Quinn Ashton's remarkable debut in raunchy comedy 'Madam'

After the third round of auditions, Quinn Ashton had not only won a staring contest against actor Rachel Griffiths, but also the role of Toby in the award-winning TV show, Madam. 

The show centres around Mackenzie, a mother to two (played by Griffiths). While debt grows in her family, her relationship with her philandering husband grows apart. Meanwhile, her disabled son, Toby, is ageing out of school in small-town Aotearoa. Times are tough. That’s when she decides to start an ethical brothel to rescue her family’s finances.

Madam is based on a true story. In 2016, American immigrant Antonia Murphy started a feminist escort agency called The Bach in the North Island. It ran for three years until her son, Silas, died suddenly. So while the show is about sex work, it offers commentary on the relationships between a disabled person and their family. 

We spoke to Quinn Ashton and his mum Selena about their experience on set. Quinn uses a powerchair and is non-speaking, preferring Selena’s translation over a communication device.

Quinn and Selena emphasised how much their lived experience was honoured on the set of Madam. “They were really good at wanting to make Quinn feel safe and comfortable at all times, and that’s probably what I wasn’t expecting,” says Selena. The storylines were quickly adapted to suit Toby’s representation of disability, for example, feeding scenes were changed as Quinn uses a feeding tube. While a seizure was scripted, that was changed to a choking scene to reflect what would realistically present as a risk for Quinn. 

When Quinn and Selena initially scoped out the home interior set, they moved aside props cluttering pathways that weren’t realistically going to be in the house of a wheelchair user. They suggested adding thresholds and rubber mats not just for practicality, but to make scenes reflect what everyday living looked like for them. Quinn and Selena were always invited by the showrunners to suggest changes, and any suggestions they made were quickly implemented.

The showrunners were in constant dialogue with Quinn and Selena to ensure Toby’s representation was authentic, making changes that reflected subtleties that only a wheelchair-user would notice. For example, the crew initially expressed concern about the lack of continuity between the use of Quinn’s manual wheelchair and his power chair. But Selena assured them, “that’s everyday life. We use both chairs.”

“They were always talking to you and not me,” Selena says to Quinn. When the crew had confirmed with Quinn if he would like to embark on this three month production journey, they worked together to figure out realistic working hours. 

Madam is a great example of how collaborations that centre the realities and preferences of disabled people can enhance the representation of not just the character, but disabled life and culture. Showrunners Harry McNaughton and Shoshana McCallum say that “using comedy to challenge preconceptions and stereotypes” is all part of Madam. They said for some reason people think that minorities on screen aren’t as funny. 

But the people who auditioned from the disabled community were “bloody hilarious” according to the showrunners, so much so that they wrote more roles for them, which meant Quinn had some of his friends and whānau casted in. 

From casting, to shooting, to post-production, McNaughton and McCallum said they consulted a lot and changed a lot of their on and off set protocol to accommodate accessibility needs. 

Of course, there came some challenges, like the time Quinn almost got his chair stuck in loose gravel on set. But generally, Quinn’s hours on set were helped by having a bed for him to stretch between scenes, having Selena paid as an on-set accessibility assistant and having a body double – not for stunts, sadly – but for long distance shots of the mobility van (which fun fact, doesn’t actually have any tie downs).

Initially, McNaughton and McCallum did worry whether as non-disabled people they had the right to tell the story of Silas through Toby’s character. They also wrestled with the process of casting the role and whether it was ok to have a disabled performer play a level of disability different from their own. Ultimately, they sought the advice of the disabled community on shaping the role which enabled Quinn to co-create Toby’s character. 

“We tried to work with the community to shape the role,” they said. “We definitely didn’t get that right all the time but we’re really proud of what we achieved.”

Aside from disabled cast members being “crack-up”, they said casting disabled actors made them question a lot of the ways they shot and make the production more friendly and accommodating for everyone. “We changed how we shot, including adding breaks and upskilled crew with language, protocol and methodology. Everyone was so willing to do so, even if it meant we shot less ‘efficiently’.”

About 60 non-speaking performers who used wheelchairs auditioned for Toby’s role. One of the final tasks for Quinn’s audition was to respond to Rachel as if he didn’t like her music. We asked how he did this and with a wry smile, he looked us dead in the eye and raised a middle finger. 

Iconic. 

All 10 episodes of Madam are now available to stream on Three Now.

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