Award Shows February 27, 2022
Why Troy Kotsur Was ‘Thrilled’ to Cuss in ‘CODA’
“Extra’s” Jenn Lahmers and Special Correspondent Adam Glassman spoke with Troy Kotsur at the 2022 SAG Awards, where his movie “CODA” won big!
Hours before he won Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role, Kotsur discussed his character, saying, “I was so thrilled to finally show what vulgar ASL looks like on the big screen — most hearing people have never seen that before. When I read the script, I was like, ‘Oh, are you ready?’”
Kotsur beat Jared Leto (“House of Gucci”), Bradley Cooper (“Licorice Pizza”), Ben Affleck (“The Tender Bar”), and Kodi Smit-McPhee (“The Power of the Dog”) for the coveted award.
He added, “I was thrilled to finally show that part of our deaf culture, we’ve already seen all your hearing swear words with subtitles. I’m used to it, but where was our opportunity? Here it was... it was so fun to play the character Frank.”
Aside from Troy’s win, the movie took home Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture
As for why the story resonates with people, he commented, “I really hope that Hollywood beings to think outside the box and begin to open their hearts and minds and really, there’s so many wonderful stories to tell from the deaf community and all of these diverse communities have so many great stories to tell, so it’s so nice to see Hollywood being to have a cultural shift and make these small improvements and have more access for us as deaf people. I’m so happy to make that impact and I hope don’t look at me because I’m deaf. I’m just an actor who happens to be deaf if you see what I mean.”
Kotsur opened up about working with his co-star Marlee Matlin, who he knew before working on “CODA.” He revealed, “I worked with Marlee on several projects in the past… I directed her in an independent film and we had one scene, a short scene on a TV show, but we became familiar with each other and she would come see me perform onstage at Deaf West Theatre in L.A. for many years, so we got to know each other a bit and she recognized my work and then that led to me joining the cast of ‘CODA,’ which was amazing and so fun to work with her… we knew our craft and our instruments, we trusted each other and we wanted to really give it our best and we did.”
