Town Hall Seattle Arts & Culture Series

Growing up as an autistic and legally blind person, actor Mickey Rowe was told that he couldn’t be a part of the mainstream world. As Rowe navigated adulthood, he was ignored and misunderstood by classmates and colleagues, infantilized by theatre directors, and even barred from earning minimum wage, all because he is autistic. But for Rowe, the structure and repetition of theatre productions made sense — after all, he spent his entire life acting to pass as neurotypical. In 2017, Rowe became the first openly autistic actor ever to play any autistic role in a professional performance setting, taking on the lead role of Christopher Boone in the Tony Award-winning play, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. Today, Rowe is a prolific performer and speaker, a husband and father, and the author of Fearlessly Different: An Autistic Actor’s Journey to Broadway’s Biggest Stage. Together at Town Hall with writer Laurie Frankel, Rowe discussed his new book and how the things that make us different can turn