Our response to feedback on our new disability features

Equity and Spotlight announce their commitment to working together to improve opportunities for Deaf and disabled creatives as a priority for 2021 - Published 13 January 2021

During last year mistakes were made in the lead up to the launch of Spotlight's new disability features, which is a matter of deep regret. Since November both Equity and Spotlight have been in discussion and reflected on what went wrong.

Spotlight accepted responsibility for the problematic formatting of a feature designed to help Deaf and disabled artists in the casting process and both organisations accept that the project, which had initially arisen as a request from Equity, had the best of intentions.

The outcome of recent discussions is that we agree this incident should not derail the urgent work needed to improve accessibility in this industry. We are determined to redouble our efforts during this year to develop a better approach that achieves fairness and equality for members of the Deaf and disabled creative community.

Further statement - Published 9 November 2020

Concerns have been expressed that Spotlight unilaterally made the changes to its website which have been the subject of so much anxiety this last week. We appreciate that, without the full context being available, people can only react to what they see and hear and that the concept and intentions behind these new features can therefore be misunderstood. We think it is important to clarify that we have been guided by subject matter experts throughout and have taken the advice we received very seriously.

We consulted with Equity for many years ahead of this launch and we wish to clarify that the inclusion of the fourth option when creating a breakdown came about as part of this joint work. It was a specific request made to us to provide an option to address the need for casting directors and producers to provide clear, transparent justification for any scenario where limitations are placed on options to cast D/deaf and disabled actors. Other areas we were advised on also included the new overview categories to display a disability and the ability to have full control if this information is publicly published on a profile without also limiting the ability to be found. 

We fully acknowledge, as set out in our previous statement below, that there were issues around our implementation of this section which we accept could have been clearer. In particular, we should have ensured that the reason for an exemption was made mandatory. We are sorry for any distress this has caused. The whole feature was swifty removed having been live for less than one business day.

We remain committed to working alongside Equity, other organisations and this community to help increase awareness, to educate our industry, and to promote these talented performer members to casting directors.

Original statement - Published 3 November 2020

We wanted to acknowledge the feedback we have received since the launch of our updated platform (released on Saturday 31st October) regarding our new disability casting feature and assure you of our commitment to ensuring we get inclusivity right on Spotlight in the future. 

We understand that our D/deaf and disabled members have, rightly, been upset by this issue, which we unreservedly apologise for - we have championed inclusivity practices within the industry for many years and our aim was to further develop this work. But we got the process wrong on this occasion, and can totally understand why, seeing this statement out of any context, members could feel hurt or angry. We are heartbroken ourselves that such a major project for us, built to promote inclusivity within our industry, has caused such upset for our members.

We have previously been asked directly by industry leaders to include an area when submitting a casting where hirers can express their commitment to inclusive casting for disabled performers within their projects, make clear when they are only looking for disabled performers for their projects and also have filters to find those with specific disabilities they need for their projects. It was also requested that we have another section where hirers could set out when/how they have related exemptions under the Equality Act, so that there is complete transparency within the casting process for all disabled performers. 

In a wish to support our disabled members, and seek to ensure hirers are always considering inclusivity when casting, we acted on this feedback, but it is clear that the initial wording and the functionality of that specific section released on launch did not meet our aims, and has caused some confusion and upset. Where there was a lack of obvious explanatory text (other than in an associated help bubble) and the further information box not being mandatory (for casting users to further set out specific background and relevant exemption information), this header, as it stood, could seem to imply that no disabled performers could be considered for a project, which is absolutely not the intention.

As the feature is very new, it may also have been unclear to hirers how to use this part of the site. This header has now been removed to ensure that there is no further confusion and that no further breakdowns go out with this header alone on them.

We will now be conducting a review to consider how best to proceed. As part of this review we will aim to speak to a range of relevant organisations and individuals to understand whether their feeling is that we should continue to work towards this type of transparency around casting breakdowns, and if so how best to redesign the feature, or if it is felt more widely that we should not intervene at all and instead just connect relevant industry organisations/individuals with hirers to address the feedback we continue to receive from our disabled members, and which concerns us greatly, regarding issues they face within the casting process.

We genuinely welcome all feedback, and so please contact us via [email protected] if you would like to share your thoughts on the best way forward, or if you would be willing to be contacted as part of the review process to provide your detailed feedback.