Intermountain Centers and The Loft Cinema are celebrating neurodiversity for Autism Awareness Month by hosting a screening of the critically acclaimed documentary “The Reason I Jump.” Two neurodivergent panelists will be in attendance for a Q&A session following the film — “Look Me in the Eye” author John Elder Robison and Netflix’s “Love on the Spectrum” star Dani Bowman.
“This event underscores a commitment to community,” Intermountain Director of Communications and Philanthropy Royce Sparks said in a statement. “Our neurodiverse communities are a treasure and we are honored to be bringing two voices as celebrated in their field as Dani and John.
“To partner with such a beloved organization as the Loft Cinema has been a dream come true — you won’t want to miss this very special evening.”
The event will unfold on Thursday, April 30, at 6 p.m. at the Loft Cinema, with the Q&A session scheduled before the screening. Tickets cost $11.50 — with discounts available for seniors, military and Loft Cinema members — and the event is sensory friendly and open to all-ages. The conversation will be moderated by Loft Cinema Programming Director Jeff Yanc and centered on Robison and Bowman’s individual relationships with autism and neurodiversity, as well as the struggles and hopes the community navigates.
“The Reason I Jump” is a documentary based on a book written from the perspective of 13-year-old Naoki Higashida — a nonverbal Japanese boy with autism. The critically-acclaimed and Sundance-Award-winning work is praised for its exploration of the nonverbal and autistic lived experience, with messages of acceptance and celebration of neurodivergent people.
“I thought that the insights that were offered in that book were quite striking to be coming from a nonspeaking person,” Robison said. “It speaks to the fallacy of making assumptions that just because you can’t see what we’re thinking, you should not assume that we have no thoughts at all — and that’s ultimately what that book and I have spoken out against for many, many years.”
John Elder Robison
John Elder Robison, 70, is a neurodivergent author who has written various books about his experiences living with autism. He was diagnosed at age 40 and has spent much of his life before then advocating for youth living in abusive home environments. Robison described learning that he had autism as an enlightening and transformative experience.
“I realized that that was a central factor in my social failures and things that I had struggled with — but at the same time, after a while, I realized it was also a factor in my successes,” the author said. “I began looking to talk to people about autism, because I felt there were certainly a great many younger people to me growing up who were wrestling with the same issues.”
Robison was inspired to write his first book, titled “Look Me in the Eye,” due to the lack of literature specifically authored by autistic people, detailing their experiences and lives. He explained that “it wasn’t easy at all to find autistic people 30 years ago” and the existing texts about autism, he said, were “relentlessly negative” books written for parents of autistic children.
“It was all, ‘you’ll be lucky if your child can ever take care of themselves, your child probably won’t be able to live independently, they won’t be able to have friends or get married,’” the author said.
He explained that “Look Me in the Eye” was a transformative experience for him to write, but also for others to read — as he had accomplished the milestones that the literature of the time painted as highly unlikely. The author said that he wanted young people with autism to have access to information about autism that would have been helpful for him growing up.
Robison would go on to write three more books, hundreds of articles and contribute chapters to various textbooks used by teachers, therapists and other medical professionals. His work caught the attention of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), who invited him to advise the government on the support and research that would be most relevant and impactful for autistic people — at a time when, as Robison noted, the concept of neurodiversity did not yet exist. The author said the presidential administrations he worked with included George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Joe Biden and Donald Trump’s first term. Robison’s efforts with the NIH and the World Health Organization produced the current definitions of function and disability in autism.
Today, Robison continues to work as a neurodiversity scholar with The College of William and Mary in Virginia. For the author, one of the most important aspects of neurodiversity advocacy is learning from the perspective of neurodivergent people.
“If you want to know how it feels to be an autistic person, you ask an autistic person — you don’t ask a therapist who talks to autistic people,” Robison said. “Nothing about us without us.”
Dani Bowman
Dani Bowman said she first met Robison as a young teenager — around 13 or 14 years old, her communication aide clarified — and new to neurodiverse spaces and the community at large. Now 31 years old, Bowman’s Q&A panel with the author will be a reunion of roughly 17 years.
For nearly two decades since the introduction, Bowman has spent her time running DaniMation Entertainment — an animation company that uplifts the voices and talents of autistic artists. “Educating, elevating and empowering people on the autism spectrum by helping them learn how to turn their passion in animation into careers,” Bowman said, is her studio’s mission.
The artist and animator started her company at 14 years old with help from her aunt and uncle — noting that she was inspired by Pokémon creator Satoshi Tajiri, who began at 17. At 16 years old, Bowman also worked with Joey Travolta of Inclusion Films — a filmmaking program for people with developmental and intellectual disabilities — teaching animation at his film camps.
The animation teacher recently had her students’ work featured at the Museum of the Moving Image in Queens, New York — short films detailing constructive, empathetic and appropriate ways to communicate with autistic people in medical contexts. DaniMation was hired by Stanford University to create and showcase the films to inform the doctors and therapists of tomorrow that are studying at the institution.
One such animated short followed a nonverbal autistic boy named Gordon, who uses an Augmentative and Alternative Communication device (AAC) to help him communicate with other people. The work showcased some missteps in interacting with someone like Gordon, as well as the appropriate ways to proceed.
In addition to being neurodivergent herself, both her students and staff are all neurodivergent as well. Currently, DaniMation has 60 active students at any given time, with seven employees who are former students. Bowman’s ultimate hope for DaniMation’s students, she said, is for them to achieve financial independence and lead fulfilling lives — building community with other neurodivergent people.
The artist and animator is commonly recognized for her time on Netflix’s “Love on the Spectrum” — though she notes she found love outside of the show, not on it. The novel experience of going on various blind dates, she said, did teach her one very important lesson.
“Finding love is not about finding the right person — it’s always about being the right person,” Bowman said. “When you focus on yourself and all the positive things (you bring to) the world, love will eventually find the way.
“You find love when you least expect it.”
With the event approaching, Robison said he welcomes anyone with questions to bring them to the Q&A.
“If you come to this and you have questions you want to ask, think them through and bring them — I’m ready for anything you wish to ask,” Robison said. “If you have a serious question, I will give you my best, serious answer.”
“The Reason I Jump” Screening
WHEN: 6 p.m. Thursday, April 30
WHERE: The Loft Cinema, 3233 E. Speedway Boulevard, Tucson
COST: $11.50
INFO: loftcinema.org