Children Of A Lesser God

A teacher at a school for the deaf marries a rebellious pupil.

1986 1h 50m Drama TV-MA

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CAST

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0

91178|0

William Hurt

1

124790|0

Marlee Matlin

2

109526|125860

Piper Laurie

3

19660|124782

Philip Bosco

FULL SYNOPSIS

Sarah Norman is a young deaf woman, working as a custodian at a New England school for the deaf and hard of hearing. Enthusiastic James Leeds has just joined the teaching staff and encourages Sarah to break free from her insulated life by learning to talk. But Sarah prefers to use sign language and vehemently resists his efforts to change her way of life. Despite the friction between them, James and Sarah fall in love and, before long, are living together; however, their mutual stubbornness causes great conflict between them.

VIDEOS

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Original Trailer

Trailer

ARTICLES

Life imitates art in Randa Haines' film adaptation of Mark Medoff's Tony-award-winning play, Children Of A Lesser God (1986). Marlee Matlin, a 19-yr-old newcomer at the time, stars as Sarah Norman, an embittered graduate of the Governor Kittridge School for the hearing-impaired. William Hurt plays James Leeds, the unconventional speech therapist at the school, who teaches Sarah about survival, trust and love in a world she has never known. And like the two main characters in Children Of A Lesser God, Matlin and Hurt embarked on a real-life romance during filming. By the 1980s, William Hurt had established himself as the most promising dramatic actor of his generation. While he was heralded for his performances in Altered States (1979), Body Heat (1981), and Gorky Park (1983), it wasn't until his Academy Award¨ winning performance in Kiss Of The Spider Woman (1985) that he really was touted as a great actor. Marlee Matlin was hearing-impaired before she was two as a result of infantile measles. Despite her handicap, she was fiercely determined to become an actress and at the age of nineteen won the title role in Children Of A Lesser God after a six month talent search throughout the U.S., Canada, Sweden, and Great Britain. The story goes that Matlin was spotted in a video of a Chicago theatrical production in which she played a minor role and her performance captivated the producers. In an interview with the New York Daily News Matlin said: "I gues...