THE START LINE
Your Para Sport Journey
Begins Here
To Knox Gibson, Los Angeles is more than the next Paralympic Games host city. It is a place where he has already experienced a Hollywood dream.
Gibson, a rising star of Para swimming, may well be part of the Australian Paralympic Team at the LA Games, which starts in exactly two years, on August 15, 2028. However, the first time he went to the bustling US West Coast city, it was as part of one of the movie industry’s biggest productions.
“It was a really eye-opening experience. It was honestly incredible,” Gibson said of his role playing the character Bobbin in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, for which he spent months filming in Europe before joining global premieres in London and LA.
“The size of the production – there were hundreds of people working on set. Filming at world heritage sites … it was honestly incredible.
It was a really eye-opening experience. It was honestly incredible.
“[For the premiere] they closed a block of Hollywood Boulevard. There was this massive red carpet and fans lining all the fences. We were doing interviews… it was just crazy, something I’d never really thought I’d get the opportunity to do.
There’s a charming irony in Gibson’s ascent to glitz and glamour. The environment in which he grew up, on the family property outside Orange in rural NSW, was as earthy as it comes, about as far as possible from LA’s bright lights, literally and figuratively.
It was a world in which physical activity was woven into everyday life, afternoons disappeared into games with mates and every sport was worth trying – even after Gibson lost his right hand at age four in a ride-on mower accident on his grandfather’s farm.
“I come from a big sporting family,” he said. “Losing my arm didn’t really change that mindset.
“The expectation was that I could do the same as everyone else. I loved footy and being able to play with my mates and learning how to catch. Being treated the same as everyone else was a big thing for me.
“Looking back, my love for sport was good for me to get over losing my arm because it drove me to learn how to do other things.”
Of all the sports competing for his time, swimming began to claim most of it. He is now on a potential trajectory towards the 2028 Paralympic Games, having recorded a string of personal bests at last year’s Australian Swimming Trials.
The expectation was that I could do the same as everyone else. Being treated the same as everyone else was a big thing for me.
“We were like, ‘Oh right… it’s The Hunger Games.’ So we tried to do a really good audition.” Knox Gibson
So, how did Gibson go from unheralded Para swimmer to a Hollywood film role?
“I was doing modelling with the goal of building a profile for my swimming,” he said.
“And it took off in a way that I didn’t really expect.”
“We were like, ‘Oh right… it’s The Hunger Games.’ So we tried to do a really good audition.”
In 2020, a filmmaker approached Gibson to ask permission to use his photographs in short film pitch to Netflix.
The pitch was successful and the filmmaker then asked Gibson to audition. He got the part, playing a child with limb difference living in Nazi Germany during Hitler’s secret program to euthanise disabled people.
More auditions followed and, while most ended the way they often do – with polite rejection – one script immediately caught his family’s attention.
“Mum had read the book,” he said. “She recognised some of the character’s names and we had a bit of a Google. We were like, ‘Oh right… it’s The Hunger Games’. So we tried to do a really good audition.”
Within weeks came confirmation he had secured the part and a short time later he was on a plane to Europe to join an international cast and crew for five months shooting in Germany and Poland. He worked on sprawling sets, filmed at UNESCO World Heritage listed locations and witnessed first-hand the extraordinary scale of blockbuster movie production.
“It was a really eye-opening experience,” he said.
Any kid, at some stage in their life, dreams of representing their country and winning gold and doing your family proud.
If his acting role was a surprise opportunity, Gibson’s Paralympic venture to LA would be through years of sustained effort.
“I’ve always been really competitive and I think that’s what drove my love for sport from the start,” he said.
“The Olympics and the Paralympics are the highest level. Any kid, at some stage in their life, dreams of representing their country and winning gold and doing your family proud.”
Find Knox Gibson on Instagram here: Knox Gibson 🇦🇺 (@captain_knoxie) • Instagram photos and videos
Your Para Sport Journey
Begins Here
Paralympics Australia is only able to continue doing its work driving the Paralympic Movement forward in Australia because of the generous support it receives from Government, Corporate Partners and donors.
The focus continues to be on delivering teams to each Summer and Winter Paralympic Games and supporting Para athletes as they enter and progress through the Para sport system and into their post-sporting careers.
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