Building ‘Adam’

What does it take for Hollywood to make the best autism-based character since Dustin Hoffman’s Rain Man? YouTube, good writing and one hell of a performance by Hugh Dancy.

by Kelly Nepogoda

Not since Dustin Hoffman put a face to autism in Rain Man has cinema seen such a courageous depiction of an individual on the spectrum.

A film pitched as an unconventional love story with conventional mishaps and misunderstandings, Adam includes something mainstream audiences have not seen in over two decades – a main character on the spectrum portrayed with respect and dignity.

Adam shows our sometimes effortless, sometimes trying, sometimes complicated but always rewarding attempts at romance through the eyes of Adam (Hugh Dancy), a young man with Asperger’s syndrome (AS), and Beth (Rose Byrne), a neurotypical schoolteacher. While their communication is challenged by Adam’s disability, the two stumble blindly, as we all do, to connect amidst a world where the odds are against them. The film beautifully conveys the rollercoaster ride that love can be and the courage necessary, no matter our condition, to brave its ups and downs.

“We all have to work at relationships, and we don’t all succeed all of the time,” says Dancy of the film’s universal appeal. “We all have difficulty making connections with other humans.”

The up-and-coming British actor, who has shared stage and screen with the likes of Oscar winner Helen Mirren and Clive Owen, was previously unexposed to the specifics of AS and made it his top priority to research so he could do the role justice.

“I did what any individual would do. I typed Asperger’s into Google. Literally I was starting from a position of knowing absolutely nothing about Asperger’s other than what Max Mayer, the writer and director, told me when I sat down and spoke to him,” Dancy admits.

Mayer, a virtual novice as a director, confesses to using the same tactics when it came to writing the role of Adam. “I did what every person does,” he says. “I went to the internet and found many accounts with people who have Asperger’s, but then I started reading books on AS and eventually reached out to some publishers for more specific books.”

For Dancy, the goal of authenticity was accessible due in part to the surge of the internet as a significant source of information for the autism community. However, the high-tech research process was not without its pitfalls, quickly teaching Dancy that the internet cannot easily encapsulate the complexities of Asperger’s for the neurotypical population.

“One of the first things I remember doing was sitting down and watching some videos on YouTube posted by individuals with AS, talking very cogently and very easily about their own condition. I suppose that was useful is some ways and bad in others,” Dancy reveals. “It was slightly misrepresentative of how they would behave in most other situations, but it gave me an enormous amount to start with.”

Branching out to helpful literature on AS, Dancy cites John Eldin Robison’s Look Me in the Eye as useful to understanding the world of AS through the perspective on someone who lived in that world. As Dancy’s research deepened, so too did his appreciation for Adam as a person and the intricacies that make us all unique. Without doing so may have done a disservice to Adam.

“What I learned early on was the strength of Adam as an individual and not as a diagnosis, not as representing every single person on the spectrum. I learned about Asperger’s and as I went deeper into understanding Adam, I realized I had to move beyond those general facts and start thinking precisely about him as a human being.”

Although Dancy may have immersed himself in readings and videos on Asperger’s, he needed to show consideration for writer/director Max Mayer’s vision: to pen something about everyone’s constant missteps in love and relationships. Adam might include a character on the spectrum but its initial purpose was not to identify, educate or enlighten. Shocking as it may be to those purchasing a ticket because of Dancy’s take on Asperger’s, the script was not intended to teach audiences at all.

“I never thought the film was an attempt to highlight Asperger’s,” Dancy asserts. “I think it would not have interested me because if you had tried to do that on its own, it wouldn’t be successful. Any story has to be universal. That is what good writing does. It takes even the tiniest story and finds the key that we can all share.”

Adam has already won awards at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, a great form of feedback from Hollywood peers. While an instant comparison to the acclaim received by Hoffman’s Charlie Babbit may be only attributed to Dancy’s acting chops, Dancy humbly honors the writing of Max Mayer as the true brilliance behind his craft and its results.

“What hooked me was the quality of the writing,” says Dancy of the initial reading of Adam. “I know enough about scripts to know an intelligently written one. It is two things: story structure and intelligent dialogue. When those two things are present, even if you know nothing about the bulk of the subject matter, then it is enough to pique your interest.”

Nevertheless Dancy steals the show. A combination of study, attention to detail and a reverence for the character come together to bolster Dancy’s performance. With a fast and furious production schedule limited to 25 days, Dancy had little time to consider the impact he would have on the autism community and more time to push past his limits as a neurotypical playing an “Aspie.”

“I didn’t care much to think about it too much while we were filming,” says Dancy of the reaction of the autism community. “Max did not necessarily make the film for people in the community, and we did not want to preach nor did we want to educate. We just hoped that would be a side effect of telling the story.”

Luckily for Dancy his choice to surpress any thought of the possible interpretation of his work in Adam allowed him to focus on creating the gap that exists between our world and high-functioning autism. The inner turmoil that exists beneath an innocently austere surface was challenging for Dancy.

“An Aspie guy would always have to try his best to act as a neurotypical. And in a social situation he is filtering and thinking about what’s been said to him and making sure that, if he can, he responds in an appropriate fashion. That distance between that way of thinking and his way of thinking is not something he is going to fully bridge. There are things he can make up, but that divide is never going to completely go away.”

Dancy does not merely acknowledge the basics about Asperger’s syndrome. Granted Dancy’s Adam eats the same frozen dinner every night, pays dearly for his blunt responses, finds comfort in discussions about space and relies on stimming in times of high stress. But it is Dancy’s profound understanding of the anxiety and introspection required of an Aspie to exist in a neurotypical society that takes Adam to new levels.

“As much as I might empathize my way into their minds, at the very least I wouldn’t process things the way they do,” recognizes Dancy. “There was always a divide I had to constantly try to bridge. I found that certainly to be very challenging but ultimately kind of freeing as an actor. I never got to sit back or take it easy or coast.”

Dancy made Adam a character bigger than himself.  Awaiting a response from Hollywood is always the first hurdle, but Dancy’s nerves also resided with the reaction from the autism community.

“It is a big enough deal to represent any group of people,” says Dancy, “but to represent a group that is underrepresented – to have messed that up and misrepresented them in such a visible way would have been a disaster.”

The community’s response was overwhelming and reinforced Dancy’s confidence in the power of the film’s story.

“It was huge. When we watched the movie for the first time with an audience with individuals with AS and members of their families, their response was so positive,” says a relieved Dancy. “When you are dealing with people with AS and watching the movie, they are not softening the blow. I knew that I was getting the honest truth. I had always felt slightly like I was kind of shooting in the dark with this. I just tried to trust in my research and my instincts, and, most importantly, I trusted in Max’s script.”

Dancy feels strongly that Adam, a film that is not your run-of-the-mill, fairy tale love story Hollywood so often reproduces, can resonate with any audience member, not solely the family member of a person living on the autism spectrum.

“When people watch the movie who live their whole lives with AS or those who live their lives with their children with AS, they know so much about it, so much more than me,” confesses Dancy. “They understand it in an infinitely deeper way than I could. They say they recognize what they are seeing and were profoundly moved by it. That is a wonderful feeling. It is also true for people who watch the film who don’t know much about it and they suddenly come away and their eyes have been opened and they are thinking about autism in a different way. That is also powerful.”

While Dancy attributes Adam’s universal impact on the power of film and fine storytelling, he is quick to defend Hollywood from those who feel the silver screen should take responsibility to educate the masses about any cause or disability.

“I don’t think that Hollywood has a responsibility to educate the masses,” asserts Dancy. “I think we as individuals do have some responsibility to the choices we make and the choices of the stories we tell. I have nothing against big, escapist entertainment. I mean I want to see blockbuster movies and not have to think about them.”

To label Dancy’s portrayal of Adam “accurate” would be an understatement. It is Dancy’s modesty that consistently put Adam first and, in turn, was an integral part of making Adam remarkable. Dancy stays true to reality – the reality of finding love, the reality of communication and the reality of obstacles. Most importantly, Dancy stays true to Adam, “an honest human being.”

5 Questions with Writer/director Max Mayer

What was your inspiration for writing Adam?
I had heard an interview on NPR years ago. A young man spoke of learning when to smile and how to understand people’s interactions. I became interested in learning more about what that would be like. When I was younger I worked at a camp with individuals people then called emotionally disturbed who actually should have been diagnosed with Asperger’s.

Why a love story?
The use of a character with Asperger’s in the film was metaphoric for the challenges we all face in our attempts to communicate and connect to another human being. Things are not perfect and love is not always a fairy tale. That has been my experience. I wanted to write not necessarily about a parental love but about that intimate connection between two people in an exposed, graphic way.

Did you find it challenging to direct a neurotypical to act as an Aspie?
Yes, it was challenging for us both. We both had done our separate research, however we also attended Adaptations, which is a group for individuals with Asperger’s where they had meetings and panel discussions about how to socialize. We got to speak with them and that helped.

While most Hollywood endings are predictable, Adam is an honest film with honest outcomes. Was the ending always the same?
No, no. I wrote the ending where things end neatly – the Hollywood ending – but I felt it did not ring true to the rest of the film. As I had said earlier, relationships are not fairy tales and the entire film needed to match that reality. If it didn’t, it would be like saying “Just kidding” about the rest of the movie.

How was it received by the autism community?
We did a 14 city tour where we showed the film and then had a Q&A session. Many people in attendance would stand up and say “I have Asperger’s” or “My son has Asperger’s” and they would share their connection. The community really identified with the film.