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

I was 21 years and 218 days old when I received the Academy Award for Best Actress. I had just stepped into an imaginary world that I'd seen at a distance for years.

Deaf people can do anything, except hear.

I can hear you and I can watch your mouth move, and then I put together the sounds and the visual image and I can understand the words as I integrate the two signals.

I'm the only one in my family who is deaf, and there are still conversations that go around me that I miss out on. And I ask what's going on, and I have to ask to be included. But I'm not going to be sad about it. I don't live in sad isolation. It's just a situation I'm used to.

At some point we have to stop and say, There's Marlee, not, There's the deaf actress.

I learned to speak first, and then to sign. I have never really known what it was like to hear, so I cant compare hearing aids to normal hearing.