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It’s amazing what a little love awards season perspective can do to a person. After receiving two unexpected Golden Globe nominations for his debut film Music, Sia publicly apologized to members of the autistic community who criticized her decision to cast non-autistic dancer Maddie Ziegler as a non-verbal person on the autism spectrum in the film. In a series of tweets posted on Wednesday night and captured by Variety, Sia said she has “heard” criticism surrounding her film and plans to include a warning at the beginning of the film, specifically about scenes in which the character Ziegler Music is physically contained. “MUSIC in no way tolerates or recommends the use of restraint in autistic people. There are autistic occupational therapists specializing in sensory processing that can be consulted to explain safe ways to provide deep and proprioceptive pressure feedback to help with security in the event of a breakdown, ”says the warning tweeted by Sia. She also promised to remove scenes from future releases of the film, tweeting, “I intend to remove the restriction scenes from all future impressions. I heard the wrong people and that is my responsibility, my research was clearly not complete enough, it was not broad enough. “
Music was nominated for Best Musical or Comedy Film and Best Actress by Kate Hudson. When members of the autistic community first criticized the “Chandelier” singer for her decision to cast Ziegler instead of an actor on the autism spectrum, Sia initially responded defensively, attacking her critics in more than 40 deleted tweets, at one point tweeting “Grrrrrrrrrr. Fuck, fuck, why don’t you watch my movie before you judge it? FURY. “However, the singer changed her tone, tweeting a blanket “I’m sorry” to ensure, on Thursday morning, in case the message was unclear. But perhaps the singer has changed her mind, since her Twitter account was disabled shortly after tweeting the apology. Although the Hollywood Foreign Press Association certainly loved the sound of Music, something definitely still sounds out of tune to our ears.