October 8, 2024 • 39 mins
Alumni Malcolm Kramp (2024) interviews Ryan Copping (2006) about his experiences as an autistic person during his time in school, on sets, and as a teacher advocating for neurodiversity.
LINKS:
Ryan Copping LinkedIn
To learn about ways you can support GVSU film and video students:
LINKS:
Ryan Copping LinkedIn
To learn about ways you can support GVSU film and video students:
- The Dirk Koning Memorial Film and Video Scholarship
- The Chuck Peterson Memorial Fellowship
- Morse-Cuppy Film, Video, Animation Study Abroad Endowed Scholarship
- GVSU F/V Alumni: https://www.facebook.com/groups/gvsufilmvideoalumni
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Welcome to Alumni Live (00:08):
The Podcast.
These are conversations with GrandValley State University film and video
graduates about the industry, thefilm, video, major and alumni profiles.
Welcome back to Alumni Live, the podcast.
My name is Malcolm Kramp, a senior inGrand Valley's film and video program.
Today we will be discussing theexperience and challenges of working
(00:29):
in film production for autisticpeople as both film students and
professionals in the industry.
Joining me today is Ryan Copping, GVSUfilm video alumni from the class of 2006.
Ryan is a screenwriter, film andculture historian, and Visiting
Professor teaching film study classeshere at Grand Valley State University.
Ryan, thank you for joining me today.
(00:50):
Glad to be here.
Before we begin, I would like to takethis moment to clarify our intended
use of terminology such as autismand autistic with consideration and
respect, as we acknowledge this may beperceived as sensitive to some listeners.
Let's discuss some of your background,your education, career as a filmmaker,
researcher, and subsequent work asa professor here at Grand Valley.
(01:14):
Well, I think I alwayswanted to be a filmmaker.
before it was film, it was actually radio.
I got interested in radio when I was achild and then kind of morphed into film.
I suppose I'm kind of a frustratedfilmmaker because that's
what my goal has always been.
I didn't really set out for a careerin academia, it just happened.
I did my undergrad in film and video andstill photography here in, 2002 - 2006.
(01:34):
I then did my Master's in Communications,and while I was doing the master's I
was just offered to teach a class as anadjunct, and I wasn't really expecting
it, but I took the opportunity and Ienjoyed it, and it just built from there.
After I graduated I taught forthree years, and then I went
over to England and I did a Ph.
D.
there.
then I came back here and now I'm, in mysecond year as a Visitor at Grand Valley.
Lovely.
(01:55):
recently on a previous episodeof Alumni Live, we discussed
the profile of Grand Valley alumTim Dailey at Exceptional Minds.
A California based academy that helpsto prepare autistic students for a
career in animation and post production.
From that, you reached out to us withthe idea for a deeper dive to discuss
Autistic individuals working in thefilm industry and as film students.
(02:18):
Well I got the idea for this becauseof my experiences both as an autistic
person as a student in the program.
on the film shoots that I'veworked on and also as a professor.
I feel that in many ways, althoughit's gotten a lot better in the last
20 years, autism is kind of invisible.
It's not something that a lot ofpeople necessarily think about.
And I've had students who identifiedas autistic or diagnosed as autistic
(02:42):
and, I'm not entirely certain thattheir needs and rights are being
recognized as much as they should be.
So that's why I'm here.
I feel like that's an importantbaseline to establish, because as you
mentioned, historically autism is oftenvery , misinformed, or normally a
misunderstood diagnosis, and one thathas often not been represented with
(03:04):
consideration in culture and media.
To give a brief baseline forlisteners, what is the autism spectrum,
and why its considered a spectrum?
Yes, this is a big question.
So, autism is a neurological difference.
from people who are not autistic,who we generally call allistic.
these people used to be calledneurotypicals, but there's some problem
(03:25):
with that, so I use the term allistic.
Basically, it's generally believedthat the way parts of the brain
are connected to each other isdifferent in autistic people.
I'm not a neurologist, so I can'tnecessarily go into it more than this.
The diagnosis of autism isone that is based on behavior,
(03:46):
cognition, and experience.
So unfortunately, there's no CATscan or blood test or anything like
that that you can take to determinewhether someone is autistic.
So we have these neurologicaldifferences that appear to be
built around, the way parts of thebrain are connected to each other.
It's very likely that autism is a normalpart of the human experience, there have
(04:07):
probably been autistic people throughouthistory through Prehistoric times.
The explosions of diagnoses that we'veseen in the last thirty years or so
are probably just it being recognizedin people, not actually more cases.
The way that these neurologicaldifferences manifest themselves.
is different in each person And it'salso very hard to actually say, is
(04:30):
this because the person is autisticor is this because of something else?
Because it's like saying, why doyou like jazz music or something?
It could be a neurological reason.
It could be psychological.
Could be your.
grandfather played jazzand you really like it.
it's very hard to actually saythat someone is doing one thing
because they are autistic.
(04:50):
That said, there are lots of traits thatare typically associated with autistic
people, although not all may have them.
One that I strugglewith is sensory issues.
And this is one thing I feel very stronglyabout, Most allistic people, not all,
but most allistic people can go into aplace that they've never been before.
And they don't have to worry about, canI physically bear to be in this room?
(05:13):
Whereas a lot of autistic people,and definitely me, every time I
go anywhere new, there's alwaysthe question of, Is it too loud?
Is there going to be a smellthat's going to make me nauseous?
Can I eat the food there?
if it's too hot or too cold, can I leave?
I have trouble with certain fabrics.
Like you never see me wear a sweateror a jumper if you're in the UK because
(05:34):
I can't stand how it feels on my skin.
. Another thing that is Somewhat sensitiveto talk about, and I want to choose
my words carefully here, here, is atleast the perception that many autistic
people struggle with social skills.
I think that's a very reductive way oflooking at this, however, I do feel that,
some autistic people, including myself,sometimes struggle with, connecting
(05:56):
or communicating with other people.
The reason why I want to be careful whatI say here is that it's very easy to
fall into a kind of negative stereotypewhich I've read on the internet,
autistic people are hopelessly uncool
geeks
who don't have any friendsor things like that.
And that's a stereotype and that'sproblematic, and I do want to say there
(06:17):
are some autistic people, just as thereare some allistic people, who are, kind
of loners and, solitary, but many ofthem choose to be like that and that's
just the way that they want to be.
That said, I do think that many autisticpeople feel a sense of social ostracism,
and, bigotry, and prejudice against thembecause the world is not really designed
for them and people are not necessarilydesigned for their, needs or some of the
(06:42):
behaviors that they want to demonstrate.
So that's a problem, but that's reallymore one of social discrimination
than it is of of the person.
Would you mind sharing a fewdetails of your personal journey?
In regards to the sensory stuff,that's probably the most obvious one.
When I was a little kid, I went to mymother and I said, there's a worm in my
shoe and she couldn't understand what Iwas talking about, and what, was going
(07:04):
on was my sock was folded within my shoe.
It didn't hurt exactly, but itwas distracting and uncomfortable.
I couldn't really focus on anything else,and I think it was difficult for teachers
to understand, why that was a problem.
I remember in the third grade,I had poor balance and I would
sometimes fall out of my chair.
I think the teacher thought I wasdoing it for attention when I wasn't.
I was literally just losing my balance.
(07:25):
I already shared that there's always akind of apprehension when I go to a new
place because I don't know necessarily ifI can handle it from a sensory standpoint.
I do want to say about 95 percent of thetime I can, I try not to let it stop
me from going to new places, but whenyou do hit that 5 percent of the time of
like, geez, I can't concentrate on whatthis person's saying because the music's
(07:46):
so loud, or, whatever, that gets badreally fast, you carry that with you.
In regards to some of the socialthings, I really didn't have
very many friends as a child.
, I was called by the other childrenas being strange and unusual.
And I think part of this is, Iadmittedly had some interests that
kids at the time didn't really have.
Like we mentioned radio,I read an encyclopedia
(08:08):
on 1940s radio broadcastingwhen I was nine, cover to cover.
In retrospect, in 1993, that probably wasnot what most of the other children were
interested in, they were talking about,Michael Jackson and things like that.
I think some of it is, just the conformitythat I think a lot of children or
younger teenagers feel, or at leastthey, they did in my generation, I'm
a millennial, kind of gets better.
(08:29):
And then it got a lot better after Ifound out I was autistic when I was 29.
one of the theories around this isthat empathy kind of works like this,
that you put yourself in a situation
that you've never been in, and yougo, Oh, I would feel like this in
this situation, or I would want this.
So that's what this personwho's in this situation wants.
I'm going to say this tothem, or do this for them.
(08:51):
And the problem is, that's notnecessarily what the person wants.
We often don't know whatthe other person wants.
But autistic people have this problem,in that if they put themselves in
a certain situation, they can beso different from another person
that this is a giant misjudgment.
That's what autistic peopleare dealing with all the time.
They're constantly trying to figure outWhat should I say in this situation
(09:13):
to make this person comfortable?
I mean, that's what I would do now.
Do you want to call someone?
Are you okay?
Do you want me to leave you alone?
Can you get home?
All right.
That's what I should have done,but I didn't think to do that.
I think it's very important to gaina little insight into that kind of
perspective, because tying into ourmain subject with autistic individuals
working on film productions, either asstudents or as professionals, this entire
(09:34):
industry is based around new experiences,making experiences, every film set is
different, every production is different.
From your experience, what are thesort of challenges that creates
Well, I think to begin with, it'sgenerally believed that there are
a lot of autistic people in media.
Tony Atwood, I believe he saidthis, that the two industries that
(09:55):
autistic people are most likelyto work in are media and academia.
So I think I might want tostart by saying what's the appeal
of media to autistic people.
And one is, in many ways it'sa way of slowing down the world.
I think many autistic peopleperceive the world as rather
chaotic and rather uncontrolled.
And if you go specifically to seea movie, you're in a sense paying
(10:17):
for a sensory cutoff experience,particularly in a theater.
You're going in to a dark roomwhere everything is designed to
make you look and pay attentionto what is going on in that room.
That kind of ability to focus on acertain part of the world, and you
can do this in literature and other,mediums that's part of the appeal.
I think many autistic people, or justspeaking for myself, working in film
(10:40):
production or media production, ishelpful because there's an etiquette
that is, easy to understand andexplained usually to everyone.
You know if you're the first AC andyou have a problem, you don't go and
talk to the makeup person about that.
I think that's part of the appeal.
The biggest issue that I see everywhere,and probably if you've listened this
(11:01):
far, you can guess what I'm going tosay, is I wish that movie sets were
more, cognizant of sensory issues,particularly location shoots, particularly
things having to do with loud noises.
I think the safety is prettygood with this, but bright
lights, that can be a problem.
particularly, for me, going outon location shoot, if I'm directing
(11:23):
something, I've presumably been to that
place before but if you'rejust working on a movie doing
whatever first AC or something.
You get sent somewhere and you mightbe out in the desert and it's 95
degrees you're suddenly in trouble.
That can be a big problem and Iwould say basically everywhere
more sensitivity to sensory issues.
I was going to add because I haveworked on some student film projects
(11:45):
and Grand Valley Summer Film Project.
I have worked above the line, belowthe line in various positions, I've
been Production Coordinator, Unitproduction manager, AD in one case.
And, there's often, a checklist ofthings , to consider for a project
like schedule, food, budget, logistics,and gear and everything like that.
But , looking back on it, the thing thatwas always missing in that checklist or
(12:07):
the thing that was never brought up wasbeing considerate of the disposition of,
the needs of people on the crew,, okay,This person has a food allergy, me in
my case, I am a severe asthmatic, so Ialways have to be aware of the environment
I walk into, but as you touched on, wecould do more steps to be more considerate
(12:29):
and accommodating for, people whohave sensitivity issues on film sets.
Do you have any further ideas?
Well, I also think that one thingthat autistic people often struggle
with are vague directions.
And I think that's why this is apretty good industry to work in.
Because, put the camera over there.
That's not an ambiguous statement.
(12:50):
I suppose , if you're directing anactor or something like that, there
can be, act more happy or somethingthat can be a little ambiguous,
but, it's also good because it's notnecessarily difficult to understand.
Another thing I think that all moviesets could do is how most of the time and
they should be doing this, the ProductionCoordinator or somebody calls everyone
(13:11):
and says, Do you have any dietary needs?
Yes, I'm a diabetic, sothat's very helpful.
But I would like to see for every movie orTV show or music video that's ever made.
The very first day of shooting, there'sa company meeting where the UPM or
somebody like that comes out andsays, This is a high stress industry.
we're going to be having crisissituations here, but everyone here
(13:35):
deserves to be treated respectfully.
And we want anyone here who feels likethat they're not being listened to or
they're not being treated respectfully togo to this person who we've designated as
the person that they can listen to or forthis purpose and say what's going on.
One of the disadvantages, of thehierarchical structure of a film
(13:59):
set is very often someone close tothe bottom of the hierarchy has some
kind of systemic problem, they can'tgo to the Director or the Producer
and say, Hey, this is happening.
Every single shoot, particularly, atleast with the crew, who are probably
going to be there most days, youhave that message said and there's a
designated person who someone can, talkto and try to, , mediate these issues
(14:20):
so people don't feel like they need tosuffer in silence or there's going to
be retribution if they say something.
We're taking a short break totell you about the Dirk Koning
Memorial Film and Video scholarship.
Here's Gretchen Vinnedgeremembering Dirk Koning.
The Koning Scholarship enables studentsto get that kind of an education, to be
a good filmmaker, to be able to expresstheir voice and to continue Dirk's dream.
(14:44):
For more information, and todonate to the scholarship, visit
the link in the description.
Now, back to the show
So to switch gears a littlebit, , I would like to steer the
conversation to your work here asa film professor at Grand Valley.
Because as you discussed, the natureof this industry and the requirements
and its characteristics, whatsort of insights could you tell us
(15:05):
about working with film students?
What kind of challenges,have you seen come about?
If I was teaching production or Iwas a producer, I think that the
biggest thing, is just awareness thatthere may be autistic people present.
Part of this is you can't really lookat someone and go, they're autistic.
And often when I've disclosed thisto somebody, I'm greeted with a whoa.
(15:28):
I had no idea.
, so being aware that there areautistic people around is important.
There's a lot I think, at the university,or any university I that can be done.
One is a STEM room, it couldjust be a quiet room or a private
room or something like that.
A room that an autistic person or reallyanyone, it could just be someone with,
(15:52):
you know, anxiety issues or someonehaving a bad day or something, that
they can go in and it's quiet, theremight be some stim toys or things like
that there, and that they can just beby themselves and collect themselves
and not feel the pressure to perform.
One of the issues that I would sayas a professor that I sometimes
(16:13):
struggle with is You haveto be there at a certain time.
So it's sort of like if you have anine to five office job , you have
to be there at 9 in the morning butdepending on what you're doing, take
a coffee break or calm down at yourdesk or something like that but if
I'm teaching a 3 o'clock to 4.
15 class, I have to bethere from 3 o'clock to 4.
15 and sometimes you walk inthere and something's going on and
(16:34):
you just have to get through it.
That is, of course, true of everybody.
But I think in terms of students, itwould be really good if we had the idea
of attendance is required, but if you needto step out due to sensory issues or just
any issues or something going on in yourpersonal life and you want to, you don't
want to be around other people, you needto take care of it, that's okay, and
here's a designated place that you can go.
(16:56):
And there really is no designatedplace so far as I know.
There's certainly not one in L.
S.
H.
I think there's a student lounge, but itdoesn't really serve that purpose So
I would really be in favor of thatjust a sensory room that students or
faculty or staff or anyone could go.
I want to emphasize to all of myautistic students, or indeed students
(17:17):
who are having any kind of issue, thatif you need to step out, it's okay.
Now you need to, talk to meabout what you missed later.
You would be expected to do that, butit's perfectly okay, it's something
that could identify to a student topersonally, but I've had students
with other issues who needed to leave.
And I want to say, that's okay.
(17:39):
you've had a bereavementor you're, sick That's okay.
It's still your responsibility tobe in touch with what you missed.
It's reason why we as professors haveto have these attendance policies is
because the people who don't have agood reason for missing class those
people but we need to normalize thisisn't a good day for me to be here
And also in terms of movie content.
(17:59):
I try to be sensitive to this, too.
Sometimes I forget, , this is a moviethat has X content in it, and you
may not want to watch it for whateverreason, and if you don't, I'll give you
an alternative or something like that.
I'm certain that would be trueof literature or something.
Those are all things I think that couldbe helpful, I would also like to see
professors trained beyond just theidea that you're going to have autistic
(18:24):
and neurodiverse students in yourclass and it's not all through DSR.
Oftentimes, depiction and representationin media is sometimes misinformed.
They rely on stereotypes,maybe old stigmas.
From your perspective, would yousay there's been an improvement
in depiction in media, inrepresentation these past few years?
(18:45):
I'd say there's been an improvement, butit's and I don't mean this jokingly.
But it's gone just as the treatment ofneurodiversity in general has gone from,
, absolutely heinously terrible to bad.
I mean, I think we've gone fromabsolute bigotry to it's on the radar.
So that's good.
Part of the issues with representationin the content that you see is, as
(19:08):
I said before, you can't tell ifsomeone is autistic by looking at them.
So, one of the unfortunateways that characters are coded
as autistic is stereotyping.
Like, Dr.
Sheldon Cooper on the Big BangTheory or something like that.
I personally know someone, I actuallytalked to her before I came on
here, who's autistic, and she isvery big on the stereotype that
(19:29):
all autistic people are geniuses.
There's the idea that, we all have thiscapability, we're all building a nuclear
reactor in our garage or something,
well, that's not actually true.
Not all autistic people are really smart.
So that's something.
there's certainly not enoughautistic characters of color.
There's not enoughautistic women, in film.
(19:49):
And the autistic, white guys that youdo see tend to be, again, stereotypical
nerds with poor social skills.
One thing most autistic peoplein my experience, need to do
is something called stimming.
and that's where you get out a kindof buildup of sensory stuff in your
body by in some way moving your body.
(20:10):
And this is something that nonautistic people do as well.
Like if you've ever tapped your foot tomusic or something that's a stim, but
autistic people Typically need to dothis a lot more than non autistic people.
one of the more obvious ways ofdoing this is rocking back and forth
and that's not socially acceptable.
So, a lot of autistic people are taughtand are punished, sometimes in school,
sometimes by their parents for doing this.
(20:32):
So, I would like to see a moviewith a character just see them
stimming, to normalize stimming.
Normalizing that not all autisticpeople are white guys would be good.
Another thing would be not allautistic people are children.
If you Google this, most of the resourcesyou get on autism is, in regards to
children, usually written from the.
point of view of a non autisticor supposedly non autistic parent
(20:55):
trying to diagnose their child.
And I find this interestingbecause it's highly genetic.
So there's a decent chancethat one of the parents at
least is autistic themselves.
So I'd like to see more autistic adults.
I want to see an autistic superhero.
I want to see an autisticrom com just want to see it.
normalized.
So from your perspective, do youthink we are starting to see a change
(21:15):
happen in society, both with culture,media, and society in general?
Do you think we're starting to see
people becoming more aware of it.
Yes, but not enough.
If you'd 10 years ago, Iprobably would have said yes.
And that was a very exciting time.
There were a lot of breakthroughs andthe media did start to cover this in
different ways and it was quite a bitbetter And that's still happening but
(21:39):
it's at a snail's pace the progressthat seemed to happen around the
teens hasn't really paid off in theway I would have liked to have seen it.
In many ways we've gone from closeto zero representation to very
stereotyped or problematic representation.
And there's one thing I would oftencall this out the news media, which
(22:01):
is a, school or a university orsomething like that has opened up a
new program to help autistic students.
Most of the time I would say that's great.
I'm not going to criticize that, butit's the way that it's covered is very
much oh, here's, Cute Jimmy, andisn't it too bad that he's autistic,
but look, the, school's taking pityon him, and he can, bring a Rubik's
(22:24):
Cube to school or something, The toneand tenor of these often offensive and
belittling, to many autistic people.
One thing I would actually praise themedia on, that I post on my Facebook page,
which is disturbing, but I feel the needto do it, is the media is very good at
covering abuse, of autistic children.
And if you Google this, You can see alot of news stories in various places
(22:48):
around, the United States and probablyaround the world where, say, autistic
students, are arrested at school orcarried physically into the principal's
office or just really, terrible stuff.
It pains me to see it, but I do applaudnews outlets for promoting these
things because people need to see thishappens and how bad, this actually is.
(23:09):
And I think most autistic peoplehave some story about something
like that happening to them.
So I do applaud the news media forcovering those kinds of stories and
letting people see how bad it really is.
I'm very curious on that perspectivebecause do you think we're especially
seeing that with younger generations likewith the current crop of film students
coming in with these perspectives, andoftentimes the drive, they want to say
(23:34):
this is me.
This is who I am.
What do you think it'sgoing to become of this?
I think it's getting better.
And I don't know if any of mystudents have heard me say this,
but I said this to the faculty.
I wish I was 20 years younger.
And it's not just because I'm, turning40 and time for my midlife crisis.
I wish I was 20 years younger becauseas I see Gen Z is being more empathetic,
(23:57):
less arrogant, and generally moreopen to, neurodiversity, but also
really all kinds of diversity thanprobably any other generation in
history, or at least modern history.
Not that there aren't serious,problems within that generation.
But, I think that it's probably the besttime, in a long time anyway, to be an
autistic person and I think that theopenness to this is a lot different.
(24:21):
And I think that the main thing that thisgeneration has that mine, at least in the
90s and the early aughts, didn't, is justa kind of openness to being different.
I remember just how, conformist thingswere, and I sometimes call it the
W word, weird, because autisticpeople are used to being called
that in a, very negative way.
and are kind of primed oralmost triggered to hear that.
(24:45):
And this generation, I think, on thewhole, doesn't necessarily go, this
person is not acting in the way Imight necessarily expect, or this
person is, doing something I don'tunderstand, but let me kind of work
with them, or at least treat themrespectfully and be nice to them.
, What advice would you give to yourundergrad self, if you could, go
back in time, speak to your youngerself, what would you say to him?
(25:07):
Well, I'd certainly say, you're autistic,because I didn't really realize until
I was 29, so, my life probably, wouldhave been a lot different if I had
been diagnosed or I realized when I wasyounger, but I would say it's a cliche.
I would say it gets better I wouldalso say just generally and I think that
most people my age would probably saythis to younger people is It's gonna
(25:28):
be okay, I know that particularly yourgeneration was hit hard by the pandemic
and you missed ending high school and alot of those kinds of experiences there.
But I would also say that, You getthrough things, you get through a
lot of difficult things, that youdidn't think that you actually would.
So I would say don't give up becausethere are a lot of resources . I think the
(25:49):
number one thing among other things, Iwish that I had known when I was younger
is if you have some problem, not evenneurodiversity, just there are often
people in the world who are there to helpyou with that problem and often that's
their job, but you didn't know that andyou didn't know how to get that help.
And one thing I really applaudthe university for is, I'll
(26:09):
just give a plug for this.
I do this in my classes.
. If you go to gvsu.
edu slash support, there's all of theseresources for students with tons of
different problems, food insecurityor mental health issues or whatever.
And there's someone at the universitythat you can talk to and may be able to
point you in the right direction with it.
Not necessarily that they can solveevery problem, but, , there's
(26:30):
a lot of, , resources that areavailable . And I would also say,
if you need help, ask for help.
This generation is much morecomfortable with counseling.
If you're uncomfortable with that,or you're somewhat reticent about
that I would certainly encourage youto look into that and that there are
lots of resources for you and thereare lots of various other things so
you know talk to go to Someone thatyou trust don't suffer in silence.
(26:55):
I guess that's the main thing.
If you have some problem orsome issue, there's someone
somewhere who wants to help you.
What advice would you have forfilm students in particular?
Specifically people pursuingthis art form, this industry.
Well, I would say, one thing that Ifind frustrating about Any industry that
there's no A to B to C way to success.
(27:16):
And film students tendto be very ambitious.
The ones who aren't very ambitioususually drop out pretty fast and they
do something else because, you gottabe willing to work hard and, work,
weekend, 12 hour days, all that stuff.
and, one of the most common questionsthat we get asked is how can I be
a movie director, or how can I besuccessful editor or something like that?
(27:36):
And unfortunately, there's no real stepsthat you can do to guarantee success.
I mean, there are people who've gottenevery opportunity break that you can
think of and they hadn't made it.
And there are also people who havebeen just completely struck by
lightning and had amazing, careers.
I want to say it's very hard,particularly if you're ambitious, to
(27:56):
kind of deprogram yourself of that.
But have to be like thefeather in Forrest Gump.
It's very based on luckand the current situation.
And, I remember telling someone issuppose that I got somehow got a million
dollars, or 2 million dollars to make afeature film together, and it was March
of 2020, what would have happened there?
(28:16):
I worked for five years toget this money together.
And then the pandemic happens.
Those things just kind of happen.
It's kind of a bitter pill to swallowwhen you're young, and now I am sounding
old, because you want to control somuch, and the world, at least for me,
and I think for most people, even verysuccessful people, , the, Coppola,
or Scorsese, or, Tarantino, or SpikeLee, or someone like that, they
(28:40):
would probably say, I believe I'mtalented, I worked really hard, and
I.
was in the right place at the right time.
Another piece of advice that I wouldgive, and this is the film professor,
film history and theory person, is yougotta watch and understand the classics.
Often the, freshman students coming inare apprehensive about watching movies
(29:02):
in black and white or silent films,
and they say something like, I don'tlike to watch an older film, and
I'll say like, what is an older film?
And they say well, a moviemade in the 90s or something.
And for me, an old movie islike a movie made in the 1890s.
if I was teaching, which I used toteach, writing, reading, read Toni
Morrison and Charles Dickens and J.
D.
Salinger, read the greatworks of literature.
(29:22):
In the same way, if you're a filmmaker,a you have an enormous advantage.
over a writer because it will takeyou two to four hours to watch one
of the great works, whereas theymight have to read a, 500 page poem
in Middle English or something.
So, you owe it to yourself to, watchevery film on the sight and sound list.
find some critic that you like and watchevery film on their 100 or 25 best list.
(29:45):
One thing that I find very edifying iswatching everything that they've did,
not just their famous films or the filmsthat you like, because you learn from
what's considered to be their lesserfilms, their failures , and it helps
you understand how an artist works.
For the most part, careersare combinations of bad,
Good, mediocre, and amazing.
Watch movies, that get you outof your aesthetic comfort zone.
(30:08):
So those two
Could I tell the storyabout how I was diagnosed?
Absolutely.
Okay.
This is actually an entertaining, atleast to me, story about how I found out.
I was living in England, doing my Ph.
D., and I met a woman online who isa very dear friend of mine, Shell.
And we went out, didn't really seemto work out that well, but we stayed
(30:31):
in contact and we were friends.
So two years later, she postson her Facebook page that she
had been diagnosed as autistic.
So I googled it, and I kind of knewin about five seconds that it was me.
course I was going, no, wait, I mean,you're being paranoid and this isn't you.
And there's all that.
I tried to put it on the back burnerwhile I was in Italy with the novelty
(30:51):
of the vacation, but during some lulls,I went online I was like, okay I really
should look into this and I should go tothe doctor it took me four years from
the time I suspected to the time I wasdiagnosed, I was actually diagnosed the
officially the week before I left England.
So I, suspected, three years becauseit was right before my, 30th birthday.
(31:13):
And I was diagnosed, when I was 33.
It took that long, and that isalso not a unusual experience
for particularly autistic adults.
It takes a long time and over there,I had the access to the wonderful NHS.
Even with that, it took forever.
Whereas over here, the United Statesdoes not have as good of a healthcare
system and there are a lot of horrorstories, particularly from adults about
(31:34):
the difficulties of getting a diagnosis.
I contacted Shell and I waslike, that was really brave that
you did that, which is true.
I mean, it certainly changed my life.
I asked her, do you think I'm autistic?
She said, yeah, I think that you are,and I started asking my friends, and , I
thought they would say, no, come on, butmost of them, the reaction was yeah, I
(31:54):
wanted to share that one because I'mdoing this really for the same reasons,
that Shell posted on her Facebook pageis that, the more people that are public
about this, the less shame and stigma,and it encourages other people who might
be suspecting themselves to go downthat road, and particularly because
Shell and I both think it's about 5050, the ratio from men to women, and
(32:15):
of course some people are non binary.
About 20 years ago it was 10 percentof people diagnosed were women, and
now it's gone up to about a third, andwe both think that it's, near parity,
because women, for various reasons,are usually taught to cover it up more.
I would also say one thing that gaveme a little pause doing this is every
time I disclose this to someone thereis a lot of how is this person
(32:36):
going to react and should I tellmy employer, tell a family member?
how does this actually work andevery time that you do that you don't
quite know what their action is.
, so that's part of the motivationfor doing this as well.
Awesome.
So one thing you were discussingearlier kind of the differences between
introverted people versus extrovertedand how oftentimes there's tends to
be a stigma associated with autisticpeople tending to be quiet, but as you
(33:00):
mentioned, that's not always the case.
So would you like to elaborate that?
Yeah.
One of the reasons I'm alsodoing this is I can't really
speak for other autistic people.
I can only really speak for myself,but I also, feel an obligation to speak
because I am an extrovert and I do publicspeaking for a living as a professor.
And I know a lot of autistic people,which is to a degree, somewhat of
(33:22):
a stereotype, but it is certainlytrue, who are shy and just don't
like to be part of the public eye.
And I want to say, that it'scompletely okay to be like that.
And there are some people who, some nonautistic people who keep to themselves.
And that's just the way that they are.
And that's beautiful.
And that's great.
I also feel another thingthat many autistic people
often say is you can't win.
(33:42):
It's sort of like you sit there and yoube quiet and you don't ask questions
and you don't say anything and peoplecomplain that you're anti social and
that you're not participating, but thenyou ask questions you make suggestions
and comments and people say that you'redoing it in the wrong way or you're
too loud or you're not doing it enough.
Or you're doing it too much, I should say.
So, the thing is that if you areparticularly in that latter group, you
(34:05):
might miss social cues or interruptsomeone, that doesn't necessarily
mean that this person is being rude.
It just means this person might bemissing some of these social cues.
But I think what many allistic peopleperceive that as is this person is
just being a jerk and they're givennegative social pressure because of that.
And then the person who has no idea whatsocial rule they missed just feels like
(34:28):
people are attacking them personally andis less likely to participate and then
they are accused of being too quiet.
So that's also why I think greaterattention needs to be given to issues of
affect and to a degree the way we thinkabout social skills is actually quite
ableist and we need to have a way of,not judging people solely based on their
(34:51):
ability to, follow social etiquette.
Those kinds of situations are somethingthat autistic people often struggle with.
And also, you develop a sense ofparanoia because you're never certain
like you meet somebody, we shouldhave lunch or I'm interested in this
business idea you have or something.
You're never really certain.
Do they really mean that?
(35:11):
Or are they just saying thatto be polite or to get rid of
you or something like that?
And you carry that around with youbecause you're never totally certain.
What does this person actuallymean when they say that?
You mentioned, , you've gotsome projects in the works.
What are you working on?
What's going on with you?
I have a lot of projectsthat I'm working on.
I try to write one script a year.
The thing I most want to do is a script Ihave about an autistic woman in the 1890s.
(35:40):
I wrote it right afterI was diagnosed myself.
And I would say that probably out ofall the scripts that I've written or all
the projects I'd want to work on, that'sthe one that I would most want to make.
And I started thinking about whatit would be like to be autistic
in a different time period.
And that's another thing
that I would say you don't usually see.
We think of autism as being verycontemporary, but it's actually
been around for a long time.
probably since caveman time.
(36:00):
So that's the favorite out ofall the scripts I've written.
I wrote the story treatment with a friendof mine, and I wrote the script myself.
I just started writing a historicalfilm about King Alfred of England,
he was the first king of England.
That is just a fun script.
So what's fun about this KingAlfred script is I'm giving
myself an unlimited budget.
I'm not doing that thing of like,how can I actually film this?
(36:22):
I'm just writing this, David Leanepic, and if it ever does get made,
I'll probably be able to make, twominutes of it on whatever budget I get.
I'm very interested in historicalfilms, I actually think that, historical
films and historical theater are theclosest that we ever get to time travel.
When I was in England, there wasa revival of Terence Rattigan, the
(36:42):
British playwright, who had beenforgotten for a while, but a lot of
his plays were produced while I wasover there, it just felt like you had
gone back in time to the 1940s or 50s.
I really love the film.
medium's ability to show youpast times and how they look.
I'm fascinated by that.
I wanted to be a movie director.
So being a film professorwas not my first career.
(37:03):
but at this point, I've set the goals.
I don't want to die before atleast making one feature film.
Hopefully several.
The script about the autistic womanis the one that would like to make
the most, and I think I could dothat on a relatively low budget.
But that's what I'm working on.
I'm also working on my second book.
Actually, I have twoideas for a second book.
So I have one book out, whichis an adaptation of my thesis
(37:26):
my PhD thesis about World War I.
This one would be a sequel to that, which would be about films about World
War I made in the 50s and 60s, and I'mparticularly interested in comparisons
between World War I and what we refer toas the Vietnam War, which I don't think
that's the best historical way of callingthat, but just that's what probably most
(37:46):
listeners would be familiar with, andalso, I have another idea for a book
that I actually wrote the proposal forthis, but I haven't submitted it because
right now, if I did get the contractfor it, I wouldn't have the time to
write it, called Before Rain Man, andthe idea for this is that it's about
films about autism that don't know it.
That's about autistic charactersin cinema before we had the
(38:10):
codified idea of what autism was.
The most obvious one to mewould be Sherlock Holmes, and
I'm a Sherlock Holmes fan.
, , that's a book that has been on the backburner for a while, but if I do get
some time off, I'd like to write that.
Well, that's about all the time we have.
Ryan, thank you so much for sittingwith us today to discuss this.
Thank you so much for sharingyour experiences and insight.
it was a wonderfulpleasure to speak with you
(38:31):
Thank you very much.
I appreciate this.
Thank you for joining us for thisepisode of Alumni Live: The Podcast.
Subscribe to our podcast, to hear morefrom our alumni across the industry.
Check out Alumni Live onFacebook, Instagram, and YouTube.
For more conversations and networking.
Let us know what topics you wantto hear our alumni talk about the
(38:52):
Grand Valley State University FilmVideo Alumni Network is here for
you, and we're glad that you're here.
Thank you for listening.
The Podcast.
These are conversations with GrandValley State University film and video
graduates about the industry, thefilm, video, major and alumni profiles.
Welcome back to Alumni Live, the podcast.
My name is Malcolm Kramp, a senior inGrand Valley's film and video program.
Today we will be discussing theexperience and challenges of working
(00:29):
in film production for autisticpeople as both film students and
professionals in the industry.
Joining me today is Ryan Copping, GVSUfilm video alumni from the class of 2006.
Ryan is a screenwriter, film andculture historian, and Visiting
Professor teaching film study classeshere at Grand Valley State University.
Ryan, thank you for joining me today.
(00:50):
Glad to be here.
Before we begin, I would like to takethis moment to clarify our intended
use of terminology such as autismand autistic with consideration and
respect, as we acknowledge this may beperceived as sensitive to some listeners.
Let's discuss some of your background,your education, career as a filmmaker,
researcher, and subsequent work asa professor here at Grand Valley.
(01:14):
Well, I think I alwayswanted to be a filmmaker.
before it was film, it was actually radio.
I got interested in radio when I was achild and then kind of morphed into film.
I suppose I'm kind of a frustratedfilmmaker because that's
what my goal has always been.
I didn't really set out for a careerin academia, it just happened.
I did my undergrad in film and video andstill photography here in, 2002 - 2006.
(01:34):
I then did my Master's in Communications,and while I was doing the master's I
was just offered to teach a class as anadjunct, and I wasn't really expecting
it, but I took the opportunity and Ienjoyed it, and it just built from there.
After I graduated I taught forthree years, and then I went
over to England and I did a Ph.
D.
there.
then I came back here and now I'm, in mysecond year as a Visitor at Grand Valley.
Lovely.
(01:55):
recently on a previous episodeof Alumni Live, we discussed
the profile of Grand Valley alumTim Dailey at Exceptional Minds.
A California based academy that helpsto prepare autistic students for a
career in animation and post production.
From that, you reached out to us withthe idea for a deeper dive to discuss
Autistic individuals working in thefilm industry and as film students.
(02:18):
Well I got the idea for this becauseof my experiences both as an autistic
person as a student in the program.
on the film shoots that I'veworked on and also as a professor.
I feel that in many ways, althoughit's gotten a lot better in the last
20 years, autism is kind of invisible.
It's not something that a lot ofpeople necessarily think about.
And I've had students who identifiedas autistic or diagnosed as autistic
(02:42):
and, I'm not entirely certain thattheir needs and rights are being
recognized as much as they should be.
So that's why I'm here.
I feel like that's an importantbaseline to establish, because as you
mentioned, historically autism is oftenvery , misinformed, or normally a
misunderstood diagnosis, and one thathas often not been represented with
(03:04):
consideration in culture and media.
To give a brief baseline forlisteners, what is the autism spectrum,
and why its considered a spectrum?
Yes, this is a big question.
So, autism is a neurological difference.
from people who are not autistic,who we generally call allistic.
these people used to be calledneurotypicals, but there's some problem
(03:25):
with that, so I use the term allistic.
Basically, it's generally believedthat the way parts of the brain
are connected to each other isdifferent in autistic people.
I'm not a neurologist, so I can'tnecessarily go into it more than this.
The diagnosis of autism isone that is based on behavior,
(03:46):
cognition, and experience.
So unfortunately, there's no CATscan or blood test or anything like
that that you can take to determinewhether someone is autistic.
So we have these neurologicaldifferences that appear to be
built around, the way parts of thebrain are connected to each other.
It's very likely that autism is a normalpart of the human experience, there have
(04:07):
probably been autistic people throughouthistory through Prehistoric times.
The explosions of diagnoses that we'veseen in the last thirty years or so
are probably just it being recognizedin people, not actually more cases.
The way that these neurologicaldifferences manifest themselves.
is different in each person And it'salso very hard to actually say, is
(04:30):
this because the person is autisticor is this because of something else?
Because it's like saying, why doyou like jazz music or something?
It could be a neurological reason.
It could be psychological.
Could be your.
grandfather played jazzand you really like it.
it's very hard to actually saythat someone is doing one thing
because they are autistic.
(04:50):
That said, there are lots of traits thatare typically associated with autistic
people, although not all may have them.
One that I strugglewith is sensory issues.
And this is one thing I feel very stronglyabout, Most allistic people, not all,
but most allistic people can go into aplace that they've never been before.
And they don't have to worry about, canI physically bear to be in this room?
(05:13):
Whereas a lot of autistic people,and definitely me, every time I
go anywhere new, there's alwaysthe question of, Is it too loud?
Is there going to be a smellthat's going to make me nauseous?
Can I eat the food there?
if it's too hot or too cold, can I leave?
I have trouble with certain fabrics.
Like you never see me wear a sweateror a jumper if you're in the UK because
(05:34):
I can't stand how it feels on my skin.
. Another thing that is Somewhat sensitiveto talk about, and I want to choose
my words carefully here, here, is atleast the perception that many autistic
people struggle with social skills.
I think that's a very reductive way oflooking at this, however, I do feel that,
some autistic people, including myself,sometimes struggle with, connecting
(05:56):
or communicating with other people.
The reason why I want to be careful whatI say here is that it's very easy to
fall into a kind of negative stereotypewhich I've read on the internet,
autistic people are hopelessly uncool
geeks
who don't have any friendsor things like that.
And that's a stereotype and that'sproblematic, and I do want to say there
(06:17):
are some autistic people, just as thereare some allistic people, who are, kind
of loners and, solitary, but many ofthem choose to be like that and that's
just the way that they want to be.
That said, I do think that many autisticpeople feel a sense of social ostracism,
and, bigotry, and prejudice against thembecause the world is not really designed
for them and people are not necessarilydesigned for their, needs or some of the
(06:42):
behaviors that they want to demonstrate.
So that's a problem, but that's reallymore one of social discrimination
than it is of of the person.
Would you mind sharing a fewdetails of your personal journey?
In regards to the sensory stuff,that's probably the most obvious one.
When I was a little kid, I went to mymother and I said, there's a worm in my
shoe and she couldn't understand what Iwas talking about, and what, was going
(07:04):
on was my sock was folded within my shoe.
It didn't hurt exactly, but itwas distracting and uncomfortable.
I couldn't really focus on anything else,and I think it was difficult for teachers
to understand, why that was a problem.
I remember in the third grade,I had poor balance and I would
sometimes fall out of my chair.
I think the teacher thought I wasdoing it for attention when I wasn't.
I was literally just losing my balance.
(07:25):
I already shared that there's always akind of apprehension when I go to a new
place because I don't know necessarily ifI can handle it from a sensory standpoint.
I do want to say about 95 percent of thetime I can, I try not to let it stop
me from going to new places, but whenyou do hit that 5 percent of the time of
like, geez, I can't concentrate on whatthis person's saying because the music's
(07:46):
so loud, or, whatever, that gets badreally fast, you carry that with you.
In regards to some of the socialthings, I really didn't have
very many friends as a child.
, I was called by the other childrenas being strange and unusual.
And I think part of this is, Iadmittedly had some interests that
kids at the time didn't really have.
Like we mentioned radio,I read an encyclopedia
(08:08):
on 1940s radio broadcastingwhen I was nine, cover to cover.
In retrospect, in 1993, that probably wasnot what most of the other children were
interested in, they were talking about,Michael Jackson and things like that.
I think some of it is, just the conformitythat I think a lot of children or
younger teenagers feel, or at leastthey, they did in my generation, I'm
a millennial, kind of gets better.
(08:29):
And then it got a lot better after Ifound out I was autistic when I was 29.
one of the theories around this isthat empathy kind of works like this,
that you put yourself in a situation
that you've never been in, and yougo, Oh, I would feel like this in
this situation, or I would want this.
So that's what this personwho's in this situation wants.
I'm going to say this tothem, or do this for them.
(08:51):
And the problem is, that's notnecessarily what the person wants.
We often don't know whatthe other person wants.
But autistic people have this problem,in that if they put themselves in
a certain situation, they can beso different from another person
that this is a giant misjudgment.
That's what autistic peopleare dealing with all the time.
They're constantly trying to figure outWhat should I say in this situation
(09:13):
to make this person comfortable?
I mean, that's what I would do now.
Do you want to call someone?
Are you okay?
Do you want me to leave you alone?
Can you get home?
All right.
That's what I should have done,but I didn't think to do that.
I think it's very important to gaina little insight into that kind of
perspective, because tying into ourmain subject with autistic individuals
working on film productions, either asstudents or as professionals, this entire
(09:34):
industry is based around new experiences,making experiences, every film set is
different, every production is different.
From your experience, what are thesort of challenges that creates
Well, I think to begin with, it'sgenerally believed that there are
a lot of autistic people in media.
Tony Atwood, I believe he saidthis, that the two industries that
(09:55):
autistic people are most likelyto work in are media and academia.
So I think I might want tostart by saying what's the appeal
of media to autistic people.
And one is, in many ways it'sa way of slowing down the world.
I think many autistic peopleperceive the world as rather
chaotic and rather uncontrolled.
And if you go specifically to seea movie, you're in a sense paying
(10:17):
for a sensory cutoff experience,particularly in a theater.
You're going in to a dark roomwhere everything is designed to
make you look and pay attentionto what is going on in that room.
That kind of ability to focus on acertain part of the world, and you
can do this in literature and other,mediums that's part of the appeal.
I think many autistic people, or justspeaking for myself, working in film
(10:40):
production or media production, ishelpful because there's an etiquette
that is, easy to understand andexplained usually to everyone.
You know if you're the first AC andyou have a problem, you don't go and
talk to the makeup person about that.
I think that's part of the appeal.
The biggest issue that I see everywhere,and probably if you've listened this
(11:01):
far, you can guess what I'm going tosay, is I wish that movie sets were
more, cognizant of sensory issues,particularly location shoots, particularly
things having to do with loud noises.
I think the safety is prettygood with this, but bright
lights, that can be a problem.
particularly, for me, going outon location shoot, if I'm directing
(11:23):
something, I've presumably been to that
place before but if you'rejust working on a movie doing
whatever first AC or something.
You get sent somewhere and you mightbe out in the desert and it's 95
degrees you're suddenly in trouble.
That can be a big problem and Iwould say basically everywhere
more sensitivity to sensory issues.
I was going to add because I haveworked on some student film projects
(11:45):
and Grand Valley Summer Film Project.
I have worked above the line, belowthe line in various positions, I've
been Production Coordinator, Unitproduction manager, AD in one case.
And, there's often, a checklist ofthings , to consider for a project
like schedule, food, budget, logistics,and gear and everything like that.
But , looking back on it, the thing thatwas always missing in that checklist or
(12:07):
the thing that was never brought up wasbeing considerate of the disposition of,
the needs of people on the crew,, okay,This person has a food allergy, me in
my case, I am a severe asthmatic, so Ialways have to be aware of the environment
I walk into, but as you touched on, wecould do more steps to be more considerate
(12:29):
and accommodating for, people whohave sensitivity issues on film sets.
Do you have any further ideas?
Well, I also think that one thingthat autistic people often struggle
with are vague directions.
And I think that's why this is apretty good industry to work in.
Because, put the camera over there.
That's not an ambiguous statement.
(12:50):
I suppose , if you're directing anactor or something like that, there
can be, act more happy or somethingthat can be a little ambiguous,
but, it's also good because it's notnecessarily difficult to understand.
Another thing I think that all moviesets could do is how most of the time and
they should be doing this, the ProductionCoordinator or somebody calls everyone
(13:11):
and says, Do you have any dietary needs?
Yes, I'm a diabetic, sothat's very helpful.
But I would like to see for every movie orTV show or music video that's ever made.
The very first day of shooting, there'sa company meeting where the UPM or
somebody like that comes out andsays, This is a high stress industry.
we're going to be having crisissituations here, but everyone here
(13:35):
deserves to be treated respectfully.
And we want anyone here who feels likethat they're not being listened to or
they're not being treated respectfully togo to this person who we've designated as
the person that they can listen to or forthis purpose and say what's going on.
One of the disadvantages, of thehierarchical structure of a film
(13:59):
set is very often someone close tothe bottom of the hierarchy has some
kind of systemic problem, they can'tgo to the Director or the Producer
and say, Hey, this is happening.
Every single shoot, particularly, atleast with the crew, who are probably
going to be there most days, youhave that message said and there's a
designated person who someone can, talkto and try to, , mediate these issues
(14:20):
so people don't feel like they need tosuffer in silence or there's going to
be retribution if they say something.
We're taking a short break totell you about the Dirk Koning
Memorial Film and Video scholarship.
Here's Gretchen Vinnedgeremembering Dirk Koning.
The Koning Scholarship enables studentsto get that kind of an education, to be
a good filmmaker, to be able to expresstheir voice and to continue Dirk's dream.
(14:44):
For more information, and todonate to the scholarship, visit
the link in the description.
Now, back to the show
So to switch gears a littlebit, , I would like to steer the
conversation to your work here asa film professor at Grand Valley.
Because as you discussed, the natureof this industry and the requirements
and its characteristics, whatsort of insights could you tell us
(15:05):
about working with film students?
What kind of challenges,have you seen come about?
If I was teaching production or Iwas a producer, I think that the
biggest thing, is just awareness thatthere may be autistic people present.
Part of this is you can't really lookat someone and go, they're autistic.
And often when I've disclosed thisto somebody, I'm greeted with a whoa.
(15:28):
I had no idea.
, so being aware that there areautistic people around is important.
There's a lot I think, at the university,or any university I that can be done.
One is a STEM room, it couldjust be a quiet room or a private
room or something like that.
A room that an autistic person or reallyanyone, it could just be someone with,
(15:52):
you know, anxiety issues or someonehaving a bad day or something, that
they can go in and it's quiet, theremight be some stim toys or things like
that there, and that they can just beby themselves and collect themselves
and not feel the pressure to perform.
One of the issues that I would sayas a professor that I sometimes
(16:13):
struggle with is You haveto be there at a certain time.
So it's sort of like if you have anine to five office job , you have
to be there at 9 in the morning butdepending on what you're doing, take
a coffee break or calm down at yourdesk or something like that but if
I'm teaching a 3 o'clock to 4.
15 class, I have to bethere from 3 o'clock to 4.
15 and sometimes you walk inthere and something's going on and
(16:34):
you just have to get through it.
That is, of course, true of everybody.
But I think in terms of students, itwould be really good if we had the idea
of attendance is required, but if you needto step out due to sensory issues or just
any issues or something going on in yourpersonal life and you want to, you don't
want to be around other people, you needto take care of it, that's okay, and
here's a designated place that you can go.
(16:56):
And there really is no designatedplace so far as I know.
There's certainly not one in L.
S.
H.
I think there's a student lounge, but itdoesn't really serve that purpose So
I would really be in favor of thatjust a sensory room that students or
faculty or staff or anyone could go.
I want to emphasize to all of myautistic students, or indeed students
(17:17):
who are having any kind of issue, thatif you need to step out, it's okay.
Now you need to, talk to meabout what you missed later.
You would be expected to do that, butit's perfectly okay, it's something
that could identify to a student topersonally, but I've had students
with other issues who needed to leave.
And I want to say, that's okay.
(17:39):
you've had a bereavementor you're, sick That's okay.
It's still your responsibility tobe in touch with what you missed.
It's reason why we as professors haveto have these attendance policies is
because the people who don't have agood reason for missing class those
people but we need to normalize thisisn't a good day for me to be here
And also in terms of movie content.
(17:59):
I try to be sensitive to this, too.
Sometimes I forget, , this is a moviethat has X content in it, and you
may not want to watch it for whateverreason, and if you don't, I'll give you
an alternative or something like that.
I'm certain that would be trueof literature or something.
Those are all things I think that couldbe helpful, I would also like to see
professors trained beyond just theidea that you're going to have autistic
(18:24):
and neurodiverse students in yourclass and it's not all through DSR.
Oftentimes, depiction and representationin media is sometimes misinformed.
They rely on stereotypes,maybe old stigmas.
From your perspective, would yousay there's been an improvement
in depiction in media, inrepresentation these past few years?
(18:45):
I'd say there's been an improvement, butit's and I don't mean this jokingly.
But it's gone just as the treatment ofneurodiversity in general has gone from,
, absolutely heinously terrible to bad.
I mean, I think we've gone fromabsolute bigotry to it's on the radar.
So that's good.
Part of the issues with representationin the content that you see is, as
(19:08):
I said before, you can't tell ifsomeone is autistic by looking at them.
So, one of the unfortunateways that characters are coded
as autistic is stereotyping.
Like, Dr.
Sheldon Cooper on the Big BangTheory or something like that.
I personally know someone, I actuallytalked to her before I came on
here, who's autistic, and she isvery big on the stereotype that
(19:29):
all autistic people are geniuses.
There's the idea that, we all have thiscapability, we're all building a nuclear
reactor in our garage or something,
well, that's not actually true.
Not all autistic people are really smart.
So that's something.
there's certainly not enoughautistic characters of color.
There's not enoughautistic women, in film.
(19:49):
And the autistic, white guys that youdo see tend to be, again, stereotypical
nerds with poor social skills.
One thing most autistic peoplein my experience, need to do
is something called stimming.
and that's where you get out a kindof buildup of sensory stuff in your
body by in some way moving your body.
(20:10):
And this is something that nonautistic people do as well.
Like if you've ever tapped your foot tomusic or something that's a stim, but
autistic people Typically need to dothis a lot more than non autistic people.
one of the more obvious ways ofdoing this is rocking back and forth
and that's not socially acceptable.
So, a lot of autistic people are taughtand are punished, sometimes in school,
sometimes by their parents for doing this.
(20:32):
So, I would like to see a moviewith a character just see them
stimming, to normalize stimming.
Normalizing that not all autisticpeople are white guys would be good.
Another thing would be not allautistic people are children.
If you Google this, most of the resourcesyou get on autism is, in regards to
children, usually written from the.
point of view of a non autisticor supposedly non autistic parent
(20:55):
trying to diagnose their child.
And I find this interestingbecause it's highly genetic.
So there's a decent chancethat one of the parents at
least is autistic themselves.
So I'd like to see more autistic adults.
I want to see an autistic superhero.
I want to see an autisticrom com just want to see it.
normalized.
So from your perspective, do youthink we are starting to see a change
(21:15):
happen in society, both with culture,media, and society in general?
Do you think we're starting to see
people becoming more aware of it.
Yes, but not enough.
If you'd 10 years ago, Iprobably would have said yes.
And that was a very exciting time.
There were a lot of breakthroughs andthe media did start to cover this in
different ways and it was quite a bitbetter And that's still happening but
(21:39):
it's at a snail's pace the progressthat seemed to happen around the
teens hasn't really paid off in theway I would have liked to have seen it.
In many ways we've gone from closeto zero representation to very
stereotyped or problematic representation.
And there's one thing I would oftencall this out the news media, which
(22:01):
is a, school or a university orsomething like that has opened up a
new program to help autistic students.
Most of the time I would say that's great.
I'm not going to criticize that, butit's the way that it's covered is very
much oh, here's, Cute Jimmy, andisn't it too bad that he's autistic,
but look, the, school's taking pityon him, and he can, bring a Rubik's
(22:24):
Cube to school or something, The toneand tenor of these often offensive and
belittling, to many autistic people.
One thing I would actually praise themedia on, that I post on my Facebook page,
which is disturbing, but I feel the needto do it, is the media is very good at
covering abuse, of autistic children.
And if you Google this, You can see alot of news stories in various places
(22:48):
around, the United States and probablyaround the world where, say, autistic
students, are arrested at school orcarried physically into the principal's
office or just really, terrible stuff.
It pains me to see it, but I do applaudnews outlets for promoting these
things because people need to see thishappens and how bad, this actually is.
(23:09):
And I think most autistic peoplehave some story about something
like that happening to them.
So I do applaud the news media forcovering those kinds of stories and
letting people see how bad it really is.
I'm very curious on that perspectivebecause do you think we're especially
seeing that with younger generations likewith the current crop of film students
coming in with these perspectives, andoftentimes the drive, they want to say
(23:34):
this is me.
This is who I am.
What do you think it'sgoing to become of this?
I think it's getting better.
And I don't know if any of mystudents have heard me say this,
but I said this to the faculty.
I wish I was 20 years younger.
And it's not just because I'm, turning40 and time for my midlife crisis.
I wish I was 20 years younger becauseas I see Gen Z is being more empathetic,
(23:57):
less arrogant, and generally moreopen to, neurodiversity, but also
really all kinds of diversity thanprobably any other generation in
history, or at least modern history.
Not that there aren't serious,problems within that generation.
But, I think that it's probably the besttime, in a long time anyway, to be an
autistic person and I think that theopenness to this is a lot different.
(24:21):
And I think that the main thing that thisgeneration has that mine, at least in the
90s and the early aughts, didn't, is justa kind of openness to being different.
I remember just how, conformist thingswere, and I sometimes call it the
W word, weird, because autisticpeople are used to being called
that in a, very negative way.
and are kind of primed oralmost triggered to hear that.
(24:45):
And this generation, I think, on thewhole, doesn't necessarily go, this
person is not acting in the way Imight necessarily expect, or this
person is, doing something I don'tunderstand, but let me kind of work
with them, or at least treat themrespectfully and be nice to them.
, What advice would you give to yourundergrad self, if you could, go
back in time, speak to your youngerself, what would you say to him?
(25:07):
Well, I'd certainly say, you're autistic,because I didn't really realize until
I was 29, so, my life probably, wouldhave been a lot different if I had
been diagnosed or I realized when I wasyounger, but I would say it's a cliche.
I would say it gets better I wouldalso say just generally and I think that
most people my age would probably saythis to younger people is It's gonna
(25:28):
be okay, I know that particularly yourgeneration was hit hard by the pandemic
and you missed ending high school and alot of those kinds of experiences there.
But I would also say that, You getthrough things, you get through a
lot of difficult things, that youdidn't think that you actually would.
So I would say don't give up becausethere are a lot of resources . I think the
(25:49):
number one thing among other things, Iwish that I had known when I was younger
is if you have some problem, not evenneurodiversity, just there are often
people in the world who are there to helpyou with that problem and often that's
their job, but you didn't know that andyou didn't know how to get that help.
And one thing I really applaudthe university for is, I'll
(26:09):
just give a plug for this.
I do this in my classes.
. If you go to gvsu.
edu slash support, there's all of theseresources for students with tons of
different problems, food insecurityor mental health issues or whatever.
And there's someone at the universitythat you can talk to and may be able to
point you in the right direction with it.
Not necessarily that they can solveevery problem, but, , there's
(26:30):
a lot of, , resources that areavailable . And I would also say,
if you need help, ask for help.
This generation is much morecomfortable with counseling.
If you're uncomfortable with that,or you're somewhat reticent about
that I would certainly encourage youto look into that and that there are
lots of resources for you and thereare lots of various other things so
you know talk to go to Someone thatyou trust don't suffer in silence.
(26:55):
I guess that's the main thing.
If you have some problem orsome issue, there's someone
somewhere who wants to help you.
What advice would you have forfilm students in particular?
Specifically people pursuingthis art form, this industry.
Well, I would say, one thing that Ifind frustrating about Any industry that
there's no A to B to C way to success.
(27:16):
And film students tendto be very ambitious.
The ones who aren't very ambitioususually drop out pretty fast and they
do something else because, you gottabe willing to work hard and, work,
weekend, 12 hour days, all that stuff.
and, one of the most common questionsthat we get asked is how can I be
a movie director, or how can I besuccessful editor or something like that?
(27:36):
And unfortunately, there's no real stepsthat you can do to guarantee success.
I mean, there are people who've gottenevery opportunity break that you can
think of and they hadn't made it.
And there are also people who havebeen just completely struck by
lightning and had amazing, careers.
I want to say it's very hard,particularly if you're ambitious, to
(27:56):
kind of deprogram yourself of that.
But have to be like thefeather in Forrest Gump.
It's very based on luckand the current situation.
And, I remember telling someone issuppose that I got somehow got a million
dollars, or 2 million dollars to make afeature film together, and it was March
of 2020, what would have happened there?
(28:16):
I worked for five years toget this money together.
And then the pandemic happens.
Those things just kind of happen.
It's kind of a bitter pill to swallowwhen you're young, and now I am sounding
old, because you want to control somuch, and the world, at least for me,
and I think for most people, even verysuccessful people, , the, Coppola,
or Scorsese, or, Tarantino, or SpikeLee, or someone like that, they
(28:40):
would probably say, I believe I'mtalented, I worked really hard, and
I.
was in the right place at the right time.
Another piece of advice that I wouldgive, and this is the film professor,
film history and theory person, is yougotta watch and understand the classics.
Often the, freshman students coming inare apprehensive about watching movies
(29:02):
in black and white or silent films,
and they say something like, I don'tlike to watch an older film, and
I'll say like, what is an older film?
And they say well, a moviemade in the 90s or something.
And for me, an old movie islike a movie made in the 1890s.
if I was teaching, which I used toteach, writing, reading, read Toni
Morrison and Charles Dickens and J.
D.
Salinger, read the greatworks of literature.
(29:22):
In the same way, if you're a filmmaker,a you have an enormous advantage.
over a writer because it will takeyou two to four hours to watch one
of the great works, whereas theymight have to read a, 500 page poem
in Middle English or something.
So, you owe it to yourself to, watchevery film on the sight and sound list.
find some critic that you like and watchevery film on their 100 or 25 best list.
(29:45):
One thing that I find very edifying iswatching everything that they've did,
not just their famous films or the filmsthat you like, because you learn from
what's considered to be their lesserfilms, their failures , and it helps
you understand how an artist works.
For the most part, careersare combinations of bad,
Good, mediocre, and amazing.
Watch movies, that get you outof your aesthetic comfort zone.
(30:08):
So those two
Could I tell the storyabout how I was diagnosed?
Absolutely.
Okay.
This is actually an entertaining, atleast to me, story about how I found out.
I was living in England, doing my Ph.
D., and I met a woman online who isa very dear friend of mine, Shell.
And we went out, didn't really seemto work out that well, but we stayed
(30:31):
in contact and we were friends.
So two years later, she postson her Facebook page that she
had been diagnosed as autistic.
So I googled it, and I kind of knewin about five seconds that it was me.
course I was going, no, wait, I mean,you're being paranoid and this isn't you.
And there's all that.
I tried to put it on the back burnerwhile I was in Italy with the novelty
(30:51):
of the vacation, but during some lulls,I went online I was like, okay I really
should look into this and I should go tothe doctor it took me four years from
the time I suspected to the time I wasdiagnosed, I was actually diagnosed the
officially the week before I left England.
So I, suspected, three years becauseit was right before my, 30th birthday.
(31:13):
And I was diagnosed, when I was 33.
It took that long, and that isalso not a unusual experience
for particularly autistic adults.
It takes a long time and over there,I had the access to the wonderful NHS.
Even with that, it took forever.
Whereas over here, the United Statesdoes not have as good of a healthcare
system and there are a lot of horrorstories, particularly from adults about
(31:34):
the difficulties of getting a diagnosis.
I contacted Shell and I waslike, that was really brave that
you did that, which is true.
I mean, it certainly changed my life.
I asked her, do you think I'm autistic?
She said, yeah, I think that you are,and I started asking my friends, and , I
thought they would say, no, come on, butmost of them, the reaction was yeah, I
(31:54):
wanted to share that one because I'mdoing this really for the same reasons,
that Shell posted on her Facebook pageis that, the more people that are public
about this, the less shame and stigma,and it encourages other people who might
be suspecting themselves to go downthat road, and particularly because
Shell and I both think it's about 5050, the ratio from men to women, and
(32:15):
of course some people are non binary.
About 20 years ago it was 10 percentof people diagnosed were women, and
now it's gone up to about a third, andwe both think that it's, near parity,
because women, for various reasons,are usually taught to cover it up more.
I would also say one thing that gaveme a little pause doing this is every
time I disclose this to someone thereis a lot of how is this person
(32:36):
going to react and should I tellmy employer, tell a family member?
how does this actually work andevery time that you do that you don't
quite know what their action is.
, so that's part of the motivationfor doing this as well.
Awesome.
So one thing you were discussingearlier kind of the differences between
introverted people versus extrovertedand how oftentimes there's tends to
be a stigma associated with autisticpeople tending to be quiet, but as you
(33:00):
mentioned, that's not always the case.
So would you like to elaborate that?
Yeah.
One of the reasons I'm alsodoing this is I can't really
speak for other autistic people.
I can only really speak for myself,but I also, feel an obligation to speak
because I am an extrovert and I do publicspeaking for a living as a professor.
And I know a lot of autistic people,which is to a degree, somewhat of
(33:22):
a stereotype, but it is certainlytrue, who are shy and just don't
like to be part of the public eye.
And I want to say, that it'scompletely okay to be like that.
And there are some people who, some nonautistic people who keep to themselves.
And that's just the way that they are.
And that's beautiful.
And that's great.
I also feel another thingthat many autistic people
often say is you can't win.
(33:42):
It's sort of like you sit there and yoube quiet and you don't ask questions
and you don't say anything and peoplecomplain that you're anti social and
that you're not participating, but thenyou ask questions you make suggestions
and comments and people say that you'redoing it in the wrong way or you're
too loud or you're not doing it enough.
Or you're doing it too much, I should say.
So, the thing is that if you areparticularly in that latter group, you
(34:05):
might miss social cues or interruptsomeone, that doesn't necessarily
mean that this person is being rude.
It just means this person might bemissing some of these social cues.
But I think what many allistic peopleperceive that as is this person is
just being a jerk and they're givennegative social pressure because of that.
And then the person who has no idea whatsocial rule they missed just feels like
(34:28):
people are attacking them personally andis less likely to participate and then
they are accused of being too quiet.
So that's also why I think greaterattention needs to be given to issues of
affect and to a degree the way we thinkabout social skills is actually quite
ableist and we need to have a way of,not judging people solely based on their
(34:51):
ability to, follow social etiquette.
Those kinds of situations are somethingthat autistic people often struggle with.
And also, you develop a sense ofparanoia because you're never certain
like you meet somebody, we shouldhave lunch or I'm interested in this
business idea you have or something.
You're never really certain.
Do they really mean that?
(35:11):
Or are they just saying thatto be polite or to get rid of
you or something like that?
And you carry that around with youbecause you're never totally certain.
What does this person actuallymean when they say that?
You mentioned, , you've gotsome projects in the works.
What are you working on?
What's going on with you?
I have a lot of projectsthat I'm working on.
I try to write one script a year.
The thing I most want to do is a script Ihave about an autistic woman in the 1890s.
(35:40):
I wrote it right afterI was diagnosed myself.
And I would say that probably out ofall the scripts that I've written or all
the projects I'd want to work on, that'sthe one that I would most want to make.
And I started thinking about whatit would be like to be autistic
in a different time period.
And that's another thing
that I would say you don't usually see.
We think of autism as being verycontemporary, but it's actually
been around for a long time.
probably since caveman time.
(36:00):
So that's the favorite out ofall the scripts I've written.
I wrote the story treatment with a friendof mine, and I wrote the script myself.
I just started writing a historicalfilm about King Alfred of England,
he was the first king of England.
That is just a fun script.
So what's fun about this KingAlfred script is I'm giving
myself an unlimited budget.
I'm not doing that thing of like,how can I actually film this?
(36:22):
I'm just writing this, David Leanepic, and if it ever does get made,
I'll probably be able to make, twominutes of it on whatever budget I get.
I'm very interested in historicalfilms, I actually think that, historical
films and historical theater are theclosest that we ever get to time travel.
When I was in England, there wasa revival of Terence Rattigan, the
(36:42):
British playwright, who had beenforgotten for a while, but a lot of
his plays were produced while I wasover there, it just felt like you had
gone back in time to the 1940s or 50s.
I really love the film.
medium's ability to show youpast times and how they look.
I'm fascinated by that.
I wanted to be a movie director.
So being a film professorwas not my first career.
(37:03):
but at this point, I've set the goals.
I don't want to die before atleast making one feature film.
Hopefully several.
The script about the autistic womanis the one that would like to make
the most, and I think I could dothat on a relatively low budget.
But that's what I'm working on.
I'm also working on my second book.
Actually, I have twoideas for a second book.
So I have one book out, whichis an adaptation of my thesis
(37:26):
my PhD thesis about World War I.
This one would be a sequel to that, which would be about films about World
War I made in the 50s and 60s, and I'mparticularly interested in comparisons
between World War I and what we refer toas the Vietnam War, which I don't think
that's the best historical way of callingthat, but just that's what probably most
(37:46):
listeners would be familiar with, andalso, I have another idea for a book
that I actually wrote the proposal forthis, but I haven't submitted it because
right now, if I did get the contractfor it, I wouldn't have the time to
write it, called Before Rain Man, andthe idea for this is that it's about
films about autism that don't know it.
That's about autistic charactersin cinema before we had the
(38:10):
codified idea of what autism was.
The most obvious one to mewould be Sherlock Holmes, and
I'm a Sherlock Holmes fan.
, , that's a book that has been on the backburner for a while, but if I do get
some time off, I'd like to write that.
Well, that's about all the time we have.
Ryan, thank you so much for sittingwith us today to discuss this.
Thank you so much for sharingyour experiences and insight.
it was a wonderfulpleasure to speak with you
(38:31):
Thank you very much.
I appreciate this.
Thank you for joining us for thisepisode of Alumni Live: The Podcast.
Subscribe to our podcast, to hear morefrom our alumni across the industry.
Check out Alumni Live onFacebook, Instagram, and YouTube.
For more conversations and networking.
Let us know what topics you wantto hear our alumni talk about the
(38:52):
Grand Valley State University FilmVideo Alumni Network is here for
you, and we're glad that you're here.
Thank you for listening.
Popular Podcasts
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.