The new film CODA premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival to rave reviews and a record-breaking distribution deal with Apple.
“If Troy were a person who could speak and hear, if he were a hearing person, his star would have risen many, many years ago,” signs fellow actor David Kurs, who is also artistic director of Deaf West Theatre in Los Angeles.
“He’s just a handsome, big guy who’s got a great face on screen and I think he’s got incredible charisma and presence.
She works on the family’s boat with her brother, who’s also deaf, and her father, played by Kotsur.
“There’s humor, and that bond is very tight.” As the film proceeds, Frank tries to understand and relate to why singing is so important to his daughter.
And then all those years later, the movie CODA was a real flashback where I did the same thing.
“Sometimes I wasn’t able to articulate it, because I can’t hear the sound of my own voice.
He studied acting at Gallaudet University, then began touring internationally with The National Theatre of the Deaf.
David Kurs the artistic director of Deaf West Theatre, specifically remembers Kotsur playing a deaf Stanley Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire.
“There’s the famous scene where Stanley screams ‘Stella!’ and Troy chose in that role to use his voice for that line.
“It’s nice to see just kind of the range of the characters I portray and the diversity — romantic, mean, heroes — you name it.” But he says he’s struggled to make sure interpreters were on set.
“What changed my life so much is when I saw Star Wars, the original one, when I was 8 years old.
So he says it was a dream come true to be cast in the Star Wars TV series The Mandalorian.
CODA filmmaker Sian Heder first saw Kotsur onstage at Deaf West Theatre in a staging of Our Town and Edward Albee play At Home at the Zoo.
The filmmaker says she hopes Kotsur continues to get authentic – and expansive — roles that match his gifts.