Light Switch

Press Quotes

“A warm look at queerness and neurodiversity … a touching and humorous play, a little gem.” —⁠Kerry Reid, The Chicago Reader

“[A] heartfelt, informative show [that] attains a true sense of beauty and a significant societal importance.” —⁠Brian Kirst, Windy City Times

“An intense and beautiful story that sheds some light on the difficulties of romantic relationships for a young gay autistic male. It’s a story about the full and complete acceptance of another person.” —⁠Erin Ryan, Third Coast Review

“LIGHT SWITCH is a vital and important theatrical piece. Dave Osmundsen, a gay, autistic playwright, weaves his personal experiences as both child and an adult into a passionate tapestry of loving relationships and insights into the autistic mind. LIGHT SWITCH will have you on the edge of your seat with riveting humor as well as deeply felt emotional moments, portrayed in a manner that is engaging, entertaining and educational. Its messages go well beyond the world of autism and LGBTQ relationships, and will be meaningful for those whose lives are touched by autism as well as those whose lives are not (or not yet).” —⁠Barry M Prizant, author of Uniquely Human: A Different Way of Seeing Autism

“With LIGHT SWITCH, Osmundsen has created one of the great central characters of contemporary theater in a beautifully written story existing at the intersection of neurodiversity and queerness. The play is a classic example of the specific being universal. What defines us as individuals differs in the details, yet we are all after the same things in life. Just like the main character Henry, we all seek love. I highly recommend this play for theaters with young ensembles and for people interested in sitting down to read a fantastic play that will entertain and move them.” —⁠Brian James Polak, playwright and host of The Subtext podcast

“Its intersectional importance aside, LIGHT SWITCH is simply a magnificent, skillfully-written play. It tells the story of a challenged, often challenging, but always endearing young man who is learning how to love.” —⁠Michael John Carley, Founder, GRASP, Director, the Connections Program for New York University’s global Autistic Students, Author, The Book of Happy, Positive, and Confident Sex for Adults on the Autism Spectrum … and Beyond!

“With LIGHT SWITCH, Dave Osmundsen has deftly written a beautifully poignant play of first love and self-acceptance through an Autistic lens. The relationships in the play are painfully complicated and fully realized by the playwright’s keen observations of young people colliding in a world of love, sex, intimacy and intellectualism. It’s a world I didn’t know, but a world that I’m grateful Dave gave me a tender glimpse of.” —⁠Gary Garrison, playwright, and author of Perfect 10: Writing and Producing the 10-Minute Play

“It took an extremely talented, award-winning young playwright who is autistic himself to ‘rip off the Band-Aid,’ exposing the open wound, inner life of an autistic young man navigating the world we live in today. Like many with the syndrome who would be characterized as highly functional, the main character in LIGHT SWITCH by Dave Osmundsen is an intellectually brilliant academic success. In this case, the play’s protagonist, like the playwright, also realized from a young age that he’s a homosexual … LIGHT SWITCH can at times be viewed as a rather humorous bildungsroman (coming-of-age story) focusing on a gay youth’s and later young adult’s search for love, I found it to be even more of a search for acceptance — of finding like-minded individuals one can relate to, and be seen and appreciated for being themselves. But most of all, by exposing how the main character’s autistic brain works — like a single ‘light switch’ — we glean possible insights into the ‘why’ of some socially divergent manifestations of ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) … This is a fascinating, edgy, enlightening, funny but also often emotionally difficult play to experience.” —⁠Mindy Leaf, South Florida Theater Magazine

“[LIGHT SWITCH] provides a deeply insightful depiction of the emotional and psychological challenges for Henry trying to find and maintain relationships. But the overall vision is applicable to any of us which is a multi-layered set of themes in itself about connecting to a world around us while maintaining — or being unable to do anything but maintain — our individuality.” —⁠Bill Hirschman, Florida Theater On Stage

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