February 10, 2005

New film to air nationally on PBS

By Diane Chiddister

When Joanne Caputo first saw Greg Smith, they were waiting in front of Mills Lawn School with many other parents for the school’s annual Halloween parade to begin.

Smith, who weighs 68 pounds and rides in a wheelchair, caught Caputo’s eye, but she didn’t introduce herself, as she normally would have. Rather, she observed him from a distance.

Her response was, she now realizes, the sort of reaction that many people have when they encounter someone who is disabled.

“There is something that happens at a deep level when we come across someone with a severe disability,” she said in an interview last week. “It makes us vulnerable, as if we think it could happen to us. It pushes us away from that person.”

A filmmaker, Caputo has spent much of the past four years immersed in the world of Smith, a radio host and motivational speaker. The result is a documentary film, “On a Roll: Family, Disability and the American Dream,” which will be broadcast nationally on the PBS series “Independent Lens” on Tuesday, Feb. 15. Locally, the show will air at 10 p.m. on WPTD channel 16.

Caputo hopes that people come away from the film with two insights. First, she hopes to convey that disabled people are whole people, whose lives embrace so much more than their disability. Second, she hopes that people realize that no one is immune from the struggles disabled people face each day.

“I would like people to take away from the film that to be able-bodied is a temporary situation, that disability can become a part of our lives at any moment,” she said.

She also hopes that the film helps to diminish people’s fear and discomfort around people with disabilities.

“The film takes you into the world of disability with a charming and intelligent guy,” she said.

Caputo got to know Smith after their children began playing together, and she found herself a frequent visitor at the Livermore Street home where Smith lived at the time with his parents, Jim and Adelle Smith, and his children. She was surprised to find that Smith was broadcasting his nationally syndicated radio program, “On a Roll — Talk Radio on Life & Disability,” from his bedroom.

“He looks so tiny but he has that booming voice,” Caputo said of Smith, who was born with muscular dystrophy. “And there he was, pulling that off. I was fascinated with the energy he was putting out for his show.”

After Smith agreed to be filmed, Caputo started following him through his life, whenever she could afford to shoot. The film includes interviews with Smith’s parents, children and ex-wife, plus considerable footage in which Smith goes about his daily life, struggling with issues of parenting, marriage and the challenges that he faces each day with even the most mundane activities.

Caputo also accompanied Smith to Washington, D.C., in 2000, where he spoke at a ceremony celebrating the 10th anniversary of the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act. In Washington, Caputo filmed as Smith encountered the everyday difficulties of the disabled, such as having no transportation, since Washington taxis were not wheelchair-accessible. And although Smith’s hotel had promised him a personal aide to help him with bathing and dressing, there was no aide available when he arrived.

At those moments, Caputo was faced with the challenge of filming a disabled person and having to decide when to keep filming and when to put down the camera to help Smith.

In Washington, Caputo put down the camera to help Smith get ready to deliver a speech. And at a different time, Caputo served as Smith’s personal aide on a trip to Japan, because performing that function was the only way her trip could be funded.

In Japan, she bathed Smith, helped him in and out of bed and dressed him. At one point she put the camera on the toilet to film as she bathed his tiny body.

“I think I handled it discreetly, but the viewer needs to see what he deals with,” she said.

That unorthodox relationship between filmmaker and subject resulted in a film that “Independent Lens” lauded for its sense of intimacy, according to Caputo.

The film also looks at other often unpublicized issues in the lives of the disabled, including facilitated sexuality. And interviews with Smith and his ex-wife raise the difficult issue of her sometimes lashing out physically in anger at her disabled husband.

“It’s not all comfortable,” said Caputo. “I believe they’re an example of the broader problem of caretaker abuse, and they had the courage to talk about it.”

Caputo estimates that she spent about $100,000 making the film, including travel expenses, fees for additional camera people, legal fees and the composition of a musical score, a figure that does not include her own countless hours of labor. She received $75,000 in acquisition fees from “Independent Lens” to finish the film, and raised about $33,000 in grants from various foundations, including the Ohio Arts Council.

However, the final costs of the film have still not been covered, said Caputo, who would appreciate donations from any interested persons.

Tax-deductible donations may be made if the donation is sent to the Yellow Springs Arts Council, P.O. Box 459, in Yellow Springs, with the specification that the donation go to the film. In addition, Caputo will sell DVDs for $19.95 each to help cover costs.

People can also donate to the film or Caputo’s future projects by visiting the film’s Web site, onarolldocumentary.com.

Now that “On a Roll” is complete, Caputo is thinking ahead to future projects. She has started or conceived of four new films, including “Inside Out,” which looks at the role of art in prison; “Letters from Frank,” about love letters from a soldier in World War II; and “Peggy and Nate,” about a mother and son struggling with obesity and poverty. She also plans to make a film about Margaret Garner, a runaway slave whose life Caputo has researched extensively and about whom she has written two books.

Caputo still sits down to watch “On a Roll,” and more often than not finds herself once again moved by the story of the tiny man with the big voice who lives a difficult life with grace and courage.