Ali Stroker says she's excited role on 'Ten Days in the Valley' isn't all about her disability
— -- Ali Stroker has accomplished a lot of firsts in her young acting career.
After her run on "Glee" a few years back, the New Jersey native, who was paralyzed at the age of 2 in a car accident, became the first actress who uses a wheelchair for mobility to appear on Broadway, starring in the Tony-Award nominated play "Spring Awakening" in 2015.
"Being on Broadway was just a dream come true," she told ABC News on Thursday just after performing at Brooklyn College in New York for "Disability and Performance: Evolving Perspectives and Practice Symposium."
The musical also featured nonhearing actors and hearing actors performing the roles simultaneously in sign language and spoken out loud, which was special for the 29-year-old.
"It was something that I wanted for so long and it was the perfect performance to be a part of, because it was working with other actors with disabilities. All of us turning this limitation that a lot of the world sees and making it into an opportunity," she added.
In fact, that role was just as important to other young actors as it was to Stroker.
"The Broadway opportunity, there were a lot of young people who would come and say they didn't think it was possible [performing on that grand stage with a disability], and now I know it is," she said.
Stroker now has her sights set on returning to TV and in the process, further breaking down stereotypes about characters with disabilities on the small and big screens. She spoke about her new show ABC "Ten Days in the Valley," out later this year, which also stars Erika Christensen and Kyra Sedgwick. The New Jersey native says the series doesn't focus on her character Tamara's disability, but more on her talents and personality.
The series is about a TV producer and single mother (Sedgwick), and what happens after her daughter goes missing. Stroker plays one of the writers on her show.
"She is a writer in the writer's room, so it's like a show within a show," Stroker said. "There is an incident that happens in her own life and it's being written into the show. Then things that are being written into the show are then happening in her own life.
"So, it's like one of those dramas, what's gonna happen next and I've loved working on it," she added. "And I play a really intelligent, no BS kind of gal."
As for working with Sedgwick, Stroker said, "When I watch her I feel like every take is the last take ... she's a leader and sets the tone."
