“I mean, it’s training, I think too, but it’s actually nepotism because I can’t do a project without it (Ziegler),” said Sai. “I do not want. I wouldn’t make art if I didn’t include it. “
Sia said that on the first day of rehearsals, Ziegler was very concerned that the public might think she was “mocking” the autism community, to which Sia replied, “I won’t let that happen. And last week I realized that I couldn’t really I won’t protect you from that. I thought I could. “
The singer said he sent a preview of the film to the non-profit educational organization Child Mind Institute, which gave Ziegler a “100% performance accuracy” rating.
“I realized that there are some things I can’t protect you from,” she said of the ex-18-year-old Dance Moms star who has been the avatar / muse of the advertising-shy singer for over six years, starring in several of Sia’s most beloved videos and participating in several live performances. She even referred to herself as Maddie’s “bonus mom”, a phrase she recently discovered and quickly turned into “1,000 T-shirts” that she wears all the time.
Despite making a film that seems to have all the characteristics of a musical film, Sia told the program that she “really hates musicals”, explaining that it originally should have been a direct narrative film. “I turned it into what I think was a musical that I could watch or tolerate,” she said. “Because there’s something that seems so extravagant about musicals that I just couldn’t seem to reconcile.”
Sia had a strong reaction to the criticisms that emerged in the first trailer for the feature film, urging her detractors to see him first, then judge his work. “Grrrrrrrrrr. F – kity f – k why don’t you watch my movie before judging it? FURY”, the singer tweeted in November after dropping the one-minute preview that introduced Ziegler’s non-verbal character, who communicates with the world through music and dance.
When Irish actress Bronagh Waugh tweeted, “Hi Sia, may I ask you why you didn’t cast an actor with a disability for this role? It is very offensive the way you chose to portray this character. People with disabilities are not broken and don’t need repairs. My friends have different disabilities and are some of the … The nicest, most talented, the funniest, kindest and smartest people I know. They are also the most underrepresented and inaccurately represented group in our society. That kind of inaccurate, offensive representation causes so much pain. “
Sia answered, “I agree. I never referred to music as disabled. Special skills is what I always said, and putting someone on the level of functioning was cruel, not kind, so I made the executive decision that we would do our best to represent the community lovingly.”
Sia wrote the script and 10 original songs for the accompanying album and told commentators that she spent three years doing research and revealing that Music is based on an unidentified friend on the spectrum who “found it very stressful not to be verbal, and I made this film with nothing but love for him and his mother.” She also said that there are 13 people on the spectrum cast for the film and that two people on the spectrum were advising her all the time, calling the film “a love letter to caregivers and the autism community”.
Watch the interview below.