Don't wanna be all by myself: Restraint and audience participation

There are several films that I enjoy so much when I am able to review them before the festival that I plan on seeing again on the big screen, for the experience of watching them in the theater atmosphere, with other humans, as part of an audience. “This is England” and “Autism: The Musical” are two of those films.


(Left to right) Neal, Adam, Lexi, Henry and Wyatt: The rugged individuals of "Autism: The Musical."

There is a moment in “Autism: The Musical” where Wyatt – who looks to me like a little philosopher, autistic or not – sits on a swing talking passionately about kids who go into their own world. He says that he and Henry could be friends, but Henry would just as soon go into his own world and start talking about reptiles.

Wyatt goes on to wax about his own tendencies to end up in his own world, explaining that it feels so great to have a friend that “isn’t rude” (he says “rude” with his father’s British accent) who isn’t “a bully.” So sometimes his own world seems the best choice, even though he knows it is not always healthy.

Wyatt seems a tiny adult in this situation, full of fire and puissance. Then director Tricia Regan shows a shot of him from the side, in the sun, and we see Wyatt as the precious, little vulnerable boy he is. The film then goes on to show Wyatt’s parents at an advocate’s office where the attorney, leaning back in his chair, hands on head (read: unprofessionally) tells them they could retain him for four-hundred-some-odd dollars an hour, which could turn into $40,000 - $100,000. All because Wyatt has a very “low cognitive function" and cannot be easily mainstreamed. Jerk.

Oh, other humans

I put you in bold, other humans, because you love to be in bold! I put you in bold because I can practically see you, in the darkened theater, jazz-hands a-flutter, waiting to hear yourselves speak! But I quickly forget, the jazz-hands slip out of focus, as another individual’s (usually stunning) work appears on the screen and I get to see his or her vision, his or her triumph of creativity, craft and statement come to life.

Is that what is so threatening to the people who get a director down in front at the Jane Pickens or the Opera House or theaters nation-wide and feel the need to utter the sentence, “I’m a(n) insert creative career title or similar here in order to project one’s own personality because one is threatened by someone else’s artistic statement…”?

Anyway… There is always someone who is the star of the Q&A - who really takes the opportunity to shine. Do you think I mean the directors, the actors? Oh no, my friend. I mean the self-aggrandizing audience member. There is one woman who (well-meaning as she must be), when I see her in both a panel and a screening of “Autism: The Musical,” holds jobs that would be the most important, most impressive to the authority figure at hand – the panelists, the directors.

Now, she probably actually is a composer and a director of musical theater (and a butcher, baker and candlestick maker). But why does a person find it necessary to tell the director of her disappointment, “There is not enough of the musical” in “Autism: The Musical.”

Luckily, though, Tricia Regan has a really good reason. “The musical wasn’t that good,” she says. And the point of the film isn't the musical, she also explains. And they even thought of calling the film "It's Not About The Show." And they're trying to reach the widest audience possible to get people engaged and to start caring about the disease, which now affects one child in 166. "But I’m sorry you were disappointed,” Regan genuinely adds.

“Oh, no!” the woman backpedals. “I really enjoyed it!”

I understand the impulse to want to connect on a creative level with these people who are living the dream. It is one thing to ask a question that pertains to something you do in your life (like one woman asked Tricia Regan if she knew before taking on the project what it was like to be a mother with a special needs child). It is quite another thing to take the condescending approach with self-aggrandizing crap. It really just makes one look threatened by an artist who is putting it out there.

Sometimes one of my sister’s pugs will get more attention and treats than the other and then the one who feels neglected will start humping the one who gets the attention – but enough about psychology.


My humps: Gigi and Francie Trim enjoy beach life between power-struggles. (Thanks to Nancy Trim for the photo).

A similar thing happens at the screening of the spacious and beautifully crafted “Shotgun Stories,” by Jeff Nichols (whom, thanks to the lovely Ericka Tavares, I had the honor of interviewing yesterday. More on that later). One man goes on and on as if only he, Jeff Nichols and Mike Shannon are in the room together.

But I’ll leave it at that. I’m here for the movies – the real stars of the show.