EXCLUSIVE: Aidy Smith is on a mission: to convince the gatekeepers of traditional TV to take a chance on presenters with Tourette’s syndrome.
Smith says he is the only TV presenter in Britain to have been diagnosed with Tourette’s disease, while there are only a handful in the US, with the core of his problem being commissioners’ lack of knowledge and executives about what the syndrome is and how it manifests.
Speaking exclusively to Deadline, he said that “the room just goes quiet” when he introduces the idea of helming a TV series to those who hold the green light.
“Commissioners and creators need to open doors and realize that we are capable of doing things,” he said.
Smith, who hosts a branded content show about spirits, said that when broadcasters make shows about Tourette’s, they often hire presenters who do not have the syndrome.
He quoted Channel 4’s Scarlett investigates… from two years ago, a document about the number of teenagers living with Tourette’s, helped by the former Glasses case star, who developed facial tics for two years as a teenager as a result of Bell’s Palsy.
Smith said the secret lies in education. For example, he regularly promotes the statistic that only 10% of Tourette’s patients suffer from Coprolalia, a form of involuntary swearing. It is estimated that around 1% of the UK population of approximately 70 million have Tourette’s disease in some form.
“Radio producers have told me I can’t be on the radio because ‘it’s live and there’s no swearing.’ Misinformation is rife and that misinformation stems from the way Tourette’s has historically been portrayed as something that is comical,” Smith added, pointing to harmful representations like Baxley in The predator. “You only have to look at the documentaries, which focus exclusively on Coprolalia. We are seen as circus freaks who cannot even find a life partner.”
On the contrary, Smith said his Tourette’s helps with concentration when the cameras are rolling. “What [gatekeepers] We don’t realize we have these tics and convulsions, but when we focus on something we are super passionate about, all the excess energy that causes tics can be channeled and we become a force of nature,” he said.
Smith has sidestepped the issue of commissioner bias by seeking funding for branded content. His three-season TV series The three drinkers, which he presents with friends and drinks experts Colin Hampden-White and Helena Nicklin, was funded by money from tourism boards and other brands, and is streaming on Prime Video. He also contributes to podcasts and radio shows, is a DE&I ambassador for this year’s MIPCOM Cannes, and is an ambassador for the Tourette Association of America.
The push for greater diversity in the TV industry, which Smith will deploy at MIPCOM, has not extended to Tourette’s disease in the same way as it does to people with physical disabilities or who are neurodivergent, he added, citing a number of citing stars who have. been outspoken about ADHD diagnoses lately, like Greta Gerwig.
“Doors continue to open for certain groups with disabilities if you can show that you are incredibly creative,” he added. “The fact that you are in a wheelchair does not prevent you from being able to act in the same way as before. You can be cast in roles even if there are access issues. Unfortunately the doors do not open [in the same way] for people with Tourette.”
Life was turned upside down
Adrian Smith (right) speaks to Sky News’ Kay Burley
Smith was diagnosed when he was just nine. Before he was diagnosed, he was a child actor in an ITV series, appearing alongside Matthew Lewis, who played Neville Longbottom in the series. Harry Potter movies.
“The first tic I remember was saying ‘woop’ loudly,” he recalls. “As soon as I went into the studio they noticed I was making these noises and I was dropped by my acting school, the TV show and the theater.”
At that point, Smith said his life was turned upside down and he was “relentlessly bullied,” with his only “saving grace” being an online community he discovered outside of school.
He said he was ‘laughed at’ when he tried to follow the conventional route to becoming a presenter and was told to ‘abandon his expectations’, but instead he was accepted onto a course at Lancaster University and was given an internship in the US, where he ‘met people who became my adopted family’, giving him the confidence to try working with people like others The three drinkers.
Now Smith sees glimmers of hope for the future, starting with the reaction to Lewis Capaldi’s tics during his set at Glastonbury last year, which produced a beautiful moment as the crowd helped the ‘Someone You Loved’ singer through his set.
“That was the biggest thing that happened in the last year,” Smith said. “His fearlessness at that moment was unbelievable. When Lewis went on stage like that and sang that, it was the first time in my life that I felt like people understood what Tourette’s was, and that gave me hope at that moment.”
He wants to bring this hope to the TV presenting world, with the wish that he is the “person who is seen as the first major TV presenter with Tourette’s disease.”
“I would like to appear on screen with a disability, where I am professional and credible and not just a victim, because I have done my very best to get where I am,” he added. “And I have so much more to give.”
