EXCLUSIVE: Ten screenplays have been selected by the 1IN4 Coalition (1IN4), the WGAW Disabled Writers Committee and the Black List for the 2024 Disability List.
The selection reps the best in work from neurodivergent, Deaf, and disabled storytellers. It’s the third edition after launching in 2019.
“Storytelling from lived experience not only challenges misleading and often harmful narratives, it also adds nuance to characters and storylines for the wider audience to absorb. For this reason, since its inception in 2021, 1IN4 has completed three cycles of 1IN4 Writers, an accessible six month program that has provided disabled writers with varying identities with horizontal and vertical mentorship opportunities so they can continue honing their craft while they grow meaningful relationships. To find out one of the selected writers on the 2024 Disability List was a past 1IN4 Writer is humbling. A big congratulations to all! 1IN4 is grateful to the Black List and the WGAW Disabled Writers Committee for this collaboration,” said Dr. Grishma Shah on behalf of 1IN4 Coalition.
“Against a film and television landscape that often leaves disabled writers and stories as an afterthought, we are pleased to celebrate the talented artists on this list. Their work spans a wide range of perspectives, genres, and experiences — and their success shines a bright light on our community’s unique grit, empathy, and value,” said the WGAW Disabled Writers Committee co-chairs David Radcliff and Shea Mirzai and Vice Chair Jamey Perry.
“More than 1 in 4 American adults live with an apparent or non-apparent disability and an even larger percentage has at least one family member living with one,” said Black List founder Franklin Leonard. “Yet stories about the community and disabled writers remain some of the most overlooked by the industry. According to a 2022 report by the Writers Guild of America West, self-identified writers with disabilities make up less than 2% of WGAW members. We’re thrilled to work with 1IN4 and the WGAW’s Disabled Writers Committee to share the best features and pilots we could find from and about the disability community.”
Several writers on this year’s Disability List have received additional industry accolades for their work. Amir Zargara’s proof-of-concept for A Good Day Will Come screened at more than 50 film festivals around the world. Anthony Zonfrelli is an accomplished improv performer and the two-time winner of the Harvardwood Writers Competition. Melissa Kong’s Wonderful World was previously featured on the 2020 CAPE List. Nick Assunto is a UCB alum and a Black List Recommended Writer. Matthew Manson has worked extensively with brands such as AwesomenessTV, Funny Or Die, Nestle, and Zappos; Manson also received a production grant from acclaimed filmmaker Chris Columbus for his feature Wannabe.
Rick Cisario is a 2023 1IN4 Coalition and RespectAbility Fellow and has developed pilots with CBS and Andy Samberg’s Party Over Here. Gina & Lisa Gomez are a twin screenwriting team; their Disability List script The Starry Night also made it to the Top 50 of the Academy Nicholl Fellowship in 2016. Joseph Kibler is a popular disability advocate on social media platforms like Instagram and has appeared in television shows such as Criminal Minds and Chicago Med as an actor. Kryzz Gautier is an alum of Sundance Institute and Women in Film’s 2021 Financing Intensive and The Black List and Women in Film’s 2020 Episodic Lab; Wheels Come Off also was featured on the 2021 Black List and the 2024 GLAAD List.
The 2024 Disability List features a diverse array of voices and projects, ranging from inclusive rom-coms to dystopian visions of the future to biopics about beloved artists.
Below is this year’s list:
A GOOD DAY WILL COME – Amir Zargara (Feature)
When a champion Iranian wrestler’s sense of honor is tested by his country’s oppressive regime, he must choose between protecting his family and standing up for justice.
BOGGED DOWN – Anthony Zonfrelli (Pilot)
A big-hearted cranberry farmer, a vulgar smart-ass with cerebral palsy, and a blustering has-been jock are three brothers struggling to get along while enduring the antics of their wicked small town in rural Massachusetts.
DON’T WORRY ABOUT IT – Melissa Kong (Feature)
After her father’s death, a woman’s obsessive-compulsive disorder spirals out of control. She enters an intensive therapy program, where she must confront his death and her OCD before it takes over her life.
FUNNY BOY! – Nick Assunto (Feature)
Seeking a fresh idea to ignite his career, young Mel Brooks mounts a Hamlet musical on Broadway, but contends with a chaotic cast, the creepy theater owner, and the loan sharks who’ll kill him if the show fails.
GABY GUFFNER: DESTROYER OF WORLDS – Matthew Manson (Pilot)
Hyper anxious personal assistant Gaby must lead the last survivors of the human race – a misfit group of exploited workers – as they try to find a new home for humanity while battling infighting, perpetual debt, and evil alien oligarchs.
SUPPORTED – Rick Cisario (Pilot)
A recent college grad has a seizure while in bed with his ex-girlfriend. When it’s revealed that Epilepsy, not poison, was the cause, his overbearing mother forces him into a support group for chronically ill young adults, where he begins to learn that being sick is not a license to be a dick.
THE BOY IN THE NET – Matthew S. Wicks (Feature)
Years after a mysterious illness turned the world’s male population primitive and violent, a trauma-hardened survivor and her 10-year-old daughter live alone in the Alaskan wilderness. When the girl encounters a feral boy for the first time, her sheltered life comes unraveled, and she convinces her mother to embark on a perilous journey to return the child to his tribe.
THE STARRY NIGHT – Gina & Lisa Gomez (Feature)
Stuck in an asylum and suffering from an artistic block, Vincent van Gogh must recount the most traumatic memory of his life in order to paint his greatest masterpiece.
THE WAY WE WALK – Joseph Kibler (Feature)
A romantic comedy that follows a budding relationship between a disabled TV Staff Writer with CP and a newly quadriplegic former ballet dancer. As the relationship grows, the two challenge their perceptions of what it means to be disabled.
WHEELS COME OFF – Kryzz Gautier (Feature)
In the year 2065, a fiery teenager with a wild imagination, her paraplegic mom, and their clueless robot struggle to navigate the post-apocalypse; but when the mother’s wheelchair breaks, the trio must venture out into the dangerous outside for a chance to survive.
