Elliot Hedley: Disability Advocate One Song and One Documentary at a Time

The disability community must have self-advocates. Meet Elliot Hedley, budding songwriter, filmmaker, and screenwriter on why being a voice for his community is so important.

 

TRANSCRIPT

 

Elliot Hedley: Disability Advocate One Song and One Documentary at a Time

 

00:19

Welcome back to DDA's Encouraging Abilities podcast. I'm your host, DDA Communications Manager, Evan Kelly. Now with me today is a friend of the association, Mr. Elliot Headley. Elliot is an extremely creative self advocate who creates music and films, which we're gonna talk heavily about. Having studied film at Capilano University, he uses his craft and abilities as a tool for advocacy.

 

00:45

Navigating life with cerebral palsy, he dedicates himself to uplifting the voices of individuals with disabilities. His commitment extends beyond the screen. He actively participates as a peer mentor in the possibilities...

 

00:59

Social Media Fellowship. Now Possibilities is another organization here in the lower mainland that supports people with disabilities. He operates his YouTube channel Red Fighter Productions 96 where he showcases some of his advocacy work and music. So Elliot, happy to have you here today. Thank you very much. Okay so Elliot, tell me a little bit more about yourself in terms of the music and film and stuff. So film, like it's not a film. Film

 

01:30

I became like, well, as a kid because my parents both are in the film industry. So yeah, so it's a whole big family thing. Oh, wow. So what did your parents do in the film industry here? Was it here? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, originally my mom was from London, so they costumed theater, right, make costumes for theater, originally. And then she transitioned to like costumes for film.

 

02:01

And my dad does props, same as my brother. So they build me props, like guards knives, et cetera. So. That is, so your brother does props as well. Yeah. That's really, you're right. That really is a family affair. Is it just you and your brother? I have a few more brothers, but they don't do the same thing as me and my brother. So you have a few more brothers. How many kids are in your family?

 

02:30

Um, so there's me, Jack, Eden, and Lee Baxter, about four of us. Cool. So, yeah, to their families, but yeah. But that's interesting that you're all involved in that. That must make it fairly easy for your mom and dad. Did they work together? I don't know if they're retired now, but do they work together on films and stuff? They used to, together. Yeah.

 

02:57

uh... the laughing but that did was got to know and now my mom is a off-duty so she is trained to do fifty without all our while is in the end uh... is that for physical disabilities or any sort of range of disabilities well it's what you would just a few non-disabled

 

03:25

I presume. Oh in July, oh wow, still working on it, that's amazing. Yeah, yeah. So anyway, we got distracted talking about your parents there, let's talk about you again. So you've grown up with cerebral palsy your entire life, how was that for you? At first it was tricky because people didn't understand me and even though the cerebral palsy is fixed in speech and physical

 

03:55

this phase. So, yeah, I did go to speech therapy for that. And also, thanks to my mom again, she got me a game called Rock Band. I think you've heard about it before. Oh, of course. Yeah. Yeah. So, the doctor said, oh, you're not going to be able to play guitar or do anything with your back hands. So I started playing like...

 

04:23

locked down to my left hand, like, it's okay, not doing anything big, but then over time, it was from like stuck in this one position to I can actually play notes.

 

04:37