A Champaign couple decided to use their experience of raising an autistic child to create a musical. AJ and Cameron Cornell are the writers behind “Let Me Fly”.
“It’s a world we’re very familiar with, and it’s a story that’s not told,” Cameron said. “And we felt passionate about telling the story about a world we’re deeply involved in.”
The plot of the musical focuses on Sam, a nonverbal autistic child, who learns to communicate and connect with the world through an augmentative adaptive communication device — also known as an AAC.
An AAC acts like an iPad or a touch screen. It has pictures and words so nonverbal people can utilize it to communicate.
“An AAC can verbalize what they are unable to verbalize themselves,” Cameron explained. “It’s bridging the gap between what’s in the person’s head or the person they’re talking to is unable to hear.”
Throughout the story, Sam learns to connect with his parents, George and Emma, and overcome life struggles.
Cameron and AJ have been working on the musical since December 2023. They had their first workshop at the Station Theatre last June and a second workshop last November. AJ said having those workshops was crucial in improving their project.
“Workshops are a big step in the development of a show, because it’s deciding whether your story is finished or developed enough to show people and get feedback,” he added.
“It’s the step before actually staging, where you know there are probably things to figure out, you get feedback from other people because you develop blind spots working on it in solitude for so long.”
According to the CDC, around 3% of Americans are autistic — but Cameron said those numbers are probably low, as autism is underdiagnosed among women and people of color. For instance, AJ who is also autistic, did not know about her condition until adulthood.
“I was 26, so that was years and years and years going through all my academic career, not understanding what was going on with my brain and why things were so much harder or painful,” she said.
When it comes to autism, AJ said there is a huge gap in resources. Upon reaching adulthood, a psychiatrist is the only option for diagnosis, but health insurance in the United States won’t cover it.
“Insurance is more likely to cover it when you are a minor,” she explained. “Once you’re an adult, insurance doesn’t call it medically necessary, so they won’t cover what can be up to, like 12, $15,000 for assessment.”
After seeing the musical, Cameron hopes the audience will walk away with increased compassion and knowledge, not just towards the autistic community, but also towards caregivers and family members.
“The universal theme of having compassion towards one another, giving each other grace, and loving each other through the messiness of life is what makes life worth living,” he said. “And it’s what makes life beautiful even when it’s really hard.”
Cameron also hopes that “Let Me Fly” will educate the community on what it actually looks like to be autistic, aside from some media portrays that can be problematic.
“I did not understand much about autism until I became a dad of an autistic kid, and then it turned out I was married to an autistic person,” he said. “And so I’ve had to do a lot of learning and a lot of self-reflection and a lot of unlearning of toxic nonsense that just kind of percolates in the atmosphere.”
Cameron and AJ are currently in the preparation phase for the project. The couple is sending scripts and songs to theater companies and festivals across the country.
Although the couple has not nailed down the exact dates, they are hoping to have a fully staged production premiere in Champaign by next year.