Autism is a much-misunderstood term encompassing a wide range of behaviours and outlooks on life. In recent years, there has been a positive push towards autism awareness and recently an even stronger campaign for autism acceptance. When one considers the inappropriate way in which people with autism who were not diagnosed in the past were treated in many cases, this is very good to see.
I have personal experience around this having taught numerous young people, who have been diagnosed as autistic.
As campaigner Greta Thunberg has put it, her own autism is not something that holds her back but rather is a superpower. It was against this background that I went to see Joe Dennis at the Alphabetti Theatre, whose show was part of the Newcastle fringe on Thursday 24 July.
Tides (an Autism story)
The performance began in darkness, with just the sound of someone strumming an acoustic guitar, before Joe came on looking at audience, emptying a box and playing with toy men from the box. They were all superheroes and Joe was enjoying playing imaginatively. Meanwhile the song turned out to be about control…
He told us that he is different, and we went on to learn that he is going under another name in the performance.
Before long we get the first experience of what sensory overload is like for somebody with autism, with the sound of a heart beating, background noise becoming loud and intrusive, an ambulance causing…stress.
We were told that the world can be scary…
We then went on a journey, through difficulties in school, and how he wanted to be want to be part of this world, but found communication difficult and a world of its own. How he found socialising at school difficult, just repeating other people’s words back.
He had supportive parents, which was just well as secondary school didn’t always go to plan either, However, on the bright side he did well in English and story writing and his teacher told him he has a superpower. This helped him to get more confident at college and soon he was indulging in ‘teenage behaviour’ and forgetting how to be kind…
Then someone he cared about died and he was overcome with a very powerful grief. We were told how he processes things in different ways and how others are different to him, while emotional events hit harder than they do for others.
Still, he was able to start a creative English degree at university, but had relationship difficulties before we saw Joe dancing manically to music in what he called his ‘session phase’
He ended with a First Class honours degree.
However, this led to work at a call centre and there were to be more difficulties there and with house sharing in 2020, before another major bereavement knocked him down again. Joe used sketches of the faces of people to illustrate what they seemed like to him and mimicked their voices, and all this was very effective and often amusing.
The world expected him to carry on while at the same time Covid-19 also came along… The performance ended with talk of life dealing bad hands but the hope that by sharing stories people might care.
Joe Dennis
I caught up with Joe at the end of the show and asked him a couple fo questions, starting with how much of the show had been autobiographical.
Joe replied that it was pretty much biographical, except that he had changed the name, because he wanted to tell the story through someone else and be an actor and not a creative writer.
I also asked Joe what he wanted people to take away from the performance.
Joe said that he wanted people to remember that we are all part of the same human race and we should try to be kind to each other.
Comment
The performance felt true to life in that it was in some ways sad, but there was a lot of humour as well. It was a powerful performance, from somebody who clearly knew what the role demanded.
The show was well received by the audience, and I can only hope that those who were there have gone away with a better understanding of what it is like to be autistic and also a greater determination to be kind to one another.
Joe Dennis is taking his performance to the Edinburgh Fringe next.
Peter Sagar saw Tides at Alphabetti on 24 Juliy.
A Newcastle Fringe review. There’s still a lot going on!
More reviews from Newcastle Fringe
‘‘Grandma’s House’ at The Biscuit Factory
Café Boheme by Headway Arts at The Cumberland
‘Howling at the Moon’ at Newcastle Fringe
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