on Broadway eight nights a week, but there's certain And you love dancing.
Erik Weihenmayer: It's like one of the things you love, it sounds yeah.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yes, it's one of my absolute favorite things, and for so long people told me, oh, you can't dance because you're not using your legs while you dance, I guess. I don't know what the thinking is. But I was constantly getting that kind of feedback. I remember auditioning for a different college and they wouldn't accept me into their performance major. But they really encouraged me to still come to their program and be in their theater administration program.
And when I asked why, they were like, Well, because, you know, we, we only want people in our performance program who we feel like are gonna work. And, um, we don't, we don't feel like when you graduate this program that you'll be able to work. it's just constant feedback like this. And,
Erik Weihenmayer: I just relate so much because it's like,I hate to be, like, to focus on the negative, but like, those things when people just look past you, and you know exactly why they're looking past you.
it's just a hard thing, because somebody's got to be there and say, you know what, I'm not really sure how this will work, but, let's try it out. Let's figure this out together, because the pressure of all that shouldn't be on a teenager's shoulders as a person in a chair.
Jenna Bainbridge: No. No.
Erik Weihenmayer: So, so, it sounds like hopefully you had some door openers as well. I heard on a podcast that you finally got an agent and it was because maybe the agent, she had a daughter who, or a son, excuse me, who was disabled and, in a similar situation, he wanted to be an actor and nobody was giving him a chance. It was like she was touched by this personal story.
And, therefore she could relate and connect and made it her mission. You tell me that story way better than I just blathered though.
Jenna Bainbridge: No, I mean, you, you, you hit the big details. Gail at, uh, KMR, which I'm no longer with them because of other reasons, but, she started the, it was called the diversity department at the time.
And it was because her son wanted to be an actor and wasn't having opportunities. And she opened this department partly to make sure that people with disabilities had a place to go for representation. Um, and, and there are so many people like that, and I'm very lucky that I have many in my own family, in my own inner circle.
When I told my parents when I was four years old and using a walker that I wanted to be a ballerina, they, didn't blink. Yeah. They just immediately, my mom called every dance studio within like a 30 mile radius And said hi, my daughter uses a walker. She wants to be a ballerina Can she dance at your studio?
And got, a bunch of people said no, but one person said yes. Debbie Stark at Dance Kaleidoscope said, yes, please bring her here, and I danced with her for years.
Erik Weihenmayer: Parents, the ultimate door openers.
Jenna Bainbridge: Oh my gosh, yes, absolutely. And I feel very lucky that my parents were always, they always believed in me, they always believed in my dreams, and they also always believed in me.
were willing to find the door that was open, to check all of the doors and see like, is this one locked? Nope. can I elbow my way through this one? And they, they opened a lot of those doors for me to the point where then, when I was old enough to start advocating for myself, I had an example to follow.
I saw what my parents had done. And so, you know, now there is still a ton of discrimination, a ton of, of criticism that I face, but now I feel very able to state my access needs and also come up with creative solutions when my access needs are not being met. And I, the thing I love about theater is that it is a creative industry at its very core.
And so whenever there's feedback of, oh, we, we can't do that. My response is always, well, why don't we think creatively about it? Because that is what we do for a living. We are creatives. So if you're saying we can't make this set accessible for me, then we're just not thinking creatively enough. And it's, it's, I love what I do.
Erik Weihenmayer: And partly that was due because your parents were mentors and they taught you how to be an advocate., I remember at No Barriers, at one of our summits, we had iced tea, believe it or not, speak. It was really cool. And he said, you know, like, I'm looking out at a bunch of folks in the audience who are disabled and in chairs and stuff.
And he said, uh, you know, but I grew up with nobody caring about me, nobody caring whether I lived or died, nobody giving me any kind of tips or leadership or ideas of what it's like being disabled. what I should be striving for. And he's that's a disability in itself. So I think you and I are both very lucky to have had that great support when we were young.
Cause it teaches you that you can take on a lot in life. Yeah. That's cool. Yeah. And
Jenna Bainbridge: it's not that I wasn't, that I didn't see the hardships that I didn't see the barriers. It was that I saw a path around them and I'm, I was grateful to be given that viewpoint in the world from a very young age.
Erik Weihenmayer: Yeah. and what was your first break? what was the first person that said, Yeah, let's do this.
Jenna Bainbridge: I, so I started performing with a theater company in Denver called Family when I was 12 years old.
Erik Weihenmayer: And by the way, I'm in Golden, Colorado, so we're, we used to be neighbors.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yes, Once Upon a Time. I love Golden. So beautiful. And I grew up in, in Castle Rock, primarily. and then went to school in Denver and family casts entirely actors with disabilities. And so that was another place where I kind of learned a lot about like, how to advocate for myself within the theater mechanism. Cause my parents aren't theater people and weren't able to teach me that, but I was able to get a lot of hands on experience.
And I acted there for many years. And from there, I met a lot of directors and producers for other theatre companies who, saw me perform at Family, and it sparked an idea in them of, Oh, what if we did, what if we did XYZ? Like, we could have a really interesting conversation and narrative about disability.
And so from Family, I had, Boulder Dinner Theatre asked me to come and be Cinderella, because they wanted to, And we had a long conversation about how Cinderella makes a lot of sense to have a disability because she is, ostracized from her family and people don't believe that she can fall in love.
And, these are a lot of things that people with disabilities face, day to day. So I did that and, another director at Colorado Shakespeare Festival asked me to come up and do Midsummer Night's Dream. And, you know, very similar story for the disability, narrative fits very well into a lot of these shows that I did.
But my big break was really when, uh, Joy Dixon from the Oregon Shakespeare Festival saw me in a production of the Fantastics and asked me to come audition for Oregon Shakes. And for those of you who, who don't know regional theater, Oregon Shakespeare Festival is the largest theater company in the country and they have a lot of their shows end up eventually transferring to Broadway at some point. And many of their actors have either been on Broadway before and are now working at Oregon Shakes or they work at Oregon Shakes and then they go perform on Broadway. It's a very common, pipeline. So when Oregon Shakespeare Festival called me and asked me to audition, I knew something was shifting.
Erik Weihenmayer: So cool. Who was that saw you perform again? What was her name?
Jenna Bainbridge: Joy Dixon.
Erik Weihenmayer: Did you ever talk to her and say like, Hey, what was your first, she obviously was just struck by your talents and had an emotional response and said you'd be good for our theater company. But did you ever talk to her and pick her brain and find out a little bit more of what she was thinking when she invited you?
Jenna Bainbridge: Yeah. so Joy and I, um, we have actually become very good friends over the year and she and Bill Rauch, who was the artistic director at the time at Oregon Shakespeare Festival. They were very passionate about, making sure that the theater company looked like America. That, it was representative of the human experience in this country.
And so, they made sure that their casting decisions were very diverse. And so they had a number of shows every year that were very much, up to date. about different groups of people, but also then if it, if they were doing like Oklahoma one year, and I've never seen such a diverse cast, you know, every possible,race and gender identity and body type.
And they always made sure that their casts were very diverse. So they were, We're always looking for voices that were underrepresented on stage, and disability is possibly the least represented group on stage People with disabilities make up, what, roughly 20 percent of the U. S. population, and, on stage, they represent less than 1 percent of roles on stage by recent counts.
Erik Weihenmayer: And so you were the first person in a chair or with, yeah, I think just a person in a chair to be a part of a new Broadway play. Right. So that's like a big pioneering achievement, of course. And you just mentioned like 2 percent of people with disabilities have broken into the screen and stage.
Why? Like if you were putting on your diagnosis hat, What's the barrier? why so little? So, why is it taking so long here? What's the problem?
Jenna Bainbridge: Uh, I think there's, there's a couple of problems. The big one that I see frequently is that the Americans with Disabilities Act does not protect backstage spaces.
Theaters are required to make their public facing spaces fully accessible, but not their backstage areas. Right. So, it means that a lot of theaters go, oh, well, we aren't accessible, so we can't hire people with disabilities. Right. I think that's part of it. I think that part of it, too, is, Theater definitely has, um, some fairly toxic sayings and mindsets that are pretty ableist at their core.
The show Must Go On is perhaps the most famous. And people, I think, view that perspective, the show must go on as being where you have to be at, you know, quote unquote, peak physical condition and, peak mental acuity. And it becomes these interesting, for some reason, people view that as not being, uh, you cannot also be disabled, even though, we all know that has nothing to do with disability.
It's just a mindset that is ableist. So I think that that's part of it. I think that part of it is also that theater, there's a lot of tradition in theater. And a lot of, well, this is how we've always done it type of mentalities. And there's no reason why we still have to do it that way. But there's ingrained in the very culture of theater is, well, this is how we do this thing with no thought of who is that excluding.
Erik Weihenmayer: Kind of a traditionalism, yeah.
Jenna Bainbridge: Absolutely. And, I do a lot of, I'm a consultant for theaters as well who want to start hiring people with disabilities. And that is one of the first things that we try to shed a light on is what are you doing simply because that's the way we've always done it?
Yeah. And is there a better method or are you just doing this because that's how you were taught to do it? That's how you've done it previously.
Erik Weihenmayer: What are a few of the steps that you,take them through in your consulting business? Isn't it called consultability?
Jenna Bainbridge: Consultability, yes. One of the first ones is that we remind people that access needs are human needs.
Every single human on the planet has access needs. There is nothing specifically about disability in access needs. So having people just kind of step through what are your access needs and do your access needs change from day to day. Disability is a human experience. The next thing that we also try to point out is that access benefits everybody because everybody will experience disability, whether directly or indirectly.
Everyone knows somebody who will become disabled, and, Um, almost every single human on the planet will acquire a disability at some point in their life. And if they don't, it's because they died before that happened. So disability, really making things accessible, benefits everybody. And wouldn't it be great, you know, everyone has this mindset of, oh, this isn't about me.
Disability doesn't affect me, doesn't affect my life. But it does. At any moment, any person on the planet can become disabled. And Wouldn't it be nice if when that happens, you can still do your job? You can still live in your home? You can still do the things that have always brought you joy and happiness?
So we really try to add, make sure that people are aware of those two key elements, and then we approach the work itself. How does rethinking the narrative of how we build theater, how does that change when you start to think about access? And sometimes it's thinking about, all right, just for imagine, just imagine for a moment that you are unable to do stairs.
What parts of the theater are now inaccessible to you? Imagine for a moment that you don't have your glasses today. What in the theater is inaccessible to you?
Erik Weihenmayer: Right.
Jenna Bainbridge: And we just try to like, Layer that in so people become more aware of their own privilege and how quickly they could lose that privilege.
Erik Weihenmayer: I help, run no barriers and we have these events with tons of folks with different kinds of challenges performing and just doing all kinds of amazing things and running workshops and we still have the same struggles just getting a ramp on the stage that we don't have one It's like wait, you don't have one just you have to go out and rent one for thousands of dollars Yeah, I mean the simplest things become barriers in society, you know that don't have to be.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yeah. And if we just changed how we fundamentally think about access. Right. And as we're creating new spaces in particular, making sure that access is at the forefront of that conversation. You know, when you're talking to architects and when you are creating these backstage spaces, if you're just thinking about access, then the whole world becomes better.
Erik Weihenmayer: Well, you're dealing with these theaters that are probably, built a long time ago, and they're probably the most inaccessible places on earth.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yes. Yes. Broadway is old. Uh, it's part of, you know, You know, what makes Broadway is that it's been there for a hundred years. So the music box, the theater that we're performing stuff in, is a hundred years old.
It predates the ADA by a very long time. And, there's a lot of hurdles to making a building like that accessible. And there's a lot of parts of it that we could not make accessible. For example, there's no way for me to get from backstage to the audience, while going through, I have to go outside and go around if I want to go to the audience, there's no way for a wheelie right
Erik Weihenmayer: Pop a wheelie right off the stage.
Jenna Bainbridge: Right? And then jive down the five feet down to
Erik Weihenmayer: Yeah, fly over the orchestra.
Jenna Bainbridge: You know, we should just get like the rigging system that they had for Spider Man Turn Off the Dark and just have me like fly back. That'd be great. I'm sure the insurance would approve that.
Erik Weihenmayer: Do you ever think, um, I don't know if this connection is obvious, but you're in a play about women's suffrage and, you know, you've broken through barriers as a person with a disability who's on Broadway,pioneering that movement in a way.
I don't know if that can, side note, maybe that connection is like visceral for you at all.
Jenna Bainbridge: Absolutely. Yeah. It's, one of the things that, that I think about a lot in our show is, We have an incredibly diverse cast, and the women's suffrage movement, if you're looking back through history and trying to find examples of, quote unquote famous suffragists, they are predominantly white, cis, hetero, non disabled people.
And our show tries to shine a light on some of the voices that were underrepresented, and in our casting we also are showing that there are many people who are part of this movement who are not remembered in history. So we have, disabled women in the show and trans women in the show and non binary folks in the show and what it shows to me is that just because we're not part of the history books doesn't mean we weren't there.
There were definitely disabled women in this movement and I hope to remind people of our existence in history. for some reason people think that, like, disabilities were just invented in 1990. So, you know, disabilities didn't exist before the passing of the ADA. And I love being there and showing people, like, No, you might not have seen a woman in a wheelchair in photos from 1913.
But there were people who had disabilities at this time, and always. And, I really hope that it also shows people that they are also included in any future movements that they feel passionate about. There is a place for them in protest. There is a place for them in politics. There's a place for them anywhere that they want to be. There is a place for them.
Erik Weihenmayer: There were disabled people, obviously, back then, but they were, like, hidden. They didn't have, like, a voice or a face, obviously. that we're only starting to develop that.
Jenna Bainbridge: Written out of history.
Erik Weihenmayer: Yeah, even
if there were publicly disabled people, the history books are, like,
Erik Weihenmayer: use,
Jenna Bainbridge: like, all kinds of weird euphemisms to be like, No, no, no, they weren't disabled.
Erik Weihenmayer: Right.that leads me to a question. I'm sure you've been asked this before, but, you're playing a historical you know, an historical play with historical figures, and you're in a chair. I know you play different roles. You play walking, ambulatory roles,and chair roles, and sometimes, you're playing a bunch of different characters, but it's not as binary as, I'm in a chair, and back then there were, women in chairs that were part of this Washington march.
It's really more like you're saying, like the, Broadway and the world's becoming more diverse, less binary, more fluid, and like what's expected out of the audience, right? Like,you always hear Oh, disabled roles should be played by disabled people, yet disabled people,you're playing men. I've heard you played Richard the third, maybe, there's men playing women playing men. it gets a little confusing in terms of wrapping your head around what the audience should be expecting or imagining.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yeah. In the theater we have a term that's, it's willful suspension of disbelief.
Erik Weihenmayer: Right.
Jenna Bainbridge: And I think it's such a beautiful idea. It's approaching every show that you attend ready to accept whatever the rules are of that world. And, people always. kind of make fun of musicals, it's so unrealistic. Nobody bursts out into song in their everyday life. And, well, first off, I definitely do.
You do. but, if you were approaching a musical and immediately coming at it from, like, well, that's not realistic, then you're not going to have a good time. Right. So, whatever the rules are of the show, of the world that you are entering, you have to just follow them. Willfully suspend your disbelief and go with that and enjoy whatever those rules are because the rules of society are all made up. We just have all mutually agreed on them. So within theater, we're mutually agreeing on a different set of rules.for Suffs, the agreement is,
Erik Weihenmayer: I love what you're saying, it's like a different reality that you walk into. It is! Yeah, I love this. Okay, keep talking though, I interrupted.
Jenna Bainbridge: And it's escapism for a few hours, right?
You get to enter into a different world with a different set of rules and different expectations. And that's nice, for a couple hours, just to be somewhere else. So, our rules, in our theater, are, we're gonna burst into song and dance. in your face for three hours. We are going to have only women and non binary folks on this stage.
So all of the male roles are played by women and non binary folks. Love it. Um, so they are femme presenting. and wearing men's clothing. So if you see a short wig, that's a guy. Even if you can tell, no, that's a woman wearing that suit. Yep. But I've got a short wig on, so I'm a guy.
And yeah, there's also elements of like, my wheelchair did not exist in 1913. I have a Ty Lite Aero Z, wonderful aerodynamic titanium wheelchair. That did not exist in 1913.
Erik Weihenmayer: Right. Right.
Jenna Bainbridge: But we are not doing any set dressing to make you, think this is a 1913 era wheelchair because that doesn't make sense. We don't need that. So there's also a willful suspension of, we are telling you the rules and the rules are when you see me in my wheelchair, I am a non disabled person. All right. And we're just going to agree to that. And so for those few hours there, you can just kind of escape whatever current society you're in and escape into ours.
And, I love that. So I also think that, when there's some plays, the rules are realism, right? Some movies, it is, this is real. This is now these characters are people, you know. Um, and in those instances, I feel like, yes, you, if you have a disabled character that needs to be portrayed by a disabled actor. And generally, I feel like if you have disabled characters, no matter what the rules of your show are, they should be played by disabled actors because we are so underrepresented.
So, for now, every single disabled role needs to be played by a disabled actor. End of sentence, end of story. At a certain point, I hope we get to a world where it is equitable, and, you know, once we reach that point of, 20 percent of the roles are played by disabled people, then we can mix it up a little bit.
Then I'm okay with it. But until we have equity. Right. I, I don't think it is, safe. Yeah. To allow other people to explore the disabled experience until disabled people get to tell that story and set that narrative for themselves.
Erik Weihenmayer: Yeah. For a while. Yeah. Until it becomes ordinary. Which we're far from that point.
So it sounds you as an actor, you probably would take any good role. but like sometimes it's, it could be somebody saying, Hey, we have a role for a woman in a chair and somebody and others, it might just be, we have a role for a great actor and we think you fit it. And you happen to be in a chair, like it can be across the board.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yes. And generally, I far prefer the second one.
Erik Weihenmayer: Yeah.
Jenna Bainbridge: I've auditioned for a number of things that I know the only reason I am reading for it is because I am disabled. I'm not right for this character. I'm not, you know, I wouldn't be considered for this if the character and myself were both non disabled.
There's no way I would be seen for it, for some of these parts. So, you know, obviously I hope that eventually we get to a point where it's just, You're a great performer. This is a great role for you. that's how we're casting. But it has opened some, some interesting doors. Like you said, Richard III, I've gotten to play.
And, I know that the reason I was looked at was, oh great, you have a disability. And I was able to show a different side of my acting for that character that I don't think people would normally expect for me to be able to present. So I'm grateful for it. Sometimes it like people look at me and go like, Oh, well, like maybe you can do this.
And,I love getting to stretch and see what these different characters feel like in, in my body. But you're right. I just love good roles, whether they are disabled or not. I just, I love being able to sink my teeth into something really interesting and dynamic, whether they have a disability or not. Because at the end of the day, when I'm playing them, They will have a disability because I have a disability.
Erik Weihenmayer: The world has changed, and it's changing, it's getting better, there are more roles for people with different backgrounds and circumstances. But I guess I'm throwing a negative spin on this that maybe you react to.
Um, because, I remember when I was applying with different speakers bureaus. I applied to the first one, and I heard word back, Oh, you know, we liked him, but we already have a blind speaker. You know what I mean? And so I feel like the world's changing, but I don't always feel like the world is embracing the value, the importance of diversity and inclusion.
It's like box checking right now. Like we're, I actually have called it the box checking stage of evolution. And maybe that's super negative. What's your experience with that?
Jenna Bainbridge: I completely agree. I I feel like a lot of institutions are viewing it as a box to check and forgetting that disability and all diversity are just human experiences.
And,I once worked with a director that I loved. I had a great time doing a show with him, and the next year I auditioned again, and was told like, oh Jenna, I really wanted to cast you, I had so much fun working with you last year, but, you know, we really felt like we'd already kind of done that.
Meaning, we'd already cast a disabled person and we couldn't do that two years in a row.
Erik Weihenmayer: Wow, yeah. And I was like, Yeah, you're speaking exactly, yeah.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yeah, and like half of the actors on that stage are people you worked with last year, you didn't do that last year? You're like. It's just because I have a disability that you're like, oh, well, we already did that.
And I would say, 90 percent of the time, I am the only disabled person.
Erik Weihenmayer: Yeah.
Jenna Bainbridge: In a show. In a room. You're like, you could have two of us. Or at least the only person who identifies.
Erik Weihenmayer: Maybe two of us. Exactly! Three of us.
Jenna Bainbridge: Right!
Erik Weihenmayer: There's no rule against, you know.
Jenna Bainbridge: There's no rule. No rule. And also, I think that there's also this weird expectation like, oh, well, if we cast a disabled person, if we hire a disabled person, then we have to explain why.
So like, you know, especially for me, if I'm auditioning to be a bank teller in the background of a Law Order episode, right? They're like, oh, well, then we'd have to explain why the bank teller has a disability. And I'm like, no, you don't. You really don't. I also have the right to just exist in the background.
Disabled people do all kinds of jobs. Disabled people exist in every aspect of society.We have the right to just exist. There can be two of us. There can be twelve of us. There can, there is no limit to inclusion, other than your own mindset. And I wish that people would kind of move past, on the one hand, I understand that the checkbox is, important right now because it means that at least people are going, like, okay, great, we're including disability, we didn't forget to include disability.
Right. But we also have to move past it of, now this is just part of how you are casting, how you are hiring, that it's not checking a box. It's, it's. making sure that disability is part of your mindset and part of your inclusion practices.
Erik Weihenmayer: Yeah. There's a lot of room to grow. So Jenna, so you had mentioned your cool titanium wheelchair. And so I have this friend, Hugh Herr.he's a co founder of No Barriers and he's a double leg amputee.and and he's like always sporting these like incredible legs with he's built legs for people that are see through. I've seen folks, not seen, did I just say seen? I've had described people with their prosthetic legs like that are, are American flags or, if they're like, real patriotic people.
Jenna Bainbridge: Fashion statements. I love it.
Erik Weihenmayer: And he calls it machine beauty. And so, uh, does your chair become like a fashion statement? I think that'd be cool, like beautiful earrings or you know, a certain way we paint your nails or whatever, would there be a way to make your chair like something like cool, sexy, exciting, you know what I mean? Like as an enhancer.
Jenna Bainbridge: Yes, I, so I personally have a very kind of boring nondescript art. Like black titanium wheelchair because it is my only wheelchair. And I have to use it on stage and in auditions.
Erik Weihenmayer: Do hot blue one?
Jenna Bainbridge: So funny, I had a lime green one, an acid green one when I was in high school that I loved.
But, you know, so, so now I have this kind of very nondescript one just so that, when I'm auditioning, it's the same mentality that they tell you of, like, when you're auditioning, you want to be a blank slate. You want them to be able to imagine things onto you, yadda yadda, so I have this very nondescript wheelchair.
But I really, I'm getting a new wheelchair and it is something I've thought about. It's what if I got like a hot pink wheelchair? And like, there are companies now that make inserts for the inside of the wheel to be like fashion statements. And they are so cool. I've got a couple of the people I follow on Instagram use them.
And like, I love when people make, they're wheelchairs fashion statements. A friend of mine has light up wheels. Cool. So it's like these like neon rims. There you go. Such cool extras. And I love it. I mean, It is. It's a part of your outfit. It's a part of your day to day expression. And you know, I just have like, I've got patches that I put on the back of my wheelchair cause I've got like a little Velcro strip that I'll put patches on it.
And primarily they have variations on don't touch me. because people always will insist on trying to push my wheelchair for me, which is super frustrating. But I do also have like little patches that will, say other cute things on them because I just think it's a wonderful way to continue to accessorize and... Wheelchairs are cool, wheelchairs are sexy, and the more that we can embrace them, the better life is.
Erik Weihenmayer: When we get your new one, send us a photo and Dee will describe it to me.
Jenna Bainbridge: I will, I will.
Erik Weihenmayer: Yeah, sweet. Jenna, thank you so much for sharing an hour with the No Barriers community when you're so busy and you have this amazing play. that I'm sure is at the top of your mind all the time. You're a total pioneer.
It's exciting to, pick your brain and, uh, thanks for all the joy and beauty and entertainment and art you're bringing to the world in such a new and fresh way. It's super cool. So good to meet you. Thank you.
Jenna Bainbridge: Nice to meet you. Thank you so much for having me. This has been wonderful, fulfilling conversation and, uh, I'm really stoked to be here.
Erik Weihenmayer: And cool. And I will quote unquote, see you when I'm in New York.
Jenna Bainbridge: Amazing. Can't wait to meet you in person.
Erik Weihenmayer: Alright, thanks. Thanks, Jenna. Thanks to everyone. No Barriers. Come to our What's Your Everest event at Chautauqua in Boulder, September 7th. You can sign up at NoBarriersUSA. org. I hope we have a big group of people that are at the theater with us that day and hiking with us that morning.
It's going to be amazing. I'll be there too. So thanks everyone. Thanks Jenna.
Jenna Bainbridge: Thank you
Didrik Johnck: The production team behind this podcast includes producer Didrik Johnck, that's me, and audio engineer Tyler Kottman. Special thanks to the Dan Ryan Band for our intro song Guidance. And thanks to all of you for listening. If you enjoyed this show, please subscribe, share it, and hey, we'd be thrilled for a review. Show notes can be found at NoBarriersPodcast. com. There's also a link there to shoot me an email with any suggestions or guest ideas for the show. Thanks so much and have a great day.
