[Quick Summary: Two 20+ yr olds with Asperger's Syndrome have a rocky road to love because of their social difficulties.]
Q: How do you show that a character struggles with an internal, mental syndrome like Asperger's, where he/she does not reason like most do and has difficulty with social cues?
A: Set up him/her up in situations where it is evident in their choices and behavior.
For example, in the scene below:
- Donald and Isabelle have Asperger's.
- His temp job is driving a taxi, which he does badly.
- He crashes the taxi --> His behavior is not how most people would react --> We realize something is not the expected norm in reasoning ability and social cues.
INT. CAB - DAY
....The Koreans BOLT out of the car, shrieking at Donald and the flower truck driver in rapid-fire Korean obscenities (we guess). Donald gets out slowly, telling Dundee...
DONALD: Stay.
Dundee FLIES out of the car to Donald's shoulder. Donald look around, oblivious to his victims and the general chaos he has brought to Olympic Boulevard. Advises the cockatiel...
DONALD: It'll take the police, oh, eight, nine minutes. [He can explain the consequences of his actions, i.e., he is high functioning.]
Instinct. And experience. The truck driver is talking to him, but Donald walks straight past him, bends carefully, and picks up a bunch of irises, brushes them off as he walks toward...
DONALD: An opportune moment. To ring Isabelle. You think? [However, he has just crashed, people are hurt, and he is concerned with flowers and calling a girl? Something is wrong with the logic and priorities.]
...a public PHONE BOOTH. He is pulling out her neatly-folded information form, getting a little mayo on it that had come from his sandwich. Opens it...
DONALD: You know what's perfect about her phone number...?
He dumps an ENORMOUS handful of CHANGE, mostly pennies and nickels, onto the metal platform beneath the telephone. Gives Dundee the punch-line...
DONALD: ...she's really pretty.
He chuckles at the joke. We've never seen him excited before. He fumbles getting the nickels in. Punches up the number. Looks at the irises. They look all right.
DONALD: Blue is her color.
The phone RINGS, and RINGS, and suddenly...
ISABELLE (O.S.): Yeh, hello...?
And Donald. Freezes. The silence is deafening. Heart-breaking. [His reaction is very human, but odd because of its timing in the wake of an accident that he caused and forgotten.]
WHAT I'VE LEARNED: I think the key is to create a situation where most people would react by doing X --> Donald does Y, unaware that his behavior is not the norm.
Also, we see why his reasoning is logical to him.
Mozart and the Whale (2005)(12/17/97 rev. 1st draft)
by Ronald Bass
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