TPP 098: Tom Ropelewski Talks About His Documentaries About 2e Kids
episode
Full-Tilt Parenting: Strategies, Insights, and Connection for Parents Raising Neurodivergent Children
42 min
1 speaker
8 chapters
transcribed 12 hours ago
Transcript
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Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
What is the purpose of this episode and who is the guest?
So it it is about bridges, but it's more about these kids and their parents and trying to find a way to fit into their into the world. And the fact that they were graduating, they were all about to graduate, they had a story to tell. They'd hit a certain milestone the and there was certain relief in the voices of their parents and a certain excitement in their voices that they had found what they're good at. They of course understood what they weren't good at. Everyone had told them what they weren't good at. But most of them had something that they were good at and were excited to go off into the world and test it.
Welcome to Till Parenting, a podcast featuring interviews and conversations aimed at inspiring, informing, and supporting parents raising differently wired kids. I'm your host, Debbie Rieber, and today I'm excited to share with you a conversation I recently had with filmmaker Tom Ropolouski. Tom is the director of the highly acclaimed documentary 2E Twice Exceptional, which came out in 2015, and he's currently wrapping up post-production on a follow-up film called 2e2, Teaching the Twice Exceptional. Tom's films center around Bridges Academy, a school for twice exceptional kids in Studio City, California that's leading the way when it comes to meeting the educational needs of these unique learners.
In our conversation, Tom shares his story and personal why behind making these films, talks about the educational model at Bridges, describes how his films are helping to bring awareness of 2e kids to the mainstream, and gives us a sneak peek of his new film, which, along with the viewer guide, will be coming out in April of this year. Here is my conversation with Tom. I hope you enjoy it. Hey Tom, welcome to the podcast. Hi Debbie, how are you? I am very good and I'm looking forward to this conversation. I've been wanting to have you on the show for a while, so thanks so much for being here.
You're welcome.
So before we get into the meat of our conversation and learning more about your films that you've made, could you tell us just a little bit about who you are, your Your backstory and then your personal why in terms of how you got brought into this particular work with two E.
Sure. Well my wife and I were both uh for many years Hollywood screenwriters. She still is. Uh she wrote uh Mrs. Doubtfire and Limitless and the new version of Hairspray and Overboard, which just had its uh anniversary and it's been being celebrated. But she was we were both comedy screenwriters. And and I've written and directed for television and for movies. Um and as movies became more interested in the past decade in superheroes, I became less interested in that. So was looking around for different ways to be creative and making films because I've always loved films. I was one of those kids, you know, as a teenager who was making films in eight millimeter with my friends in the backyard. And um So I always wanted to be a filmmaker of some sort.
But lately, over the past fifteen years or so, I've um best le been less enamored with with the Hollywood industry and my wife and I have made enough ill gotten gains that I could sort of make other kinds of film. The first one I did was co was um about my wife's family, which is kind of a strange thing to do. Why would you make something about your your father in law as the star? But um he his parents were two um American artists. One was Dorothea Lang, who was a a famous American photographer, The Depression, and her father was a his father was a um Southwestern painter. Named Maynard Dixon. And during the depression, when they couldn't afford a A studio for him and a studio for her and a home They got rid of the home and put the kids in foster care off and on for seven years.
And the movie was about not about the these great artists, which the you could argue that they're uh particularly Dorothea Lang, who who's one of whose photographed Migrant Mother is probably the most iconic in American history. But what I wanted to make a film about was the family dynamic and and the choice between family and art.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the purpose of this episode and who is the guest?
0:00–5:08
2
How did Tom Ropelewski transition from Hollywood screenwriting to documentary filmmaking?
5:08–10:18
3
What is Bridges Academy and how does its educational model serve twice‑exceptional students?
10:18–15:51
4
What inspired Tom to create the first documentary “2E: Twice Exceptional”?
15:51–20:51
5
What impact has the first film had on parents, schools, and the broader community?
20:51–26:30
6
What can viewers expect from the upcoming sequel “2E2: Teaching the Twice Exceptional”?
26:30–31:35
7
How does Bridges Academy use strength‑based education and flexible scheduling to support 2E learners?
31:35–37:18
8
What are some real‑life success stories of 2E students featured in the documentaries?
37:18–42:13
Speakers
1 identifiedMore from Full-Tilt Parenting: Strategies, Insights, and Connection for Parents Raising Neurodivergent Children
TPP 266a: A Conversation with Poet and Advocate LeDerick Horne
TPP 522: A Whole Child Approach to ADHD with Phil Boucher, M.D.
TPP 091a: A Conversation With Steve Silberman About His Book “Neurotribes”
TPP 521: A Conversation with Dr. Peter Gray About Restoring Childhood
TPP 253a: Advocate and Author Jonathan Mooney on Why Normal Sucks
TPP 520: Dr. Özgür Bolat on Why Rewards Backfire and the Real Science of Motivating Kids