LIVING A DREAM
13-year-old star of ‘Endlings’ hopes to be ‘role model for kids with disabilities’
Cale Thomas Ferrin would watch TV and never saw himself represented. The actor decided when he was 7 that he wanted to be in front of the camera.
Now 13, Ferrin portrays Finn in the Hulu series “Endlings.”
The second season is streaming on Hulu.
“Endlings” is set 20 years in the future and tells the empowering story of four teenagers in foster care together who discover they’re not alone in the universe, even though it can sometimes feel as if they were.
The series showcases themes including empathy, inclusion and the meaning of family as well as the importance of conservation and preservation.
As the four kids discover the connections between themselves and the natural world, they learn being an “endling” doesn’t have to mean “the end.” Together, the intrepid family is on a mission to save the “endlings” — the very last of an earthly or intergalactic species — and bring them back from the brink of extinction.
The goal of foster care is to reunify children with their biological parents whenever possible.
“What I really like most about Finn is he’s very much the same as me,” Ferrin says. “He’s a lovable kid. He loves to give hugs, like I do, and he’s very positive and funny. One thing that we’re different is that I literally talk all the time. Finn doesn’t.”
Since Ferrin began acting, he’s been helping to increase disability representation on screen, both through “Endlings” and his breakout role in the movie “More Beautiful for Having Been Broken.”
The 13-year-old actor has Fanconi anemia, a rare blood disorder that eventually prevents bone marrow from making new blood cells.
He had more than 27 surgeries before he turned 7 and over 100 hospital visits — and none of that has prevented him from pursuing his dream of being an actor and performer.
Ferrin is also the face of Lucky Fin, a nonprofit organization that aims to end the stigma around limb differences.
“The real reason I’m acting is that I want to serve as a role model for kids with disabilities,” he says. “Each one of them can be actors. They can do wonderful things. I’m excited to help and use my powers for good.”
Ferrin enjoys acting and knows that he wants to stay involved in the film industry in some capacity as he gets older.
He says he and his sister write stories all the time, and he would like to write books.
“I’d like to write my own movie,” he says. “A director or producer or a writer and a casting director. I’d love to do all of those jobs. But an author is what I’ve been into recently.”