Robert De Niro and writer Tony Spiridakis used their own experiences of raising neurodivergent children for new movie 'Ezra'.
The film tells the story of stand-up comedian Max Bernal (Bobby Cannavale), who lives with his father (De Niro) and faces challenges when it comes to co-parenting his autistic son (William A. Fitzgerald) with his ex-wife (Rose Byrne).
Tony told Variety: "I didn’t know anything about autism, I thought I gotta write this down. Because of the lack of understanding that I had, I kept thinking, every day was a surprise.
"I made so many mistakes as a father, I wanted to show warts and all — the mistakes of being a father of an autistic child because I held on tight, I loved my son, and my son showed me with his wonderful spirit a way out of it, and that was a beautiful thing. So I thought it would make a good movie to see a father be that wrong."
Robert added: "I had certain things about it that I thought should be addressed. Everybody is well-intentioned, coming from a real place. It was done with a lot of love and a lot of hard work.”
Director Tony Goldwyn said he took on the project because Spiridakis is his “best friend in the world".
He added: "This is a story about destigmatising autism and disabilities in general. More so, it’s about celebrating the fact that what makes us powerful is our uniqueness and our differentness.”
