A disabled actor has called for improved representation for disabled performers in the entertainment industry – and specifically an end to what activists call “cripping up” – casting non-disabled actors in disabled character roles.
Marissa Bode, who plays the prominent role of Nessarose Thropp in the hit film musical Wicked and its sequel Wicked: For Good, told The Guardian: “I really hope my casting sets precedent.”
She added: “It’s just navigating a world and a system that we have just not been acknowledged in as we should be.”
The Guardian reported that when she was cast in Wicked, Bode made history as the first disabled actor to play Nessarose, a character who is a wheelchair user. But she added that since the stage version premiered in 2003, only non-disabled actors had played the role.
Bode is calling on casting directors to follow Wicked director Jon M Chu’s lead to use disabled actors for disabled roles, and also to cast disabled actors in other roles where the character’s physical ability is not specified.
The actor added that her experience on the set of Wicked was overwhelmingly positive thanks to the presence of a disability coordinator, Chantelle Nassari, also a wheelchair user, who was tasked with ensuring accessibility on set.
She said: “That was one less thing I had to worry about and I could just go in and do the job.”
Bode told The Guardian that physical access barriers and a lack of willingness to modify them almost stopped her from performing on stage earlier in her career: “I’ve experienced a lot of inaccessibility in general throughout my life.”
After the release of the first Wicked film in November 2024, Bode was even targeted on social media.
The Guardian reported that she responded on TikTok: “Not liking Nessa is OK, it’s totally fine because she’s fictional! Aggressive comments and jokes about Nessa’s disability itself is deeply uncomfortable because disability is not fictional, at the end of the day.”
In November, Bode received the Christopher Reeve acting award at the 2025 Media Access awards, a celebration of disability representation in the media. The honour aims to support up-and-coming disabled actors but Bode says unawareness about disability persists in the industry.
She said: “I do my best to hold a lot of empathy for those that do get it wrong. We just don’t have any education surrounding disability or the type of language that is appropriate or that we should use.”
Bode added that she wants to see more disabled people making their own art: “I think it’s important that we are telling our own stories a lot of the time.”