Shoshannah Stern on her award-winning film, storied career, and Gallaudet memories

Shoshannah Stern, ’05, earned rave reviews for her first feature film as director, Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore, which premiered at Sundance Film Festival in January.

The film is now available for rent on Apple TV+, Amazon Prime Video, and Fandango at Home. On October 14 at 9 p.m. EST, it will be broadcast on local PBS stations and the PBS app.

With a list of credits that includes ER, Jericho, Weeds, Supernatural, and Grey’s Anatomy, Stern is a familiar face for audiences. Hollywood called her while she was still a student at Gallaudet. She left school during her senior year to pursue acting, and eventually finished her English degree by correspondence. 

She added writer and producer to her resume as the co-creator of TV series This Close. While guest starring on This Close, Marlee Matlin, H-’87, encouraged Stern to start directing. Later, Matlin handpicked Stern to direct Not Alone Anymore.

The documentary about Matlin will open the first-ever Deaf Way Film Festival at Gallaudet on October 16. After the screening, Stern will participate in a conversation about her film. The visit to Gallaudet will be a homecoming before Homecoming for the proud Gallaudet alumni.

“I honestly don’t remember making the decision to go [to Gallaudet], I just always knew that I would,” Stern reflects. “Both my parents went, as well as my aunt and uncle and both of my siblings. I wore Gallaudet shirts growing up and visited campus for events my parents took part in. I knew there was nowhere else in the world like it.”

In the interview below, Stern shares more about her Gallaudet experience, family, and filmmaking career.

Family

You come from an extraordinary family. Two Deaf Jewish grandmothers who survived the Holocaust. Deaf parents and siblings who are community leaders. How has your family’s multigenerational legacy influenced your work?

Thank you. It’s not an exaggeration to say that I think about that probably every single day of my life, just recognizing how much I’ve been shaped by them, and how much I will continue to be. Both my grandmothers were the only Deaf people in their family who risked everything to come to America. The first thing they found was their community, and through it, they found their significant others, and made a family, and that’s why I’m here today.

They have both passed, one of them during the making of the film, so I think about them a lot. What I always carry with me is the pride I always saw in both their faces when they would watch their family sitting around the dinner table conversing about anything and everything in sign language.

I know that’s the reason why both my parents decided to work in the field of education and make sure that Deaf students had the kind of access to learning my grandmothers didn’t. I know it’s because of that I’m able to see the world the way that I do, and do what I’m doing.

I would never be where I am without them, because of the communication and conversations I was lucky enough to have. It’s moved me to bring that to the world–because I know it’s something we are all hungry for. 

Your parents are Gallaudet alumni. What was your perception of Gallaudet before you enrolled? How did your perception change after?

For some odd reason I always felt this sense of urgency about going, even while I was there. I always had this feeling it would be the last time I would be in an environment that was similar to the one I grew up in. And that turned out to be right, because the environment I’ve worked in after has been very different. I think I always knew the value of learning in my language and being immersed in it, and I’m so glad I never took that for granted.

Time at Gallaudet

Which dorm did you stay in? Which places did you go the most?

I lived in Cogswell, Benson Hall, and Clerc before living off campus. I spent a lot of my time in Elstad, taking as many theater classes as I could and acting in as many plays as possible.

Most of my classes were at HMB and I loved getting lunch at Ely Center. I used to get grilled Swiss cheese on rye bread with grilled vegetables there at least twice a week. Oh, to be young!

What are some of your favorite memories of your time at Gallaudet?

I loved playing soccer on the women’s team and cheerleading, but really it was spending time with my friends–who I still count among my best friends today.

We loved learning, and would sign up for a lot of the same classes and do group projects with them. We would always take them very seriously, and go off campus to prepare at a coffee shop in Adams Morgan. I remember we ended up making our teachers cry more than once when we presented the projects—that’s how much work we put into them!

I approach my work today the same way. I work as hard as I can, but I always try to make it as fun as possible.

What was your biggest challenge as a Gallaudet student and how did you overcome it?

I think a lot of my challenges were internal—that age is a hard age! I remember thinking I needed to have everything figured out because it seemed like everyone else did. But I’m glad that happened, because I came out of that realizing from that point on I had to look inward rather than outward.

I realized that early on at Gallaudet, thankfully, and I still have that perspective today. I think that’s how I’ve been able to have the career that I’ve had, because that’s the only way you’ll stay sane!

How did Gallaudet prepare you for a career in Hollywood?

I loved my time at Gallaudet because I loved learning. That love really served me well in Hollywood—from making sure I read a script many different ways as an actor to figure out what my motivations and backstory were, to learning how to write scripts from books and screenplays, to learning from the many people I met along the way.

I also loved learning so much I decided to get an MA in Film Studies and became a professor of Deaf Studies for seven years. So much of what I did as a professor has shown up in the work that I do now–and that’s because I loved being in the classroom so much!

What advice do you have for Gallaudet students now?

I’ll give them the same advice I gave myself when I was in their shoes—don’t ever compare yourself to anyone else. Instead, keep your eyes on your own lane. Put your focus on what’s within you.

Everything you do shouldn’t be about anyone else but you and how to make yourself the best version of you that you can be.

Creativity

Where do you get inspiration for your stories? Do you have any creative rituals that spark inspiration?

It comes from anywhere and everywhere—from things I read or films I see, from conversations with people, from situations I observe or museum exhibits. I notice traveling often does it for me because I have time to really unplug and that’s when I observe best!

My creative rituals are kind of funny. When I write material, I’ll set goals for myself to hit, and once I get there I will email it to myself like a crazy unhinged person: “5 PAGES YOU DID IT!!!! KEEP GOING YOU SUPAHSTAH!!!!” It works and it keeps me going, so there you go.

What themes, other than the Deaf experience, do you find reoccur in your storytelling?

I find the theme of hope, of the change you seek coming from within, to be present in most of my work. It’s something that my father is big on, and something that both my grandmothers never lost even in all that they went through.

Deaf people are visual. How does that visual lens help you bring a story to life as a director and creator?

I knew to make that visual lens clear I had to do away with sound as people knew it—particularly sound as a crutch, which is what I believe voiceover does. To me, it allows hearing people to remain sound-based rather than give them the opportunity to experience the world visually, the way that we do.

Once I enabled the hearing audience to experience films the way that we do, through captions, they can harness the power of the visual experience and understand how much we can all stand to gain from that.

You’re in a business well-known for rejection. Looking back on your career, how did you find the courage and drive to keep going in the face of barriers?

Growing up I always encountered people who thought my family and I couldn’t do a number of things. They thought my parents couldn’t drive, that they couldn’t read, that I shouldn’t try out for the soccer travel team in my hometown of Fremont when I was eleven. And they were wrong on every count.

I think I’ve always turned that rejection into fuel because I knew my parents and my grandparents before me have encountered far worse, but none of them ever gave up. They just kept going.

There will always be people who will look at you and think you’re less than. It makes it all the sweeter when you prove them wrong. It won’t happen every time, but it just gives you that determination you need to keep going.

Not Alone Anymore

How did you balance staying true to the Deaf lens and ASL while still keeping the film palatable for hearing audiences?

What I was consistent about was if there is one thing that Deaf people always think about—it’s accessibility, so while I would be making a film for everyone, I would not be watering down the Deaf experience or anything about the reality of it. I felt that doing that would be a disservice to everyone, particularly the story itself.

Every time I’ve been in writers rooms, I’ve always asked what the Deaf audience would learn because I think it’s vital, not to mention necessary, for both audiences to learn something from a single piece of work. They can be different things, but everyone needs to learn something about themselves and the world.

I’ve always believed that audiences are ready and eager to experience things differently. I did want to make sure that the information we shared would be relatable, so I made sure I had an open door policy, especially when anything was confusing. Most of the time our test audiences understood things much better the less we explained, which made me very happy!

What are the technical challenges of filming American Sign Language? How do you approach them?

The challenge for me was there weren’t really any comps I could use to show people I was working with—only what I was seeing in my mind because the very form and rhythm of filmmaking itself has been sound-based. You have cutaways that make you lose people’s faces to close-ups where you lose people’s signs.

I refused to see that as a challenge, I even forbade myself from using that word and instead replaced it with the word opportunity – because that’s what it was. I always said we had the opportunity to create a new form that puts our language front and center. 

Since Marlee Matlin won her Oscar in 1986, there’s slowly been more Deaf representation on screen and behind the scenes (many of them Gallaudet alumni). How can the Deaf community keep this momentum going in the long-term?

Representation behind the camera is just as important as in front of, so we need more people in all areas of film, and the jobs there are more consistent than in front of! I’d love to see more Deaf people taking crew work, editing work, camera work—more Deaf people anywhere and everywhere.

What’s next?

I’m always working on something! The development process is long and has a mind of its own, but hopefully I’ll have something to share before too long.

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Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore is now available for rent on Apple TV+, Amazon Prime Video, and Fandango at Home. It will be broadcast on local PBS stations and the PBS app on October 14.

Follow Shoshannah Stern on Instagram to keep up with her latest projects.