Comedian Chris McCausland is blind due to a hereditary condition. Here, the star explains why his family was determined not to treat him with kid gloves when it came to his disability
Chris McCausland and Dianne Buswell’s classic American Smooth earned them their first tens of the series on Strictly Come Dancing.
The routine in the Blackpool Tower Ballroom prompted head judge Shirley Ballas to tell Chris, 47, he had the best feet she’d seen in a long time. The couple are among the favourites to lift the Glitterball Trophy with the funny man, the first blind contestant in Strictly history, winning over the show’s viewers and judges alike.
The star lost his sight 20 years ago between the ages of 16 and 22 years old due to retinitis pigmentosa, a genetic disease that affects the retina’s ability to respond to light, leading to a slow loss of vision.
Chris’s eyesight deteriorated at university, meaning he was unable to pursue his longed-for career in web development. Luckily, he also had a talent for stand-up comedy, with his gigs leading to a TV role playing Rudi in CBeebies’ Me Too! and appearances on Have I Got News For You.
“Being blind wasn’t just something that happened to me, it was hereditary,” the comedian told The Big Issue. “Nan was blind, my mum was losing her sight. It was always treated as just part of life, so you get on with it and have a laugh.”
The star says inheriting a known condition within his family “fed into my way of viewing” his blindness and it’s one which might not be expected. He explained: “When somebody has a disability that comes out the blue, it is very easy and understandable for parents to be protective and wrap them in cotton wool. There’s a worry, there’s a panic, there’s a lack of experience.
“But having it in the family meant even with me having poor sight in my childhood, I was treated no different, sent out playing in the streets. All that forms your personality when you’re older.”
The comedian is married to Patricia, who he met at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and the couple have daughter Sophie, 11. He admits the prospect of becoming a parent terrified him, telling Gyles Brandreth: “My dad, all the things he used to do with me as a kid, taking me to different places, and the time he put in helping me build things. You go: ‘How am I going to be able to do those things – I’m not going to be a proper dad, I’m going to be a half dad’.”
Luckily, he found fatherhood “amazing” and hasn’t looked back. As for the future, he told The Big Issue: “I did always think, things are moving so fast, we’ve got the internet now, surely there will be a cure [for his eye condition] and I’ll be able to see by the time I’m 30. I mean 40. I mean… and it just moves on and on.”
