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Minimal-speakers with autism converge on Lawrence to participate in a fiction feature film
July 18, 2025 at 03:00 AM EDT
(PRLeap.com) Cinema history will be made on Saturday at 10 AM as 20 or more than 20 people living with minimally-speaking autism, accompanied by their aides and families, converge on Appleton Street in Lawrence, MA, between the Courthouse and City Hall to participate in a scene in a fiction feature film. "Pointing Fingers" is the first fiction feature film written by, about, and acted by people with minimally speaking autism who communicate their thoughts by spelling them out one letter at a time on a keyboard or letterboard. In the story, written by Dan Bergmann, a minimal-speaker who learned to type out his thoughts when he was 12, Claire and Francis are a couple living with minimally-speaking autism, who take the bold step of living in an apartment of their own with an aide to help them with just about everything. Unfortunately Daisy, tTheir aide, has a past they didn't know about and one morning they wake up to discover that she has been murdered during the night. Swamped by grief and deprived of their means of communicating with the world or even with each other, they manage to use an emergency button to call 911 - and are arrested for a crime they had nothing to do with.
While they are being detained, other minimal speakers who know them through online communities show up to demonstrate in support of them. As Francis and Claire are dragged through the justice system, they come to believe that their attempt to take charge of their own lives was too difficult, and they will now abandon their dream. However, when they meet the demonstrators, they learn that that we all have an obligation to the people we inspire, and they resolve to keep trying, and to find the real murderer and bring him to justice.
Some minimal-speakers will travel hundreds of miles to get to Lawrence participate in this scene, because to them the chance to be taken seriously and to do creative, imaginative work in a movie is too good to pass up.
Dan Bergmann says, "I wrote this script to express my fondest hopes and worst fears about taking charge of my own life."
Claire is played by Emily Faith Grodin, a senior in college at Cal State Northridge. She is a creative writer and published poet. She is co-author of the book "I Have Been Buried Under Years of Dust" and the subject of an upcoming documentary based on the book.
Francis is played by Dan Bergmann, who also wrote the screenplay. Dan graduated with honors from the Harvard Extension School in 2021 where, even though he can't speak, he won an oration competition to speak to and for his graduating class at commencement (via Text-to-Speech computer). He has written a short film that was produced by the Metropolitan Museum of Art, given a commentary on CBS Sunday Morning, and made keynote presentations and participated in panel discussions at various autism conferences.
"Pointing Fingers" is being filmed entirely in Massachusetts. It is supported by two foundations and more than 75 individual donors.
GET IN TOUCH
Michael Bergmann
Burgeon & Flourish, LLC
http://www.pointingfingersmovie.com
You can see the original version and more on PRLeap here: http://www.prleap.com/pr/306121/minimal-speakers-with-autism-converge-on-lawrence-to-participate-in-a-fiction-feature-film
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