Let’s hope the story of disability-rights activist Arthur Campbell Jr. is never turned into a made-for-TV movie. Nothing could do justice to the life of this crotchety, intelligent man afflicted with cerebral palsy, as PBS’ “P.O.V.” documentary series superbly shows at 11 p.m. Tuesday on WTTW-Ch. 11.
Shot by filmmaker Walter Brock, with a script written by Campbell himself, the hourlong program shows that just because people are disabled that doesn’t mean they’re not thinking, feeling and vital.
“Don’t you know that people don’t want to watch a film about someone like me?” Campbell asks in “If I Can’t Do It.” He’s probably right. A look into his world is uncompromising. We see Campbell drooling as he tries to speak words that need subtitles because they’re so garbled (narrator Nick Stump helps give superb “voice” to Campbell’s feelings.). Watch as he messily shaves and cooks for himself, and experience his struggles to get around with limbs that flail uncontrollably.
“Nothing in my life prepared me for my first sight of Arthur. What kind of life could this guy possibly have?” Brock says in the show, which is part of a project about disability issues he was commissioned in 1987 to film by the state of Kentucky. “Maybe the most meaningful thing would be to put him out of his misery.”
“A decade later,” Brock continues, “this initial reaction still haunts me. Where does such prejudice come from?”
Campbell’s story should be seen, not only because it offers a unique perspective into lives of the disabled, but because Campbell in particular is pretty fascinating. Especially compelling are tales of his family and early life, which Brock fashions with the help of photographs and archival film.
Born with cerebral palsy in a Kentucky mountain cabin in 1944 (his head was stuck in his mother’s womb for 24 hours), Campbell spent the first 38 years of his life in the care of a large family that included an overprotective mother and an alcoholic father who verbally abused him. Campbell says his father once yelled how “it made him sick to watch me eat.”
Campbell was lucky to have formed a bond with his sister Sue, who took care to try to understand her brother’s speech patterns. She never really thought of him as disabled, because “he just would figure a new way to do things that other people didn’t,” she says.
Unfortunately, however, Campbell grew up in a time when little was known about cerebral palsy, a disorder that affects the central nervous system. Those who suffered from it usually were consigned to a mental hospital.
It was Campbell’s good fortune that psychiatric tests were run to determine his mental abilities when he was in his late 30s. Even then the tests were given only because of a near-fatal hunger strike Campbell undertook in frustration over his prisonlike home situation.
When the tests determined that Campbell could function on his own, a new world opened for him. This is when “If I Can’t Do It” turns from a story about the Campbell family into a portrait of the struggles of the disabled. Although still compelling, it isn’t as uniquely personal as it is when dealing with the Campbell family.
After spending a little time on Campbell’s new independence (getting a motorized wheelchair, moving in with a roommate, falling for a stripper who eventually uses and abandons him), Campbell is seen getting involved in the political movement aimed at attaining more rights for the disabled.
Campbell’s participation started in 1984, when he took part in demonstrations at two Denver fast-food restaurants that didn’t have adequate access for disabled patrons. The protest was sponsored by the American Disabled for Accessible Public Transportation, (ADAPT) a guerrilla activist group now known as Americans Disabled for Attendant Programs.
Fueled by the experience, Campbell spent two years spearheading a battle for better access for disabled people on the transit system in Louisville, Ky., where he lived.
Campbell eventually went to Washington, D.C., to protest on behalf of disabled rights, and his participation helped push through the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990.
“Before I got out of my parents’ house, I thought my problems were unique,” Campbell says. “That is, until I began to be around other disabled people, and I discovered how similar our stories were.”
“If I Can’t Do It” doesn’t gloss over Campbell’s affliction or his personality. He may seem pushy, rude and a general pain in the rear. You may not like him, but you can’t help but respect him.
Incidentally, the title is a perfect reflection of Campbell’s spirit, which is reflected in his motto: “If I can’t do it, it ain’t worth doing.”
– Where’s the remote: The 69th annual baseball All-Star Game is Tuesday on NBC with Denver as host, and the Cubs’ Sammy Sosa (no Kerry Wood?) and the White Sox’s Ray Durham (no Frank Thomas?) represent Chicago. Play ball at 7 p.m. on WMAQ-Ch. 5.
