When it comes down to it, it's about who you know, and who's a fan. It's about whether you're the right age, whether you're hot or not, whether the studio is into you or not.

The only thing I can't do is hear. I can drive, I have a life with four kids, I work on TV, I do movies, so the deafness question, is it that they want to know because, what? Not sure.

At the end of the day, it's about the best interests of the children.

Maybe my way of communicating through sign made me more in tune with my body and how it moved. Who knows? I just know when I saw a stage for the first time, I wanted to be on it.

I've always wanted to write a book relating my experiences growing up as a deaf child in Chicago. Contrary to what people might think, it wasn't all about hearing aids and speech classes or frustrations.

How many deaf people do you know in real life? Unless they live in a cave, or are 14, which seems to be true for most people in this business, what could I possibly tell them that they don't already know?

I guess not being able to hear just made me adventurous and daring. And in most cases, that didn't make my parents very happy with me.