Opportunity knocked last year for Johnson Elementary student Anna Grace Philippe, when she just happened to be at a camp called Camp No Limits. It was a fitting spot to begin a journey that would take her out to Los Angeles and back and give her a taste of the acting life.
She auditioned and won a small, one-episode role in an upcoming television show, Best Foot Forward, on Apple TV. Her episode will stream this week beginning on Friday, July 22.
The casting call
While she and her family don’t have big plans to move out to Hollywood anytime soon, the experience was a fun one and could easily be a first foray into a career if Anna Grace chooses to pursue it in the future. The operative word here is “chooses.” The future is in her hands.
Camp No Limits is a camp devoted to children with limb loss or a limb difference. Anna Grace was born with part of one of her legs missing. Her parents adopted her from China when she was 2.
“She came here, got a prosthetic leg and has been running circles around everybody ever since — figuratively and literally,” said her mother, Wynne Philippe.
A mentor at the camp just happened to also be an actor who lives in L.A. From time to time, he shares casting calls if he sees something that might interest one of the campers. There are occasions when film and tv studios have very specific roles for children with limb differences.
Anna Grace and her mom saw one of these from the Nickelodeon production company. The casting call was for children with disabilities who were “spunky, outgoing, charismatic.”
“Well, we checked all those boxes,” Philippe said.
The show
Anna Grace uploaded an open audition onto the casting website, and the next day her mother got an email from a casting director. It wasn’t from Nickelodeon, but from the Apple TV, asking if Anna Grace would be interested in a part on a new show they were working on.
They were specifically looking for an 8- to 12-year-old girl with a prosthetic leg to play a role in a series based in part on the life experiences of Josh Sundquist, a paralympic ski racer, author, comedian, and motivational speaker.
The show zeros in on Sundquist’s life when he was 12 years old and transitioning from home schooling to a middle school. While the show is about a person who has limb loss, it’s also about the trials and tribulations of middle school and of being “different, ” fitting in and growing into the person you were meant to be.
Another audition and another callback later, Anna Grace and her mom were on a plane flying first class to L.A. — and onto an adventure.
The acting bug
Anna Grace would be in L.A. only a few days. She was in one scene in one episode, but both mom and daughter said they had a “super fun” time.
An acting coach worked with Anna Grace, helping her with her lines through two Zoom sessions before she went to L.A. The coach was part of the crew and was there to help her and the other actors on the set as well.
Philippe said her daughter did very well despite a room full of cameras, lights and strangers.
“She’s never had any formal acting training and she’s never done anything like this except for a few little church programs,” Phillipe said. “This is really her first acting experience, and she did a great job. People out there kept asking, ‘Are you sure this is her first time doing this?’ The director would come between takes and say, ‘OK we’re going to change your lines now, do this line instead.’ There was a lot going on, and she did really well with it.”
Anna Grace has the acting bug. Simply put, she said, “I loved it, and I want to do it again.”
She’s already told her mom she prefers TV and movies over live theater because if you forget a line, you can do it over as many times as you need.
She’s got plans.
While her mom doesn’t want to put the brakes on Anna Grace’s ambitions, and she said she loved the experience it gave her daughter, for now she will stay put.
“Right now I want her to still be able to climb trees and have sleepovers with her friends and go to vacation Bible school and all those fun things,” she said. “I told her when you get to middle school, I really want you to try one of their theater productions because I think you’d love it (and you can always improv if you need to).”
A show for kids and families
Philippe was most impressed with the show itself and happy Anna Grace could be a part of it.
“It’s a groundbreaking little series that puts disability at the forefront visibly with someone who has a disability, but the great thing is that, while the character of Josh has as prosthetic leg, that’s not the main thing about him,” Phillipe said. “The main thing is he’s a kid who’s been homeschooled and is transitioning to middle school, an experience a lot of kids can relate to. Any kid going to middle school is faced with all these new things.”
The lead character’s prosthetic leg is obviously part of the show, she said, and sometimes a source of humor in some of the plots. In one episode he tries to sneak a two-liter soda into the movie theater by putting it inside his leg. In another episode the kids try to figure out how to use his leg to help them win track and field events.
Philippe said she likes this about the show. The target demographic is kids age 8 to 12. It handles the subject of difference and fitting in, in a way all kids can relate to.
More movies and tv shows these days are featuring people with disabilities and differences but often the themes of the shows are not child-appropriate. Philippe said she is glad now there is a family friendly show aimed at kids.
“I think it’s going to be great for families to have conversations with kids about inclusion and awareness and acceptance and diversity and celebration of differences, whether it’s a kid with a limb difference or it’s a kid who is hearing impaired or uses a wheelchair or is visually impaired,” Phillipe said. “It’s opening up the doors for conversations with our kids about how differences don’t really make us that different, how underneath we’re pretty much the same.”
Another thing Philippe said she especially loved was the diversity on the production crew.
“They were very intentional about making sure there was representation behind the scenes as well as on screen. On this show at least 20 percent of the cast and crew identified as disabled. One of the writers of the episode that Anna Grace did is a gentleman who has cerebral palsy; he uses a wheelchair. One of the directors uses a wheelchair. One of the production assistants was a young woman with Down’s Syndrome,” Phillipe said. “It was a really great thing that they ensured there were no barriers to people doing what they wanted to do.”
Looking to the future
Anna Grace will enter fifth grade next year. Her mom said she’s typically pretty confident, but as any 10-year-old she doesn’t always want to stand out and gets annoyed sometimes at people staring at her or treating her differently.
Philippe said the filming experience was special for her daughter.
“I saw her confidence increase after the show because she was around other actors with prosthetic legs, people that look like her and she kind of realized being different can be challenging but because of it she got this special experience,” Phillipe said.
Much of the time the added attention is not welcome, but Anna Grace said sometimes it can open doors.
“The part that is good, you ask yourself, would you rather be the person who has something different about you that people notice. They pay attention to you and talk to you and ask what happened to your leg, and you might happen to make new friend or would you rather be so normal that no one ever pays attention to you and just walks by you?” she said.
The family plans to join friends at their church for a watch party this Friday. While her part was small, all are excited to see Anna Grace’s acting debut.
“Being on the show made me feel special, and even though I have a prosthetic leg it does not mean I can’t do things. I can do anything I set my mind to,” said Anna Grace.