Acton family Michael, Meredith and Dan Bergmann, screened their upcoming film, “Pointing Fingers,” at the Maynard Fine Arts Theatre on Saturday, May 9 for an audience of about 150 people. On the film’s website, “Pointing Fingers” is described as “the first-ever fiction feature film about, written by, and starring people with nonspeaking autism.” Last January, the Acton Exchange reported on the filming that took place in local municipalities, including Acton, Maynard, and Lowell.
Maynard Fine Arts Theatre owner Daphna Krouk-Gordon welcomed the audience, explaining that she and her late husband, Les Gordon, purchased the business three years prior with the aim to do the work she attributes to movie theaters, of “connecting purposes and connecting people.” To that end, as the founder and president of Toward Independent Living and Learning (TILL, Inc), an organization that supports individuals with physical and intellectual disabilities, Krouk-Gordon leverages the movie theater “as a platform for training and employing people with disabilities in the movie theater industry and the adjoining ice cream retail shop,” according to the theater’s website.
Lisa Keller, president of Autism National Committee, as the sponsor of the screening, also welcomed the audience, encouraging membership in the autism advocacy organization, a modest $10 annual fee for autistic individuals. Keller introduced the filmmaking team, the Bergmann family: director and producer Michael, writer and lead actor Dan, and cinematographer Meredith, adding that Dan and Michael are board members of the Autism National Committee and are instrumental in putting on webinars that help all people with autism, not just nonverbal autism.
Michael provided a bit of background on the film process, noting that the film is almost complete, with just a little bit of image coloring to finish up. “We did it,” he proudly proclaimed. “It wasn’t particularly easy, but nothing in this space is particularly easy.”
Dan, a writer, actor and activist with a BA from the Harvard Extension School, and the school’s 2021 commencement speaker, shared his thoughts using a text to voice feature on a tablet. He reminded the audience “that this is a story. I made it all up. It’s not abstracted from my life. Some of the characters are wrong about everything, and the rest of us make mistakes. I learned from watching our wonderful actors that actors enjoy it when their characters make mistakes. Emily and I enjoyed it too, a rare experience for those of us who try so hard to do everything right and watch ourselves fail so often. If this movie does nothing else, it demonstrates what a lot of neurotypical and autistic people can do if we do something big together.”
In late 2023, the Bergmann family sent out an announcement about the project they had just launched, in which Dan shared his vision for the film. “I want the most diverse cast and crew possible in POINTING FINGERS, and as many differently-abled actors as we can reasonably cast. This is because I want to evoke a world, aspirational at the moment but hopefully normal in the near future, in which very diverse people function together as if it’s perfectly normal to do so.”
Emily Grodin, Dan’s co-star, sent a video message from her home in California. In addition to acting, Grodin works as an author and journalist. She shared, also using text to voice, gratitude “to our producer, Michael Bergmann, and to Dan Bergmann, the amazing writer who put this masterpiece together. It was such a special experience to be a part of, and I’m really proud of what we created together.”
Following the screening, the filmmakers and many of the cast members took to the stage to entertain questions from the audience. One member asked the team to share the most difficult, and most fun, moments in filming. Dan responded, “It was all difficult, and it was all fun.”
For Michael, the most fun moment was filming the demonstration outside the Lowell courthouse, a demonstration that was supposed to be quiet since the protestors were almost exclusively non-verbal autistics and their aides, but they ended up making a lot of noise with their applause when the characters played by Dan and Emily, Francis and Claire, walked out of the courthouse. Michael went on to say that the most difficult moments were the scenes with aggression, scenes where Dan and Emily had to push other actors.
Autistic and non-autistic audience members showered the team with praise. One offered that Dan is a “brilliant writer and wonderful voice.” Another noted that the pair of actors were a convincing couple. One cast member, Kelly, shared with her spelling board and aide, “I am so impressed, and I was happy to be part of this historic film.”
In response to a question about his other writing, Dan said that this script was his first piece of fiction. So much is “said for me by someone else, so I started writing dialogue for actors.” Responding to another query about the message the team hoped viewers would take away from the film, he said, “That we [autistic non-speakers] can know what’s going on.” Michael added the observation that, “People who are skeptical of their intelligence don’t spend a lot of time with these individuals.”
Michael also told about one of Dan’s experiences that was a critical starting point for the project. Dan had said, “I wanted to make a film filling in a gap in a song.” The song? “Four People” by Elizabeth Bonker. “Four People” is about a nonverbal autistic couple in a romantic relationship, each relying on a parent to navigate life and to communicate. Dan wondered about the four at the beginning of the song becoming two at the end when the couple is old and living together independently; how does that happen?
Keller urged the team to discuss how the spelling and typing featured in the film by the nonverbal actors had been sped up to optimize the timing. Michael explained that this was sometimes done by preloading text on tablets. At other times, primarily for dialogue between the two main characters, the tablet they shared featured a fictitious app using AI that offered prompts, anticipating likely word options after their extensive use of the program.
Michael also said that Dan is currently developing a real typing app with Dr. Elliot Cole of Neurohope. The company specializes in identifying the strengths of each unique person with a disability and developing customized tools, therapies, and applications.
Following the Q&A, cast members enjoyed ice cream and socializing at the adjacent Theatre Creamery. Using their spelling boards and aides, they chatted with one another and audience members. “Pointing Fingers” is dedicated to the 31 million non-speaking autistics around the world, and to the people who reach them and love them. If readers missed the screening and would like to see the film, a request for a screening can be submitted through the website.
Alissa Nicol writes about community events for the Acton Exchange.
