Facts of Life Geri Jewell reflects upon her work

Geri Jewell played the first character on primetime TV with a handicap. She has cerebral palsy. She played Blair Warners cousin. She talks openly of her experience on Facts of Life in this show called "The Truth Behind The Sitcom Scandals."

Category:

Comedy

Tags:

• geri
• jewell
• jeri
• jerry
• jerri
• gerry
• jewel
• blair
• warner
• facts
• of
• life
• tootie
• natalie
• mrs
• garrett
• kim
• fields

[extrememaggie]

This is all I have, sorry

[kdarreena3]

I give Geri a whole lot of credit. I really liked her acting and how she opened the issue of just treating people with disabilities no different.

[sabre926]

I don't know what it is, but I really like Geri and I loved her performance on the Facts of Life. She was just adorable and innocent at the same time.

[hugboxx]

The reason they couldn't find anything to do with her was not because they were "scared" of having her on, but that she was introduced solely to be "that retarded one"; there was no depth to her character, so that whenever a storyline didn't need to revolve around disability, there was no reason to have her around. Who can blame them? Nobody (apart from perhaps PC activists or fellow disabled people) will ever want to watch someone with CP acting in a leading role, unless the char has CP also.

[lordzaphodbeeb]

Geri was an inspiration for disabled actors and comedians, including myself. I went on to do stand up comedy and acting also. She helped break the "handicapped barrier" in Hollywood so more disabled people could get in. It took a long time. And, we're still chopping at that "stereotype" of disabled people that most non-disabled folks have. Gerri is still fighting to give us more chances.Kudos to her. :)

[time4dawnnow]

I went through the same thing with one of my supervisors. She has a daughter, who is a mirror image of my disability and she kept comparing me to her. Wanting her to do what I did and then it seemed like she was setting me up to fail, because if I failed it would justify why her own daughter did not succeed.

[redmr2na]

Because I never know what their situation is. I give her alot of credit for doing what she did and does. She is really a pioneer in Television, for lack of a better term. She blazed a trail in to a realm of entertainment that for the most part ignored and failed to appreciate what the differently abled could do on the small screen up until that time.

[redmr2na]

It's to bad about Geri Jewell's brief career on The Facts of Life. She is amazing in many ways. Seeing her as herself, I have to say that she is very pretty. It's unfortunate that many people would look at people who are differently abled such as Geri, and treat them differently then they would a normally abled person. Others would slowly accept her after getting to know her. Unfortunately I myself, if I meet someone who is differently abled, it is slightly akward to meet them at first...

[bostonscholar]

Sound of Silence is up (Tootie is having trouble haering) Geri appears

[fridun007]

For a second I thought she said, "I'm looking for marijuana" instead of "Blair Warner."

[Kimmie10]

That is interesting. Thanks for sharing that with us.