This is our yearly entry into the Easterseals Disability Film Challenge. This year’s theme was changed to documentary at the last minute due to the pandemic so we decided to let the kiddos tell their own story.
Conan in the Cloud
In “Workflow From Home” Episode 5, Michael Cioni takes you behind the scenes of the TBS late-night show “Conan” to find out how they shifted to a fully remote workflow. Lead editor Robert Ashe shows us how they’re working from home and using Frame.io (http://frame.io/) to produce four shows every week.
Post Perspective - How being a special needs dad helps me be a better editor at Conan →
I have been working in late night television for Conan O’Brien for nearly 10 years, currently as the lead editor for Conan on the TBS network. Late night television has an extraordinarily demanding pace. An old colleague of mine used to refer to it as the “speed chess” of editing. It demands that your first instincts when editing are the best ones. The pace also puts extraordinary pressure on your writers and producers. I like to think of editors as the pilots hired to bring the plane in for a landing that may have already lost an engine, so it’s important that you maintain balance and focus.
I am the father to three amazing kiddos with special needs. My first daughter was born with the amyoplasia form of arthrogryposis multiplex congenita. She is also nonverbal. My youngest daughter was born with amniotic banding syndrome. For her, it means she only has a few fully developed fingers and a prosthesis on one of her legs. We’ve addressed her physical challenges through surgery and she has lots of fun sprinting around with her “robot leg,” which is what we call her prosthesis. We are in the middle of adopting our son and hope to bring him home in the fall. He has similar orthopedic challenges to our second daughter.
I take my jobs as editor and as a father very seriously, but it is also important to note that I am happy. Here are some things that I have learned over the years. I have made mistakes in every one of these rules, but I try every day to be better.
Made in Frame: The Conan O'Brien Show →
On January 11, 2018, Donald J. Trump, the sitting POTUS, called the Caribbean nation of Haiti a “s***hole.” The mainstream news outlets did little more than give airtime to the usual talking heads clapping back, while most of the late night talk show hosts capitalized on the ready-made monologue material.
But at a time when a few humorists are doing some of the most important journalistic work on TV (John Oliver and Bassem Youssef come to mind), Conan O’Brien decided, right then and there, to travel to Haiti in order to set the record straight. It wasn’t an unprecedented move—he’d previously done shows from Mexico, Israel, Armenia, and more.
What was different was the time frame.
CHLA - Young Girl with a Prosthetic Leg is Unstoppable
The Mighty - How 'Scarman' Helped Me Understand My Daughter's Disability →
Five years ago, my daughter was born with a rare condition called arthrogryposis as well as additional cognitive delays. My wife quickly gravitated towards the internet support community to learn as much as she could, while I was feeling stuck, asking myself the larger questions about my daughter’s path in life. Right after her first birthday, we found ourselves attending a National Support Conference for Arthrogryposis. It was there I met “Scarman.”
Ward “Scarman” Foley was born with arthrogryposis and has spent the last 30 years giving speeches across the nation and abroad. He is also a published author and hospice volunteer. He spoke at that conference and engaged new parents, old parents, teens and adults who had never met another person with the same condition. These were his words:
The Mighty - An Open Letter to Tim Cook, Apple's CEO, From a Parent of a Child With a Disability →
My name is Robert James Ashe. We’ve never had the pleasure of meeting but I’ve been a huge admirer of both, you and Apple, for a very long time. I’ve worked in film and television for the past 20 years using Mac products to plan, design, edit and create works to entertain the viewing public. In my household, you will find Macbook Pros, iPads, iPad Pros, iPhones and a really old mac pro used by myself and my wife. My oldest daughter uses her iPad as her voice. One of the biggest things I’ve always admired about Apple was their commitment to giving people with disabilities access to your equipment. It is because of this fact that I am writing you today to make one small humble request. I am requesting that you add medical terms to the Mac’s spelling dictionary. The word I personally am after is “arthrogryposis.”
The Mighty - Along the Way →
My first daughter was born with the amyoplasia form of arthrogryposis multiplex congenita. She has extremely low muscle tone on all four of her limbs, no bicep movement in her arms, her elbows don’t bend all the way and her knees don’t straighten. She is also nonverbal and currently participates in ABA therapythroughout the week.
My youngest daughter was born with amniotic banding syndrome, for her, it means she only has a few fully developed fingers and she had to have her leg amputated. She’s addressed her physical challenges through surgery and has lots of fun sprinting around with her “robot leg,” which is what we call her prosthesis.
I take my job as a father of a child with disabilities very seriously, but it is also important to note that I am happy. I have two beautiful daughters and an amazing wife.
Here are some things I have learned along the way that I think can help anyone who knows a family like mine:
Congenital Hyperinsulinism - The Sugar Soiree →
We also give special thanks to Conan O’Brien for being an entertaining host extraordinaire. He lit up the room with laughter and wit. The short video created by Robert Ashe of Conan’s team was a succinct and moving telling of the CHI story. We give thanks to all who participated in the making of the film.
Scarman on Amazon Prime →
We are not given a bad life or a good life. We are given a life and it's up to us to make it good or bad". Scarman is a short documentary about author and public speaker Ward 'Scarman' Foley. Directed by Two-time Emmy Nominee Robert James Ashe.