Should autistic actors, you know, act?

Remember when film directors used to cast white actors in blackface and yellowface back in the old days? Remember when that was actually ok? In case you didn't know, big name actors like Laurence Olivier and John Wayne actually performed these kinds of roles during their careers. Laurence Olivier was, of course, a well-respected actor who made Shakespeare film adaptations and had the Laurence Olivier Awards in London named after him. Since he was an experienced Shakespearan actor, it made sense that he would be cast as Othello in a film adaptation of the iconic tragedy back in 1965. The real tragedy, however, is that Olivier was cast as an African character. He actually performed in blackface and developed a specific walk and voice for the role. Despite being Oscar-nominated for his work, this role has obviously aged poorly. As for John Wayne, he played Genghis Khan (yes, THAT Genghis Khan) in 1956's The Conqueror, and working on that film cost him his life. The movie was filmed in an area near a nuclear testing site that led to ninety-nine cast and crew members developing different forms of cancer. Wayne was one of those ninety-nine members, and he was sadly one of the forty-six who died as a result. As you probably already know, it isn't a good idea to cast white actors in non-white roles, especially since plenty of black and Asian actors are available to play Othello and Genghis Khan. Yes, it's acting, but it's also pretty discriminative to cast someone who doesn't fit the obvious description and can be seen as cruel mockery. We know better than to whitewash roles, so why are we still refusing to cast autistic actors as autistic characters?

Recently, Australian singer Sia released a trailer for her upcoming movie Music, which focuses on a drug addict and her nonverbal autistic sister. When it was announced that the verbal and neurotypical (non-autistic) Maddie Ziegler would be playing the sister and that Sia teamed up with Autism Speaks for this project, the autism community voiced their disappointment. Autism Speaks acts as a charity that wishes to help families with autistic children, but they're actually a hate group that spreads misinformation about autism and wishes to "cure" it. Instead of accepting the fact that she made a huge mistake and offering to fix the problem, Sia made excuses and threw a tantrum. She insulted the very group that she wanted to spread awareness for, and yet people are STILL defending this rather offensive project. The main issue that I wish to discuss today is the casting of an abled actor in a disabled role, specifically non-autistic actors in autistic roles.

As an autistic actress, I was rightfully upset when Sia defended her casting and made all of these excuses for why she couldn't cast the proper actress for the role. I made a bunch of TikTok videos on her and abled actors playing disabled roles, and so many people have commented saying, "It's just acting." Is it, though? As I mentioned earlier, there was a time when white actors performed in blackface like it was no big deal. Someone clearly saw an issue with this and spoke up, which is why it is now impossible to whitewash a role without sparking controversy. Non-white actors can now play roles that are actually meant for them. Like race, autism is genetic. You are born autistic and that is how you are to live your life. Also like race, being autistic means that you will face discrimination for the way you were born. It's bad enough that we autistics have to deal with ableism everyday, so the least you can do is actually let us play ourselves like how you would let black people play themselves. Sadly, an army of ableist trolls flooded my comment section with stupid things like "Dead people should be in horror movies" and "Real serial killers should play serial killers". You are not born a clueless teen who gets butchered by a maniac who wears a hockey mask, and being a serial killer is a choice. I had no choice when I was born autistic.

Sia's main excuse for casting Maddie in the autistic role is that the previous actor she supposedly had didn't work out so well. She claimed that she did cast an autistic actress, but the girl couldn't handle the process. Instead of accommodating this girl like anyone who claimed to have done three years of research on autism would do, Sia decided to let her go and didn't even bother to cast any more autistic actresses. Furthermore, it was revealed in an interview all the way back in 2015 that Sia had actually written the role specifically for Maddie and never actually planned to cast an autistic actress in the autistic role. If this autistic actress that she claimed to have previously hired actually existed, then she should've made the whole filming process autism-friendly. I have an autistic friend who just so happens to be an actress, and she recently filmed a movie in which she plays an autistic woman going on a date. She did experience some sensory overload while on set, but her director didn't go, "You know what? I tried." Instead, she made sure that my friend had the time she needed to calm down and refused to continue shooting without her. There are actually so many different autistic actors to choose from, and accommodations should be available for all of them. It's also ok to cast someone with a less severe version of a disability in the role of someone with a more severe form because it would be a bit easier to work with and it could still come across as authentic. If you've watched Breaking Bad, then you know that Walter White's son has cerebral palsy. Walter White Jr. is played by RJ Mitte, whose cerebral palsy isn't as serious as his character's. Mitte is technically still acting because he has to act more disabled than he already is and he is playing a different person who isn't exactly like him. If Mitte and my friend can get the job done, then Sia really had no excuse for not casting an autistic actress.

Rain Man wasn't the first-ever movie to have an autistic character, but it made history with its success by becoming the highest-grossing movie that year and winning four Oscars, including Best Picture. It may have paved the way for more portrayals of developmental disabilities, but it was also sadly responsible for the stereotypical portrayal of autism that just refuses to die. Even though some neurotypical actors have given more respectful representations of autism in recent years, they still come across as Rain Man ripoffs because that seems to be the go-to way of acting autistic. It also doesn't help that writers tend to go for Rain Man-esque storylines that often revolve around how autism affects neurotypicals. It's always an autism story by neurotypicals for neurotypicals. Sure, you can argue that it helps "spread awareness", but it doesn't help if you're just repeating the same thing over and over again. The overused neurotypical actors and writers have really narrowed a lot of people’s perceptions about what autism looks like. We all know how neurotypicals are affected by autism, but we never see how autistics are affected by ableism. We never see parents planning to abandon or murder their autistic kids because they just don't want to care for them anymore. We don't see how autistic girls are less likely to be diagnosed at an early age than boys due to a sexist myth that only boys can be on the spectrum. And what about the fact that some autistics can't get married without losing Supplemental Security Income and Security Disability Insurance? And why won't you show us a black autistic man who has to deal with racism and ableism? Don't you know that trans autistics exist? And don't you know that autistic people are more likely to be abused and sexually assaulted than neurotypicals? And why oh why won't you discuss internalized ableism, which is currently a serious issue in the autism community? Why can't you show us THAT? Enough with the recycled Rain Man plot!

One of my "favorite" troll comments that I've received on the subject matter of casting autistics as autistics was, "Does that mean that autistics can't play non-autistic characters?" Uh, no, that's not what that means. I'm going to bring up race again for this one. Back then, you'd only see black actors in roles that are meant specifically for black people like slaves or folks in the Civil Rights era. Nowadays, we see black people kicking ass in horror movies and black singers killing it as Javert in productions of Les Miserables. Just take a look at Hamilton; the reason why the cast was so diverse is because it was meant to show how differently America looks today from how it looked nearly 250 years ago. Also, we have enough Broadway shows that focus on white people. Now, back to disabled folks. Most of them can only play so many roles, and they can't just sit around and wait for roles that are meant specifically for them, especially since abled actors keep getting the dang roles. It also doesn't help that the roles that disabled actors do manage to grab are often stigmatizing. Nowadays, we've seen more theatre companies cast disabled actors in roles that were never actually intended to be disabled. For instance, one of the Best Musical Revival nominees at the 2016 Tony Awards was a production of Spring Awakening that was almost completely made up of deaf and hard-of-hearing actors (with translators, of course). The deaf community is often ignored by society, just like how the youths in the show are ignored by the grown-ups in their lives. One of the actresses in the revival was Ali Stroker, who later became the first wheelchair-bound person to win a Tony thanks to her portrayal of Ado Annie in Oklahoma! in 2019. Neither of her Broadway roles were meant to be performed in sign language or a wheelchair, but she killed it regardless. Back in 2018, 5th Avenue Theatre over in Seattle cast deaf actor Joshua Castille as Quasimodo in The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and he was accompanied by an actor dressed as a gargoyle who provided his singing voice. This casting actually made perfect sense considering the fact that the legendary hunchback was deaf in the Victor Hugo novel of the same name. There is really no excuse to not cast disabled actors in any possible role. So, to answer that little troll, autistic actors can play whoever they wish to play. Deal with it.

"Should autistic actors be allowed to play autistic roles?" Honestly, is this question even necessary? If you're gonna ask that, you might as well ask if black actors should play roles meant specifically for black people. Autistic people deserve to have their stories shared, and they should be the ones to tell them. Honestly, any script that screams RAIN MAN should be illegal from this moment on because nobody needs to hear that story retold with different people and plot lines anymore. We also need to accommodate autistic actors and let them play whoever they wish to play. December 3rd is International Day of Disability, and I would like to take the time to ask you to listen to disabled voices. Let them tell you their stories. Please listen because we need your attention more than ever.