Brett: A Life with No Arms

This programme contains some strong language.

# Here we go again One, two, three

# Do you want to come and join in the dance with me? #

My name is Roger Graef.

50 years ago, I made a film about an Australian boy named Brett Nielsen.

# ..in the dance with you

# Here we go again Down that same old path

# Here we go again

# Here we go... #

I have come to Australia to find out

how Brett has survived the last 50 years.

I catch myself out, you know, occasionally it makes me laugh.

When there is someone around who doesn't have any arms,

my first thought is, "Oh, poor bastard,

"I wonder how he manages," you know?

You are on Bay FM amongst other things,

it's 21 past 4 now and it's Friday afternoon,

for all of those who may have forgotten, no, it's Friday.

# Asked me why I wore no shoes upon my feet... #

I know I don't have any arms,

but it's not sort of a major part of the day, you know,

it's sort of a, "Oh, yeah, that's right."

The last time I saw Brett was in England.

He was four and being fitted for artificial arms.

When he was six, his family moved back to Australia and we lost touch.

-Hello, Roger.

-Brett, how are you doing?

-Good. How are you?

Gorgeous to see you. Can I hug you?

-Absolutely. It's been a while.

-50 years, right?

-Yeah, 50 years.

You haven't changed at all, except you're, you know, taller!

You said that every day, you're solving problems, you know.

Reinvent the wheel, that was it.

-CORK POPS

-Whoops! Wow, that came out quickly!

-That was good! Brilliant!

-And suddenly!

'It is immediately clear that a great deal has happened in 50 years.

'Brett has had three marriages and two children -

'20-year-old Pasha from one ex-wife and 12-year-old Jack from his third

'and he has a new serious girlfriend, Helen,

'a flight nurse he met four months ago.'

We've got some grapes from our garden as well.

Oh, these are your grapes? Wow!

Who was it that broke up these various marriages and relationships?

Uh, in my marriages, I think...

Well, my wives ran away from home was my perception.

Obviously, they weren't happy.

Apparently I am a little bit intense at times, you know,

a bit like a steam train,

but Helen doesn't think so, do you, darling?

HE MOUTHS

'The thing that attracted me the most

'about Brett was our common values'

and we exchanged a lot of written stuff,

because it was a distant relationship,

'and he is quite a gifted writer

'and so he would paint these images and I really got to know him.

'It almost sounds a bit old-fashioned,

'the old letter way, really,

'and I just fell in love with that,

'being romanced by the written word,'

and flowers in the post. Yeah, he's a good find!

'Seeing Brett as head of the family takes me back

'to filming him in the '60s when he was the youngest at the table.'

He was pretending to be his father, you see,

and he said, "Oh, I am Peter Nielsen and I have got three sons."

I said, "Oh, yes, and what are their names?"

And he said, "Well, one is Mark and he teases,

"and one is Karl and he cries and one is Brett and he's got no arms."

Total disbelief to think that a tablet that had been given

to ward off morning sickness would create this sort of problem.

The tranquilliser thalidomide was a global commercial success story

in the '50s that became the greatest medical disaster in history.

It is now believed that at least 100,000 babies in 46 countries

were either destroyed or damaged by the drug.

Some parents were advised to put their babies straight into care

or even leave them to die.

I was hoping to actually see the birth and I was kept well away

and it was possibly an hour or so after the birth before I was told

that there was an abnormality

and I found it a bit hard to deal with.

In the summer of '61, thalidomide was discovered

as the cause of the global spike in birth defects.

Damage to the foetus was done in the first 42 days of pregnancy,

depending on which day it was taken.

The 20th caused brain damage, the 21st and 22nd eyes and ears,

the 24th affected arms.

In Australia, Brett's mother Barbara took just one tablet

from a sample given by her GP on what must have been her 24th day.

-Cheers, Roger.

-Cheers!

-Cheers!

'Brett worked all his life until he retired five years ago,

'but he is still very busy.'

For 30 years, he made his living as a record producer

and ran a bulldozing business.

'Now he is about to release a CD of his own songs

'and is building a house next door for his dad.'

You'll be happy to know I have thought

about giving up smoking recently.

No, seriously.

'There is a lot happening apart from building the shed, you know,

'a house for the old man.'

Yeah, we have just finished the album

and doing a new website

'and getting the infrastructure together

'for, you know, flogging CDs again

'and Dad is moving in, which is a big one,

'and I am having a romance as well.

'So, you know, I mean, there is a lot going on

'over the next few weeks. All good, all good.'

Don't do this at home, kids.

'Brett's independent life was established early on by his parents.

'They refused advice to put him into care

'and instead treated him as a normal child.'

We had decided the only thing to do was to possibly go to England,

where there were far more children,

and we had been in correspondence

with the Thalidomide Association over there,

so we could actually achieve something worthwhile for Brett.

This choice wasn't easy.

Victims' families were struggling on their own,

emotionally and financially,

so the Nielsens sold everything and moved to Britain.

There were many more families with affected children sharing advice

and the best artificial arms were being made there.

-NARRATOR:

-The Nielsens' search

began 12,000 miles away in Australia.

Powered limbs are so new

that they had to come all the way to England to find them.

That's when I first met Brett and his family.

That is where these were hidden, in the newspaper clippings.

We'll take them out, we'll take them out.

'Given the 50-year gap, I'm keen to see pictures of Brett growing up.'

-There he is.

-Yep, that's me.

-Awww!

-Awww!

-There is you.

There is young Dad. Looks like a smooth haircut. You're so cute.

-Young Brett.

-Young Bretto.

-This is boarding school.

-Jack, check out that... It's '73 so you would have been...

-13.

That is Dad at your age. You have got the same hairdo as well.

-Oh, wow!

-Oh, here's Mum - me and Mum.

Awww!

I remember Brett's mother Barbara vividly from the original film.

She was amazingly resilient

and key to ensuring Brett had a normal childhood.

-BARBARA NIELSEN:

-We felt that, rather than treat Brett gently,

we should make every effort to treat him

as near as possible as a normal child -

because he was going to grow up in a normal world

where people will say hurtful things,

where, whilst he may be quite an adorable little thing

whilst he's a baby, he won't be very adorable

when he is 15 or 18 or 25, so he must compete with others.

She played an important role in the whole of their upbringing.

There is no question of that.

And that showed very eminently

when we were down at the hospital the evening she died -

the emotions that were displayed there were phenomenal.

Hello, Brett, how are you this morning?

Have you come to see us at nursery school?

'She was the one that sort of got Brett to do things

'that were probably outside of his normal comfort zone, I guess.

'More important, they were outside

'a lot of other people's comfort zone'

so he wasn't going to get away without doing the washing up.

OK, he had to sit on the draining board to wash up,

but when it was your turn, it was your turn.

So she didn't want him to be special

in a way that made him stand out for the wrong reasons.

She wanted him to be special for the reasons like his music or whatever.

-BARBARA NIELSEN:

-When Brett was a tiny baby,

I used to take him out to the shops

and the clinic, things like that, as much or possibly more

than I used to take the other children

because I thought, "Let him get used to being stared at

"and poked, as some people do, right from birth."

Better be used to a half-dozen stares every day of the week

than to just suddenly get half a dozen every Sunday.

I think she had some very hard social interactions with people,

because they would see her with Brett

and they would only think the worst, so...

-BARBARA NIELSEN:

-Sometimes, people have come up in the street

and said, "Did you take those drugs?"

They somehow think that one is a drug addict and takes narcotics.

And so they think that these mothers

have brought this on the child themselves.

And, for quite a long time, it would hurt.

But mothers who keep their children at home

so that they may protect themselves and the children from stares

and unkind remarks are really making the burden far greater,

because the child must come out into the world someday.

'Going shopping with Brett, it's clear the awkward outings

'with his mother prepared him for his confident shopping trips today.

'For a start, he shamelessly parks in the disabled bay

'without an official permit.'

We will go and park in the spastics' spot cos it is nice and close.

HELEN LAUGHS

-Hi, Richard.

-G'day, mate. How are you?

-Good, good, good.

'She was a very strong person, Mum,

'didn't take no for an answer, EVER!

'Yeah, no, she was a classic.'

OK, thank you very much.

'She would always be finding little sayings and God knows what

'and one of them I pulled off her fridge

'and the line was "It doesn't matter what happens to you in your life,

'"what matters is how you deal with it."

'But these are the things that shape your personality

'and all of that sort of stuff.'

That one looks like it has been run over by a truck.

-Let's not have that one.

-We won't have the run-over-truck one.

-No.

-No, OK.

-This one will do.

OK, listen, Jack, you need to wash your hands.

Get all that oil off them now, darling.

I park in the spastic one, because I can, and Pasha hates it.

Because Dad parks in the disabled spot in a two-door Mercedes.

-It just looks ridiculous.

-Why?

Because Dad has no sticker

and he is driving a two-door convertible Mercedes.

What's the car got to do with anything? It's a parking spot.

Because the disabled spot is for someone in a wheelchair, Dad.

-No, no, no...

-Or someone with bad legs.

But, Brett, there is a catch - you are not disabled.

Yeah, but, you know... And I don't have a sticker.

You are disabled when it means parking out the front of Woolworths.

-Well...

-Then it's, "Oh, I really just need the car here."

Look, I'm an easy target, Pasha.

I'm an easy target. If it will make you feel better...

"I have no arms! Why would you move me out of this parking spot?

-"I need help."

-Stop being disloyal to Dad.

It's OK, Pasha, I am an easy target, you know.

Go hard if it makes you feel better, it's fine.

Oh, shut up, Dad!

Do you remember me telling you about Brett last week?

Remember me telling you that when his mummy made him,

there wasn't quite enough to make arms

and how lucky you are that when you were all made,

your mummy managed to make arms for you?

Getting Brett and other affected children into a normal school

was the aim of the original film.

It wanted to show reluctant head teachers

that children without all their limbs

actually used more of their brains than other children.

He has grown up with the fact that he hasn't any arms

and he accepts things so completely as they are and he doesn't mind

if the children say to him, "Where are your arms?"

He will answer them quite sensibly.

It is the parents who are much more worried than the child about it.

I suppose that it is just an inborn fear

of any kind of physical deformity. Some people just can't accept it.

To help Brett fit in, he wore an artificial arm in infant school.

Getting him arms was the reason

his parents spent everything on moving to the UK.

They hoped this was the key to a normal life,

but it was far from straightforward for Brett.

Let me see if you can press straight.

If you press it on one side, Brett, it comes up.

If you press it the other side, it goes down.

Now, you press it with your chin for a minute. That's it.

The movements are simple, but the apparatus is complex,

especially for a little boy or girl to live with.

It will take 12 days just to fit the jacket properly

and, as he grows, Brett must return for a new arm every six months.

'We tried just about everything over there.'

The best that was available at that stage was the gas-operated unit.

Its power comes from compressed gas

kept in a cylinder on the child's back

and is controlled by switches under the chin.

Working?

-It's not.

-Try the elbow.

That's the shot.

But dressing a child in a prosthetic each morning

is a fairly lengthy process, and with Brett bitching

that it is hurting here, it is hurting there...

-NO!

-Oh, you'll forget all about it.

BRETT PROTESTS

-Where does it hurt?

-On my shoulder.

So, he was quite a lively boy, was he?

Far too bloody lively, yes.

Kids at school were terrified of that.

It's a scary hand, how did you click this closed?

There was a little gas cylinder I had to wear

and it had to be changed throughout the day and whatnot

because they ran out.

Occasionally, one of the air pipes would come off the thing

and there would be this thing

-snaking around inside my shirt at 100mph.

-Oh, no!

-Yeah.

Once we got back to Australia, I spoke to a doctor

and he felt that he could actually put a pair of arms on Brett

and I mentioned this to Brett and I was told in no uncertain manner

what to do with the arms, and they wouldn't have looked pretty there.

Family comes first in Brett's life -

his mother's death a year ago was a terrible loss

and changed Brett's view of his role, especially towards his ageing father.

We don't have power, which is very frustrating, because...

..there is not a lot you can do without power,

but, fortunately, we do have gas.

I am trying to build a new shed/house

for my dad to come and live in

and it is running about three and a half weeks late at the moment.

'I wonder why Brett is doing this.

'Is it to look after his childhood carer?'

Right, you want to spin around on the chair first?

Better ask your friend first.

You've been a good lad so we'll give you a good swing.

I'm going round...

Dad and I speak every morning on the phone, you know,

and we are very much a part of each other's lives in a lot of aspects

and, you know, we talk to each other often, two or three times a day,

what's going on and what's happening.

And it's good. I am looking forward to having him here,

having three generations of Nielsen blokes under the same roof.

I think that'll be fantastic!

'Given how full Brett's life is already,

'it's surprising he wants to take on looking after his ailing dad as well.

'Peter lives in north Sydney on his own,

'but close to his two other sons.'

A couple of years ago, he had a heart attack and fell over

and he broke both his arms and I was the one who went

and looked after him, which I thought was quite ironic.

You know, hang out and help him get dressed

and turn the shower on and cook and rah-rah-rah-rah-rah

and company and all of that sort of stuff, so to me, he looks like

he needs a bit of a hand, so to speak,

and I just figure that he can probably live a much better life

living up here with me than he can living by himself in Sydney

with my brothers a mere 5km away.

But, anyway, we won't go into that.

I don't think anybody likes being told what they should do.

I am concerned about it

because it is costing a bloody lot of money

and I don't want the feeling that I've actually disappointed him

or done anything... But I have access to various doctors down here,

which I wouldn't have access.

Brett says it is only half an hour up the road to the Gold Coast,

but I don't particularly want to go to the bloody Gold Coast

every second day or so to see some doctor, and that's it.

'I don't know how he is going to make up his decision.

'I don't know what different items he has to put into the mix

'to try and decide,'

so he may or may not... I think part of him...

The trouble to move may be greater than the benefit of actually moving.

I keep putting it to the back of my mind, you know. It's a dilemma.

I feel Brett's trying to force him into accepting the fact

that he's built this thing just for Dad

and I think that's wrong. Dad's his own person. He's got his own mind,

he's always done his own thing.

I understand where Brett's coming from, but I don't see that working.

And Brett does not see our point of view.

So, sorry, Brett, I don't want him to go.

All the Nielsens seem to have strong opinions.

Brett's decision to abandon artificial arms so young

was a declaration of independence.

But if he couldn't support himself,

he could need lifelong financial help from his parents.

That was the argument 62 British families used to win a six-year fight

for compensation from Distillers,

the company that licensed thalidomide in Britain and the Commonwealth.

The firm which sold the thalidomide drug in Britain

has offered to pay £20 million.

It will go to more than 300 children born deformed

because their mothers took the drug

on doctors' orders when they were pregnant.

Distillers also paid modest compensation

to 36 Australian children, including Brett.

But it went into a trust fund

that he could only access a decade later, when he was 25.

In Sydney, that meant both Nielsens had to work all hours

to send the teenage Brett to boarding school.

It must have been his next big test.

I want to know how he survived with hundreds of adolescent boys.

To find out, I have come three hours west of Sydney

to Scots School in Bathurst - now co-ed.

I thought it would be a very good thing for the school

to have Brett with us

and his father was terribly anxious that he should be a normal boy,

and he was to all intents and purposes,

though very confident and very competent -

an interesting child.

He used to walk around... He was a bit cocky with that,

I don't know how he got away with it,

but he used to have the smokes in his top pocket

and I remember him flicking it out and just pulling one out.

He'd have a lighter or matches, whatever. Incredible.

I had been caught smoking in town, in a cafe,

and before he wrapped the cane around me,

he said, "What the hell did you think you were doing?"

And I apparently said, "Well, I didn't think anyone would notice."

"You're sitting in a cafe smoking a cigarette with your feet

"and you didn't think anyone would notice?!"

And you also said that you couldn't be caned

because it was against the law.

That was at the state school,

because they caned everyone on the hand, but at boarding school,

they'd wrap the cane around everyone's arse

and I had one of them so...damn.

We also had another situation.

He and another boy were going to have a fight.

They had a fight, Brett won - that didn't do Brett any harm at all.

He grew in the estimation of a lot of the boys in the school.

Anyone said anything wrong, he'd get stuck into them.

He could look after himself.

He could kick you quicker than someone could punch, basically,

he was phenomenally quick on his feet

and he could really defend himself.

We were told, you know, "Look after your brothers,"

but that went for the other two looking after me too

if I got into a scrap, and Brett has come to my aid as well, too.

I got picked on at Pittwater High and Brett just walked up,

dunked his satchel off his shoulder and kicked the shit out of someone.

Left hand, under there... Tight into your shoulder.

All right?

Lock it in,

swing your other arm through... Lose it or eat it.

'I didn't enjoy school. I didn't enjoy boarding school at all.'

I was always on the outer. The whole school was either involved

in the school cadets marching around with .303s

or in the bagpipe band, and, you know, saying about,

as much as I loved music, the idea of me marching playing bagpipes

just didn't seem like a great career move,

and the army insisted that the rifle be held with both hands,

so, you know, I sort of spent a lot of time just doing my own thing.

Left, left, left, right, left...

Brett left school at 15 to become an intern at the local radio station.

It was a job that would change his life.

Bit of solid gold

from Creedence Clearwater Revival - I Put A Spell On You.

10 past 12 now from 2MBS-FM.

'I found kids like that who were determined'

not to allow their disability to become a handicap

and they worked harder and tried harder

and once they got to the normal level of competency,

they didn't stop trying.

He came to us from Scots School

and they said, "Look, he has an interest in production and music.

"He plays piano and he would love to come in

"and do some work experience,"

and we just... With a view to perhaps getting a career in radio,

and I think learning the production and giving him the skills,

which Brett just then ran with,

because he ran his own production company, didn't he?

-And...

-He still does.

HE PLAYS PIANO

# See that old man in the street

# Asked me why I wore no shoes upon my feet... #

'My neighbour had a piano and I used to go and annoy them,

'often playing their piano and mucking around with it,

'and then when I was still at school,

'a fella taught me basic chord structure'

and so with that I sort of started working out

how to get my feet around playing chords.

# People like to think they know who they are

# Too many trying to copy a star

# Aaaaaaah, aaaaaaah... #

'I started writing songs,

'because it seemed to be something

'which was interesting me at the time,

'because I had a lot of spare time at boarding school,

'and I starting bashing away on a piano

'and decided I was going to become a songwriter,

'so that's what started off trying to write songs

'and just sort of has progressed ever since then.'

Singing and playing his own songs took him into local clubs.

I ran a restaurant in Byron Bay in Johnson Street

and we decided to put on some entertainment.

# There is a house in New Orleans... #

And Brett approached us one day to come and play there and we said,

"Yeah, this is unusual, but, yeah, give us a go."

He was very good. I mean, on stage he was very entertaining.

We had people coming back basically just to see him

and he had quite a good following, actually.

Love of music also brought Brett his first wife, Lydia.

She was 27, Brett was 19.

A mutual friend introduced us whilst we were at the function.

She said, "You would love to meet Brett,"

and I went, "Oh, yeah, OK," so I met Brett

and I didn't even realise that he was in any way unique or different,

I just thought he was standing in a crowd of people.

And we were just chatting away and we started to talk about music

and playing piano and I casually mentioned

that there was a piano at the house where I was staying

and he said, "Let's go, let's go!

"I want to play you my songs, I want to play you my songs,"

and I went, "Oh, all right," off we'd trot,

and we spent the whole night just listening to music,

to each other's songs.

I think of my time with Brett as the best years of my life.

We had a ball, we had an absolute ball.

OK, in the early days, we had very little.

We had the house and that was about it

and we slowly pieced it together and made it into a beautiful house

and we got the gardens happening, we got the studio built,

we did the music and we got into stuff

and we were energetic and we did things.

And that's when you're in your 30s, you do those things,

and we did those things, it was our 30s,

it was our, you know, our prime time.

Brett's studio was the key to a successful recording business,

including producing nine CDs of his own relaxation music

that sold over 120,000 copies.

Oh, look at that!

'Brett's latest project is an album that began 27 years ago

'and was never released.

'It is a collection of mostly his own songs called Pigs In Space.'

# Here we go again One, two, three

# Do you want to come and join in the dance with me? #

Why did it take 27 years to finish Pigs In Space?

I recorded all of those songs

and a whole bunch more and then I mixed them

on two or three different occasions

and I was never quite happy with the product at the end of it

and never quite happy to release that,

and then decided we wanted to finish the Pigs In Space project

and that is what we did.

# Roses are red and violets are blue

# Nobody does it for me like you do... #

When did you stop singing publicly?

In 1981, I stopped singing publicly.

It was the International Year of the Disabled

and I didn't want anyone to get the wrong impression.

What was the wrong impression?

Well, I don't know, that it was something to do

with the Year of the Disabled, you know,

I just didn't want to be a part of it.

# Bend the ending, bend the start

# Nothing's worth it when you've lost your heart

# Grandpa once said to me

# "Boy, you've gotta let your spirit go free"... #

'Brett's impressive lifestyle contrasts sharply

'with other surviving thalidomide victims around the world.

'They have struggled all their lives to win compensation

'against fierce corporate resistance.

'Although Brett gained from the settlements,

'he kept working and avoided the treadmill of legal campaigns,

'preferring the company of family and friends instead.'

I think it all starts from the back yard, really, and I figure

if my little world has integrity and all the rest of it,

that it can flow out from there,

so that is sort of what I mainly concentrate on.

I was also thinking about you not wanting to be seen as a whinger.

What does it mean to be a whinger, when there is a really good cause?

Whingeing, to me, is sort of where one's got the attitude

that the world owes them a living

and I don't believe the world owes anyone a living.

I think everyone needs to get up and get happening

and do the stuff they have got to do.

Whingeing in the Nielsen family is strictly taboo.

Brett's mother died last year,

but her influence still prevails throughout the family.

You could never, ever complain about anything with Grandma,

cos she would shut you down.

So, yeah, I definitely think the no whingeing comes from Grandma.

You could rip off Mum's arm and she would say,

"Just put a Band-Aid on it, I have got other stuff to do".

She really was like that, she was unbelievable.

-BARBARA NIELSEN:

-I used to get so annoyed when he would ask me...

not ask, DEMAND that I should do this and do that

and he would scream so much,

but because the child was so handicapped,

it seemed even worse to me to feel resentful.

-NARRATOR:

-Brett's mother realised that her resentment

was normal for a young woman with two other children,

and so stopped giving in to him automatically,

but she also saw that Brett was not just crying for help -

he was crying for more independence.

MOTOR STARTS

'I can see Barbara's influence on the way Brett has lived his life.

'As well as marketing the studio, he bought a small bulldozer

'and worked on building sites locally for 27 years.

'It was a high-risk venture, both financially and physically.'

It is a bit of a career jump.

It is not like, "The natural progression of my radio career

"is to go and buy a tractor."

No, it's not, but I mean, you know,

I like driving things, you know that,

and I needed to earn some sort of an income somehow

and nothing much was really jumping out,

so earth moving seemed like a really good idea.

'Brett's willingness to take risks

'to become independent showed in his teens.

'With money from a serious bicycle accident,

'he bought a flat in Sydney, and then traded it in for a house

'that he still lives in 37 years later.

'He was just 19.'

I came for a holiday up this way

and came to visit some friends who were living here.

And I said, "This is such a great place,"

and they said, "Yeah, it's such a bummer it's up for sale."

BRETT LAUGHS

So I went and put a 50 holding deposit on it,

down at the local real estate

and went home and sold the other place and bought this one.

14 years later at 33,

Brett's independence and fearless way of living

were threatened by a near-fatal car accident.

-Look at this, Dad.

-Oh, my God!

It was an F100.

And it was a very, very big accident,

where a person in a Volvo couldn't drive very well

and lost control of their car and crashed into me.

I smashed 16 teeth, lip got severed right up into my nostril,

broke my nose, stitches in my eye, broke my left leg,

couple of toes in my right foot had broke as well

and it was a bit like having broken arms and legs - I couldn't walk,

I couldn't hold a cup, I couldn't hold a cigarette,

I couldn't do anything,

and my wife had left a couple of months earlier. Damn, damn, damn!

Were you angry? How did you feel about the other driver?

I thought he was a bit of a clown

for not being able to drive his car very well,

but, you know, accidents happen!

Did it make you cross?

Cross - no. No, I don't think I was cross,

it was more frustrated,

because not being able to walk or anything,

it was just very, very difficult to get around.

And, you know, a wheelchair?

"How are you going to go in the wheelchair, Brett?"

"Badly!" You know?

Crutches? No!

And on and on it went,

so I had to rely on friends more than anything

for the better part of a month

to do everything, which was, you know, terrible.

Terrible.

'I am finding it hard to grasp how calmly

'Brett seems to deal with adversity.

'If he wasn't angry at someone who almost killed him,

'surely he must feel strongly about the scandal of thalidomide

'and the German company who made it, Grunenthal.'

'I've seen him cross with people,'

but I wouldn't say Brett's actually got a temper.

I don't see him as that...

He can be very cutting with the wit.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

I think that's what gives him the ability

to do such great motivational speaking.

The feet thing has never really been an issue.

It's whatever you are used to as you grow up.

I was with my daughter one day, who was two or three at the time,

and she said, "Look, Dad, there's a man playing piano with his hands."

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

In his 30s, Brett turned his optimism and resilience

in the face of his situation...

"What a weirdo!" You know?

..into a third career as a motivational speaker.

He was in demand all over Australia.

He joked about his lack of arms,

but stayed clear of thalidomide politics.

As we close, if I was to share some insights about life

which I consider to be important, it would be these few things.

The first is personal responsibility -

my parents made no special modifications to our home

as they felt that I should adapt to the world

and not expect the world to adapt to me.

Be kind to yourself, recognise your achievements,

listen to your heart and follow your dreams.

Look around and see the beauty in simplicity.

Work hard at whatever is in front of you

and know in your bones that you can do anything.

And, finally, it doesn't matter what happens to you in your life,

it matters how you deal with it.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you so much, good night.

CHEERING

'Brett now follows those principles in his turn as a dad.

'He is a single parent to Pasha

'and to Jack, whom he looks after four days a week.'

He is my number one support system.

He's great. He really supports me with anything I do.

He's a great dad.

'Someone once said to me that having a child

'is the greatest love affair of your life

'and I think it is, you know, I love the kids,

'and no-one makes me laugh as much as Jack does.

'He is just hilarious, you know, constantly.

'We have a crazy time together

'and, you know, we do lots of stuff together,

'we cook together every night and all of that sort of stuff,

'just hang out. It's great.'

Here's Jack.

-Hi, Jack. How are you, darling?

-Good. How are you?

-Good. How was your day?

-It was pretty good.

-Yeah?

He has always been Dad. You know how Dad is.

Dad - the man of the house, Dad cooks dinner,

I help, you know, that sort of thing.

But now I know how intense Dad's life has been,

I want to help more with him. that sort of stuff.

Another part of Brett's life has come into sharper focus.

He is increasingly concerned

by the behaviour of the makers of thalidomide, Grunenthal.

A few years ago, someone sent me an e-mail

about a book about thalidomide,

and I had never read any books about thalidomide. What for, you know?

The horse has already gone,

let's not bother shutting the gate now, you know.

And I must have been very bored the next day or something

because I went to the link

and sort of had a bit of a look at it, as you do,

and the entire front cover was a photo of me

and so I had to read the book after that.

Tell me more about the book

and what it made you feel at that point.

It made me feel quite incredulous

that the whole thing had actually happened...

..that, you know...

Yeah, this is just outrageous that people could carry on as they did.

Since the scandal broke in 1961,

Grunenthal has always denied responsibility.

In the late '60s, the German government took them to court

on behalf of the 5,000 German victims.

After years of bullying expert witnesses and victims,

the leading defence counsel became Minister of Justice.

After several secret meetings with the prosecutors,

the trial was stopped without a verdict,

but with fierce condemnation from the judges.

It took until 2012 for the new chief executive

to express regret to the victims

for what he called "50 years of silent shock".

The victims said they would rather have more money.

Brett has kept out of the fight until now.

What is the point in being anything with that situation?

I mean, there is absolutely nothing I can do to change it. Nothing.

You say it very calmly, you know what I mean?

There are people you could hate, you could hate them.

I would, I think I would. I don't know, what do the other victims feel?

Do they hate them? Because you are very special as a person, anyway.

Well, I don't know if they hate Grunenthal or whatever.

I mean, it seems a little bit sort of counterproductive

to hate them. I think they are a bunch of arseholes,

but I don't hate them, you know, I think the way

they went about what they did was absolutely outrageous,

-but, you know, it has already happened.

-Sure.

So far better to make a statement

that makes them actually respond, I think that would be great.

'Brett's launch of his new CD offers him

'the chance to challenge Grunenthal.

'It has taken 27 years to complete the album.'

They have choreographed it to your...

'And even longer for him to take on the company that made thalidomide.'

Action!

'I want to do some videos to promote the album

'and as an added extra, I thought it would be really cool

'to make a statement about Grunenthal,

'and, you know, Grunenthal just haven't really done the right thing.

'It's just really, really wrong and I believe they should be held'

accountable for their actions

and for the products that they've produced.

And I am probably old enough now to talk about it,

whereas probably before I wasn't. You know, a bit young and silly.

I think this is beautiful, this tape. I love this stuff.

It is a bit American Gothic or something, isn't it?

Fantastic, well done!

'Brett has recently taken on a lot of responsibility -

'the album, two music videos, building a house for his dad

'and raising Jack on his own.'

-They're better than the white ones.

-Really?

-Yeah.

'Doing all this with no arms and very little help carries a major risk...'

Good morning, Brett, how are you?

'..that his body could suddenly let him down.'

-I am all set up for you.

-Good on you.

Come in, make yourself comfy. I will be with you when you are ready.

It's not one of those sort of movies, it's a family show.

-That's right. Off you go.

-OK.

I want to know from Peter, Brett's physio and close friend,

what is the long-term physical cost of Brett's remarkable independence?

Brett's, basically... Because of his disability,

he works with his legs a lot,

and there is obviously more wear and tear

in his pelvis, his legs, his knees, as there would be with other people,

so my focus is mainly on balancing the pelvis, straighten his hips,

keep his spine in good working order, and I work a lot on his feet

to make sure mobility remains good,

and, over the years, he has been pretty stable.

You have seen him in action! He's quite remarkable.

When I see him operate his hands, his feet, I am so impressed.

The joints in his, they are so much more mobile.

They are meant to do fine work.

The fine motor skills are much more developed in the hands.

But when I look at Brett's fine motor skills

that he uses with his feet, it is remarkable.

-How are you?

-Good, how are you?

-Good, thanks.

-What's going on?

'Did Brett ever imagine having arms?

'Or feel phantom pain in the missing limbs?'

He told me this one story,

he was painting his house, painting up on the ceiling,

one foot had the paintbrush, one foot had the paint pot,

and he was sitting on the ladder, painting.

He fell over and he said the first and only time in his life,

he wanted to use hands to soften the fall,

but still no phantom pain,

but he said he had this feeling,

arms were growing in that second when he fell

to soften the fall, and I thought, "That is a remarkable experience".

'Brett's plan to move his father next door is on hold.

'The new house is months late with serious building problems.

'He shows them to his friend Trevor, a property developer.

'For a start, there are no handrails on the stairs or veranda -

'risky for a man with no arms

'and his 83-year-old father who has trouble walking.'

-Oh, gee.

-It shouldn't be like that.

The other thing is that there is a beam running along here,

all the way along there,

all the way down the other side and it is not here.

There it is down there, but it's in the wrong place.

-I think so.

-I am staggered they have done this to you, Brett.

They demanded full payment, last final payment before Christmas.

But they hadn't finished?

-They hadn't done very much by then at all.

-I hate to have to say it,

but I think you have been taken advantage of in this circumstance.

I think I have, Trev.

'Yet again, Brett seems calm in the face of things that would have me

'climbing the wall, like Grunenthal or the construction problems.'

Brett doesn't show a lot of emotion outside, he is very controlled

and I think that also comes from the fact that when you are at school -

back to his schooling again - he would have had a lot

of cruel things said to him, I'm sure,

and he learned to insulate himself so not to show emotion

and I think that is where that would have come from.

'Helen found the same reaction when they were disturbed at a restaurant.'

We'd had a lovely evening, really nice evening, chattering away

and this drunk walked up

-and started just being loudmouthed, wasn't he?

-He was.

-Obnoxious.

He was fascinated by the situation

and couldn't help but to say something

and, in doing so, he was taking up our space, basically.

The way Brett deals with that,

I found that really extraordinary,

because I wanted to get out and snot them,

because that seemed fair and reasonable.

Losing control, I mean, if you, you know,

are telling someone to fuck off, essentially you have lost control.

-BARBARA NIELSEN:

-Of course we felt sorry for him while he was young,

but as he grew older and was quite happy,

then there was no need to feel sorry.

Why should one feel sorry for a happy person?

'The family have seen the original film before,

'but I want to show it to them again to see if it sheds any light

'on what lies behind Brett's incredible composure.'

Don't touch it! DON'T!

-That was brutal!

-He sees the world

not quite with rose-coloured glasses...

I'd say he deserved it, personally.

..but he thinks people are mostly very kind.

-Do you still believe that?

-Yep.

'I do. I've always thought that, you know.'

I figure that mostly when I meet people for the first time,

they go into some sort of state of shock, basically.

And all of the layers of bullshit that everyone has up to impress

and whatever else is stripped off.

And I get to see the real person.

The Nielsens, like many other parents, had already been through

a frustrating series of hospital visits.

Thalidomide problems were new

and so complex that most doctors were caught unprepared.

It was a very intense time for me as a young child.

-Yeah. Really?

-Shit, yeah.

Yeah, well, I spent three months in hospital and Mum and Dad came

and visited every Sunday cos it was 70 miles away or something,

once a week for a few hours sort of thing, and on and on it went,

so it was a lot of separation anxiety and stuff like that.

Oh, poor you!

It's just sad to watch it, it's really sad.

It's like Dad with no arms now isn't sad. That's just Dad,

but a child with no arms is really, really tragic.

Yeah, tough times.

Awww!

Yesterday, when we watched One Of Them Is Brett together,

last night, it sort of...

..it sort of stirred up a few things

and I sort of realised that there was a whole bunch of memories

or whatever about those times

that I had basically fairly successfully stood on

and, you know, repressed for 50 years, feeling a little bit

sort of abandoned, really, you know, and left in hospitals and whatnot

and I totally understand and realise

that my parents were doing the absolute best they could for me

cos they loved me so much and all of that sort of stuff.

But, you know, at the end of the day,

the feeling is still there of some sort of abandonment as a youngster.

I never knew that Brett spent three months

in hospital being fitted for arms,

largely on his own, at the age of three.

He had already lived through it by the time I filmed him a year later.

'With the house in limbo and his dad still undecided about the move,

'Brett turns his energy back to his album and the protest video.'

It's a tricky one because...

'Simon the director and his editor Julie

'have come to Brett's house to produce it.'

When was it actually banned?

It was released in October '57 and it was banned worldwide in '61.

In '61, right. I personally never realised the extent

to which Grunenthal were like, "Whoops!"

That seems to be their attitude.

-50 years is ridiculous.

-Not really having been held accountable for it.

The other thing about Grunenthal is that the brothers,

the Wirtz brothers, who had it running, were Nazi Party members.

-Oh, God!

-And the people who invented the drugs

and who worked for Grunenthal were all out of the camps.

They are all the doctors or whatever they were,

who were testing stuff and doing experiments on the Jews

and rah-rah-rah. They are the guys who invented thalidomide

and they are the guys who worked for Grunenthal.

That adds a very sinister dimension, doesn't it?

Well, it does and I just figure that no-one seems to have had

a great deal of success in doing anything with Grunenthal.

And I'd love to embarrass the bastards.

Really, really embarrass them.

'Brett going public about his feelings

'is another big step for him.'

I am not looking for money from Grunenthal for me,

I am really not,

but there's a lot of people who aren't in my position,

who haven't been as fortunate one way or another

with their ability to work or whatever it is.

And, you know, there's a whole lot of people out there

having a really shitty time, shitty, shitty time, and it's wrong.

And the second one for me.

'The protest video is Brett's way

'of finally joining the 50-year campaign

'against those who made the drug.'

Thalidomide.

Every woman must be aware

that it's most important that they do not take this drug.

We're looking at the very worst disaster inflicted by medicine.

# Isn't it a pity

# Isn't it a shame

# How we break each other's hearts

# And cause each other pain... #

Half a century after my film about a determined four-year-old,

I see a happy man driven by love - of his children, of his father,

who has now decided to move into the new house,

and now Helen.

Inspired by her, Brett is writing songs again

and he no longer hides his feelings about Grunenthal.

# Isn't it a pity? #

'It has been a privilege to share a small part

'of the journey of this extraordinary ordinary man.'

Years ago, I sat down and I was feeling miserable about something,

glum, as Helen would say,

and I sat down with a bit of paper and a pen

and I wrote down all of the things that I wanted in my life, you know,

sort of, you know, the most extreme things that I could think of,

and I wrote them all down and looked at it all

and went, "Ah, I've got them all."

You know, I want to live in a big house, have a view of a mountain,

live near the water, have a recording studio in the back yard.

I mean, really, you know, beautiful kids, girlfriend, dog.

# Now isn't it a shame... #

Researchers report that Thalidomide children continue to be born.

# How we break each other's hearts... #

What many saw as corporate greed at its worst...

# And cause each other pain

# How we take each other's love

# Without thinking any more... #

It's an absolute disgrace.

# Forgetting to give back

# Isn't it a pity?

# Forgetting to give back

# Isn't it a pity?

# Forgetting to give back

# Isn't it a pity? #