How CoorDown Defied ‘The Self-Fulfilling Prophecy’ for Down Syndrome Community
This year, on World Down Syndrome Day, March 21, CoorDown - the National Coordination of Associations of People with Down Syndrome - launched their yearly PSA campaign, this time called ‘ASSUME THAT I CAN’.
The film took inspiration from the idea of shattering ‘the self-fulfilling prophecy’, spoken about by Marta Sodano, a 29-year-old Italian woman with Down syndrome, during the WDSD Conference at the UN in 2018. First described in 1948 by US sociologist Robert K. Merton, said prophecy illustrates how people’s assumptions and expectations affect and have the power to change reality – prejudice becomes internalised, so if you expect less of somebody, they will likely perform at a lower level.
CoorDown applied the self-fulfilling prophecy to the Down syndrome community, highlighting how low expectations affect people with intellectual disabilities negatively, and urged everyone to make a shift in perspective. Instead, use the self-fulfilling prophecy to make a positive impact.
The Association came together with Luca Lorenzini and Luca Pannese, at SMALL – who they have worked on these yearly campaigns with for 13 years – to come up with the newest concept and create the unusually rhythmic film that has since had over 150 million views and counting. Blending comedy, drama and incredible editing, the project was their biggest feat so far.
LBB’s Zoe Antonov spoke to SMALL’s Luca Lorenzini and CoorDown vice president Martina Fuga about how they broke the barrier of the small budget, why casting was crucial for the film and how the self-fulfilling prophecy affects us all.
LBB> Martina, tell me a little bit about your organisation and its history.
Martina> Active since 1987, CoorDown aims to promote the rights of individuals with Down syndrome and their inclusion in school, in the workplace, and in society. Between our diverse activities, we also activate social communication actions to raise awareness for the potential in people with Down syndrome. Every year we celebrate a key awareness event for World Down Syndrome Day (March 21) launching a campaign to create awareness but also concrete actions that generate inclusion.
LBB> Luca, you do this campaign with CoorDown every year. Do you have a particular brief and how did you tackle it this year?
Luca> We usually don’t have a specific brief, what we do is we have some chats and brainstorming sessions with our client/friend Martina. Every year we try to tackle a different topic. In the past, we worked on topics like the school system, or different challenges in work environments.
This year, we started by considering the speech by Marta Sodano that she made to the UN in 2019 – she was talking about the concept of ‘the self-fulfilling prophecy’ that we found very interesting. It was an insight coming directly from a person with Down, so we thought it would be something super interesting to use as a jumping off point.
Martina> This is the 13th year we have been working on WDSD campaigns with Luca Lorenzini and Luca Pannese at SMALL, and every year we think it will be very difficult – almost impossible – to find the right theme and not repeat ourselves. To find the right insight we are guided by people with Down syndrome, who are the real beneficiaries of the campaign. "Nothing about us without us," the activists ask, and we truly believe in it. We talk to them, we listen to them. The campaign this year was inspired by Marta Sodano’s speech to the UN in 2019, in which she shared personal anecdotes on how assumptions around Down syndrome impacted her learning and created a ‘self-fulfilling prophecy’ of unrealised opportunities.
LBB> And Luca, what is it like for you to be such an integral part of this campaign for 13 years now?
Luca> We have worked with CoorDown for 13 years now and have worked with them through four different agencies – Saatchi & Saatchi Milan, Saatchi & Saatchi New York, Publicis New York and finally SMALL, our own agency. And for us, it’s always very enriching working with them because we grew up together.
In the beginning, we didn’t know much about Down syndrome and we didn’t entirely know what struggles people with Down syndrome face. We think, though, that little by little together with the client we helped towards overcoming some of these barriers.
Today, for us it has become the most important project of the year, every year. It’s just so fulfilling, we speak to a lot of interesting people, and we do it with great pleasure every year.
LBB> Tell me about the casting of the campaign and what were you after when choosing the person who would take the main role?
Luca> We collaborated with a lot of associations around the world for the casting. We asked for English speaking people to perform the monologue and we received a few auditions and one specifically was the audition from Maddison, who we already knew, as she’s a quite famous actress from Canada.
We immediately knew she had the right attitude, but we wanted to do our casting like we always do – we wanted to see her acting out the script and see the result. Already from the audition tape, we understood she’s the perfect match – sass, versatility, she had everything we needed for this kind of film in which she has to play a lot of different parts.
She has to be frustrated, aggressive, sweet, happy, sarcastic, and many more things. We believed she was the perfect person for this film and the success it’s having is demonstrating that.
LBB> What was the most challenging part of creating this campaign, and equally the most fun?
Luca> The most challenging part, of course, as you can imagine is that we don’t usually have a big budget for this. We had a lot of help from Indiana Productions, who made it possible for the film to be very well produced. The challenge every year, for probably every charity campaign, is finding people who want to help for free or for very low pay, always trying to create a puzzle so that the campaign can be shot. In this case, we had the possibility to shoot in Barcelona because the director was already working there on another project. So we flew there and shot the commercial there.
The most fun part of the campaign… To be honest, it’s always fun shooting for CoorDown. Many of the people involved are volunteers, so they do it because they really want to and care for it. And it’s always different when you are there because you have a job to do and you’re paid, while instead you’re there because you really want to do it and believe in the cause.
LBB> And what made Indiana Production the right partner for this film?
Martina> This is the third campaign we have worked with Indiana, and the fourth with [executive producer] Karim Bartoletti. In addition to expertise, they know our reality, work well with the agency and add an ingredient that is not taken for granted: love for our cause. Doing things well and doing good is rare, and they know how to do it. Every year they put together an incredible team to make the best film possible, without being held back by our budgets which are those of a small nonprofit, they convince the best talent to be on board, and they bring all their best internal resources to the table. This year we worked with the dream team, the one that made ‘The Hiring Chain’, one of our most impactful campaigns. I didn't think it would be possible to rework with these people, yet Karim brought them on board.
LBB> There are some super creative transitions throughout the campaign, like the key going into the keyhole – what went into the creative decisions behind those and why were they good to add to the film?
Luca> We wanted a film that was super energetic, and [editor] Rich Lee did this for us. It’s a social media first film, so it needed a very tight edit. We knew that we wanted especially the second part, to be a bit over the top. That’s where Rich helped us, for example where the outro says the Shakespeare line, or when she punches the punching bag, having it explode. These are all ideas that Rich came up with that give that kind of ‘over the top’ feeling that we wanted. We love it.
We worked with Luca Pannese for the rhythm of the film, we worked with Stabiolo Music who we always work with. We wanted something super energetic. We’re not used to seeing PSA films with this kind of rhythm and pace, this energy, so that’s why we wanted to do something that is different from what all the other charities are doing. Luckily our script was quite literal, not very deep – it was easy to follow and having a base that was easy to follow could allow us to be a bit more complicated and interesting when it came to the editing and images. We wanted to have a bit of nice juxtaposition.
LBB> What do you think are the elements in this campaign that address wider society and not just the community that is usually targeted by content regarding Down syndrome?
Martina> This campaign is relevant to everyone; the self-fulfilling prophecy impacts each of us. We have all experienced the impact of low expectations or the positive energy of trust and encouragement, starting with our parents. How much did the teachers who believed in us change our lives? An employer who believes you will do your job well… How much will it empower your daily work? It is a universal message that people need to hear, beyond Down syndrome.
LBB> What scenarios were important for you to depict in the film to show the multitude of ways in which people with Down syndrome are underestimated in society?
Martina> All! We wanted to represent all contexts of life, from family life to the workplace, from sports to social life. We wanted to do this by dismantling all the most common stereotypes – the eternal child, the person who will never become independent, is only entertained in school but does not learn, will always have to live with parents, does not have a full emotional and sexual life... and yes, even alcohol and swearing are off limits. Let me be clear, there was no encouragement to drink and use a certain kind of language, but the adults with Down syndrome we talk to often tell us about such episodes – at the bar they serve them a Coke when they ask for a beer, and they are considered always loving and happy-hearted while they often get angry as well.
LBB> What has the response been so far?
Martina> In a word – incredible! We hoped the campaign would be well-received, understood, and have a big impact outside our community, but we didn't think it would go viral like this. In the history of our collaboration with SMALL, we have had great successes with our campaigns but never has something like this happened before. The views we can count are 150 million, excluding user-generated videos some of which reach one million views alone, but people have downloaded the campaign and reposted it, so we are unable to control virality and impact.
But the most impressive numbers are the likes, comments, shares, and saves that are evidence of people's need to talk about this topic, to save the campaign, to watch it again, to share it with friends. The debate that has been generated is extraordinary, and young people have even created memes with the face of the extraordinary actress Madison Tevlin with the intent not to mock her, but to treat her as she is – a cool young woman with a badass attitude. That’s inclusion!
Luca> The response is one we’ve never had before. It was incredible. In four days we had one hundred million views across platforms. Many people downloaded and reuploaded our film. We had incredible feedback from people across the world, it was so overwhelming for us. We feel like this was the message people needed and wanted to hear, which is probably the reason why so many people shared this film.
We are extremely happy for this campaign, so was the client. We look forward to CoorDown 2025!
LBB> Any final thoughts?
Martina> The collaboration with Luca Lorenzini and Luca Pannese has been going on for 13 years, and it is closer and more effective every year. They are extraordinarily talented, they are open to listening, but they are also unyielding and uncompromising, they are courageous and ambitious, and they put these characteristics to the benefit of CoorDown and all people with disabilities. In these 13 years they have made the difference: they have completely changed the way we narrate and communicate about disability, and this time they have surpassed themselves, because they have succeeded in a mission in which – probably – no one has succeeded until now: inspires, without falling into the inspiration porn trap.
Last but not least, I would like to highlight the outstanding performance of Madison Tevlin. She is an extraordinary actress and a natural-born advocate. Her performance made the difference and made the campaign so impactful. Her expressions, energy, and determination will remain indelible in the eyes of those who saw the film and will continue to challenge prejudices against people with disabilities for years to come.
