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Asperger's, not what you think it is | Krister Palo | TEDxYouth@ISH

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Behind the Curtain: Mockingbird (Page to Stage)

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For more information or to buy tickets, visit: http://www.kennedy-center.org/events/?event=KPTBB A world premiere Kennedy Center and VSA commission Caitlin's world has always been black and white. As an 11-year-old on the autism spectrum, she used to rely on her older brother to help make sense of things beyond dictionaries, schedules, and the facial expressions chart at school.

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Kennedy Center Theater for Young Audiences presents Mockingbird

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For more information or to purchase tickets, please visit: http://www.kennedy-center.org/calendar/event/KPTBB Adapted by Julie Jensen from the 2010 award-winning book by Kathryn Erskine, this vibrant and moving world premiere play, commissioned by the Kennedy Center and VSA, tells the story of a young girl on the autism spectrum who changes a community.

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Review of Julie Jensen's adaptation

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The Kennedy Center's Family Theater presents Mockingbird a world premiere to the Kennedy Center. Hailed as "extraordinary... [a] moving and insightful masterpiece" by Publishers Weekly, Kathryn Erskine's 2010 National Book Award-winning young adult novel has been adapted for the stage by Julie Jensen, a recipient of the Kennedy Center Award for New American Plays.

Kathryn Erskine, the author, was directly affected by the Virginia Tech 2007 shootings and felt it was important to show the personal toll that violence has on families with special needs children. Ms. Erskine attended the world premiere, seeming genuinely touched at the audience's reaction to the production. This dramatic adaptation was artfully crafted for the stage by Julie Jensen, and was lovingly directed by Tracy Callahan. This moving, vibrant, and surprisingly humorous world premiere production shows how the perseverance of one girl can change a community-and how black and white can always be complemented by a kaleidoscope of colors.

Well acted and directed, it will be a performance you will talk about for years to come!

The novel, Mockingbird, is nuanced with images and references from To Kill a Mockingbird, a Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Harper Lee published in 1960 about racial intolerance, that was later made into a movie, which Caitlin and her brother, Devon, would often watch together. Devon often called Caitlin, "Scout" and Caitlin calls her father, "Atticus." Caitlin, much like Scout, sees herself as a passive witness to the events that unfolded in her life, protected by her older brother, and admiring of him and her father. Caitlin uses the story of To Kill a Mockingbird to process her understanding of the reactions of others, and communicate with her father. Caitlin's heartfelt drawing of the mockingbird, which represents her brother, is a constant connection onstage to the classic novel, and a reminder of the intolerance that children on the spectrum often face in their daily lives.

Caitlin, an 11-year-old on the autism spectrum, portrayed with humor, empathy and energy by Dylan Silver, used to rely on her older brother to help make sense of things. But now that he is gone, dead from a random act of mass violence, she is on her own. With the support of her guidance counselor, teacher, father, and a new young friend, Caitlin begins to understand how to get close to people again, embrace the "messiness" of emotions, and use her burgeoning artistic talents to move on. Her failure to be "normal" is met with school friends who tease her and teachers who encourages her to use techniques and memorized tricks to navigate the emotional world where Caitlin is encouraged to conform. Words and expression are difficult for Caitlin, but with training, she comes to understand and behave appropriately to the emotions of others, which are beyond her ability to feel herself.

Helping Caitlin make friends and interact with others is the focus of every adult. Her teacher, Mrs. Johnson, firmly and commandingly played by Susan Lynskey, tries to help Caitlin with the day to day challenge of making friends, and learning to be part of a group. The guidance counselor, Mrs. Brook, played elegantly and firmly by Gabriela Fernandez-Coffey, reminds Caitlin that she needs to pay attention to invisible clues of other people's moods and interpret words that appear to be confusing. Her Dad, played by veteran actor, Mahoud Ebrahimzadeh, is going through his own pain of losing a child, coupled with the often inappropriateness of Caitlin's use of words, bringing her father additional pain. It is interesting to note that despite Caitlin's avoidance of physical touch, she allows her dad to comfort her, his tenderness, sometimes hidden by his short-tempered handling of his confused daughter, is genuine and beautifully portrayed. The sweetest moments are portrayed between Caitlin and the 6 foot tall, baseball cap wearing, 5 year old, Aaron Bliden who plays Michael. Forced to attend the recess of younger children, Caitlin finally starts to make a friend with Michael. Someone who likes her for who she is, understands her and the audience sees that the efforts of the staff are indeed working as Caitlin seems happier having friends.

Set designer, Misha Kachman's, use of a geometric staging and a giant blackboard magnify what Caitlin is thinking or what she is drawing, allowing others to see how her limitations affect her ability to "just act normally." Minimal props make for minimal distraction for the theatergoers. Having 30 year olds playing 5-11 year olds makes for a creative conundrum, which is dealt with finesse by the costume designer, Deb Sivigny. She shows cohesive simplicity along with the necessity for a quick clothing change for the rest of the cast, somehow it just works. Many know now that people on the autism spectrum are sensitive to light and sound. The light design, created by Andrew Cissna and the sound designer Christopher Baine join forces to highlight the contrast of the world Caitlin would like to live in, soft lighting, and rhythmically consistent music, with the bright and loud world in which she is forced to live. Slamming of brightly colored lockers, which interchange as doors and walls, the audience begins to see the world through Caitlin's eyes.

So whether you are a caregiver, friend, family, on the spectrum yourself, or anyone curious about autism, this is a must see! Well acted and directed, it will be a performance you will talk about for years to come!

Advisory: For ages 10 and up.

Running Time: 65 minutes, with no intermission.

Sensory Friendly Performances are offered at 1:30pm on Saturday, January 24th and 11am on Saturday, January 31st.

Mockingbird runs through February 1, 2015 at The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, 2700 F Street, NW Washington, DC 20566. For tickets and information call 800-444-1324 or 202-467-4600 or click here.

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Theatre Review: 'Mockingbird' at The Kennedy Center's Family Theater

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The Kennedy Center's Family Theater presents Mockingbird a world premiere to the Kennedy Center. Hailed as "extraordinary... [a] moving and insightful masterpiece" by Publishers Weekly, Kathryn Erskine's 2010 National Book Award-winning young adult novel has been adapted for the stage by Julie Jensen, a recipient of the Kennedy Center Award for New American Plays....

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"Mockingbird" by Kathryn Erskine - created at http://animoto.com

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Kathryn Erskine is an American writer of children's literature. She won the 2010 National Book Award for Young People's Literature for her novel, Mockingbird.

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Comparison of To Kill a Mockingbird and Mockingbird

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The rough first draft of Harper Lee's uber-classic To Kill A Mockingbird, Go Set A Watchman, was released this past Tuesday. Unsurprisingly, it's smashing sales records around the world, but it has also set off a wave of controversy. The situation surrounding Watchman 's publication has left a very bad taste in many people's mouths, and indeed there is much that is suspect in the tale.

Like countless others, To Kill A Mockingbird is my favorite novel, without question. There are others I love - A Prayer for Owen Meaney, The Corrections, Nicholas Nickleby, Wait Until Spring, Bandini, A Confederacy of Dunces, For Whom the Bell Tolls- but Mockingbird is the only one that's perfect.

Personally, I'm going to forgo Go Set A Watchman, but all this talk of Mockingbird is making me hungry for more... Luckily there's a cottage industry specializing in books spun off from Lee's novel. Here we present a brief list of some of the best.

I Kill the Mockingbird
Written by Paul Acampora
Published by Roaring Book Press, May 2014

Three friends decide to pay tribute to their favorite teacher -an lover of Lee's masterpiece- by attempting to entice as many people as possible to read To Kill A Mockingbird. They do so by endeavoring to make the book as scarce and difficult to find, knowing that people love to be a part of something exclusive. They misshelve the book in libraries and bookstores, and take to social media and set up a website (ikilledthemockingbird.com) to publicize their mission. With the help of Wil Wheaton, their work goes viral...

In Search of Mockingbird
Written by Loretta Ellsworth
Published by Square Fish, April 2007 (reprinted July 2015)

Erin's mother died years ago, when Erin was too young to even get to know her. Now, all she has that connects her to her mom is a tattered, note-filled copy of To Kill A Mockingbird. Obsessed with the book for years, on her sixteenth birthday Erin decides to set out on a journey of discovery to learn as much about her mother as she can, and so she makes her way to Alabama to find the reclusive Harper Lee. Along the way she meets a menagerie of colourful characters... Think if it as a middle grade, literary Field of Dreams.
Read our interview with Loretta Ellsworth HERE.
I Am Scout: The Biography of Harper Lee
Written by Charles J. Shields
Published by Square Fish, 2009 (reprinted July 2015)

I Am Scout is Charles J. Shields' middle grade adaptation of his own biography of Harper Lee, Mockingbird. This book offers an engaging portrait of woman whose one (real) book is one of the most revered and widely read in the history of literature. From her days as a hard-headed tomboy in Alabama through her school years and the beginning of her writing career, struggling in New York, to the publication of her seminal work, I Am Scout is wonderful further reading for any young fan of To Kill A Mockingbird.

Mockingbird
Written by Kathryn Erskine
Published by Puffin

Kathryn Erskine's National Book Award-winning tale concerns a young girl with Asperger's Syndrome trying to deal with her emotions (or lack thereof) following the school shooting that claimed her brother.

Erskine mines much of the same ground as Lee, especially where the compromise of innocence is at play, and she makes many references to To Kill A Mockingbird throughout, both subtle and overt.

The Neon Bible
Written by John Kennedy Toole
Published by Grove Press, 1989

From the Try it If You Like... files we present John Kennedy Toole's The Neon Bible. This book has no ties to To Kill A Mockingbird, save for circumstances: Written before his Pulitzer Prize-winning triumph, A Confederacy of Dunces, but not released until after not just Toole's death ( Dunces was released after his death as well, actually...) but also following his mother's death. (Toole was just 16 when he wrote it.) Neon Bible was never meant for publication, and when she died, his mother left strict instructions that it should remain unpublished, which apparently meant nothing to her kin, who of course saw dollars in them thar pages. What separates Bible from Watchman is that it is wildly successful, furthering Toole's legacy rather than detracting from it. Ironically, it bears more than a passing resemblance to Mockingbird in tone; in fact, were you to read it without knowing the author, and then were asked whose unpublished book it was, Harper Lee would be a much better guess than Toole.

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THE MIDDLE GRADE OFFSPRING OF TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

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The rough first draft of Harper Lee's uber-classic To Kill A Mockingbird, Go Set A Watchman, was released this past Tuesday. Unsurprisingly, it's smashing sales records around the world, but it has also set off a wave of controversy. The situation surrounding Watchman's publication has left a very bad taste in many people's mouths, and...