How does the Fund work? 

The Disabled Consultant Futures Fund radically increases the leverage that disabled creatives who are asked to consult have by providing them a back-up offer to confidently negotiate to be hired as writers, directors and actors—their actual desired role. But if they aren’t able to achieve their desired role, the Fund will buy back their time by paying them 150% of the first offer to fund their own creative pursuits.

Why are you making this Fund? 

For far too long, disabled writers and performers have been hired as disability consultants for pennies on the dollar, giving their life experience and creative contributions to projects about disability that are usually helmed by non-disabled people. The clearest way to push back on this practice and push for the hiring of disabled creatives in the roles they actually desire, is to give disabled creatives the tools to negotiate for the positions they want while giving them comfort that they have an alternative option to redistribute their energy towards advancing their own creative endeavors if their negotiation is not successful.   

Why isn’t it enough to just cast authentically? 

The vast majority of the film and television projects that contemplate disability or have disabled characters were written by and helmed by non-disabled people. This means nearly all of the films and television shows about the disability community remain created and controlled by people who are not part of the community. 

It’s unacceptable for any historically marginalized community to lack agency over their own stories and narratives. While allyship is important, it cannot come at the expense of accelerating and empowering disabled storytellers of all backgrounds.  

Casting authentically, while a recommended practice, does not make up for the reality that nearly all of the people in charge of the project are non-disabled, thus few, if any, disabled people end up being in positions of power on the project. 

Does the Fund apply to film and television projects? 

It applies to both. 

For television projects, the existence of multiple seats in the writers’ room creates ample opportunities for projects to employ disabled writers at multiple levels. 

For film projects, films with disabled lead characters that lack a disabled writer or director will only be accepted as a Qualified Consulting Offer at this time. This limitation exists because there are fewer writers and directors working on any given film compared to a television show—and our strong preference is that films with disabled lead characters should, at minimum, have a disabled co-writer and/or a disabled director. 

Films that have disabled supporting characters and disabled writers are a plus, but there is no expectation or precedent for a one-to-one correlation between the identities of all of a film’s characters and the identities of the writers, which is more reasonable to expect in television given the existence of a writers’ room. 

How do I find disabled writers if I can’t hire consultants? 

Inevitable Foundation’s Concierge service is a free, high-touch service that connects creative executives, showrunners, and producers with mid-career disabled screenwriters for development and staffing. We created the Concierge because there was no central place for industry professionals to discover, read, and meet mid-career disabled writers. Since launch, the Concierge has fielded over 500 requests from more than 140 different executives and showrunners. Over 100 of those requests have led to meetings with companies including Disney, Amazon, Apple, Paramount, AMC Networks, Lionsgate, and Starz. In the last three months alone, the Concierge has generated over $250,000 in earnings for disabled writers. 

If you are looking to fill your development slate and/or staff a show, email concierge@inevitable.foundation to connect with fantastic mid- and upper-level disabled writers.

Will this Fund have a chilling effect on disability representation in the industry? 

The current wave of stories with disability representation are mostly created by non-disabled people. At best, disabled actors and maybe one disabled writer get hired on a project—but this is the exception, not the rule. 

We recognize this Fund might encourage non-disabled people to stop incorporating disability into their work. Instead, it should lead non-disabled people to put disabled creatives in positions of power, which will give them the choice to center their own community in their work if they so desire since disabled writers don’t write solely about disability. 

Every historically marginalized community should be in control of their own stories and narratives, and the largest minority group in America is no exception.  

Are you tracking what companies are the highest users of disability consulting? 

Yes, and we plan to publish those results at a later date. 

I have another question. 

Please contact us at advocacy@inevitable.foundation