When stand-up comedian Chris McCausland was unveiled as Strictly Come Dancing’s first blind contestant, everyone had the same question: how can you dance if you can’t see?
It is a question the 47-year-old has asked himself, and he admits he still has ‘no idea’.
The Liverpool-born comic lost his eyesight in his early 20s due to a hereditary condition called retinitis pigmentosa and has not watched Strictly before.
He said: ‘I’ve never seen the show for obvious reasons. I can’t even go back and watch it to see what it involves, how intricate the dances are.
‘All we can do is figure it out as we’re going along because I need to be in it and doing it to see what works and what doesn’t.’
When stand-up comedian Chris McCausland was unveiled as Strictly Come Dancing’s first blind contestant, everyone had the same question: how can you dance if you can’t see?
It is a question the 47-year-old has asked himself, and he admits he still has ‘no idea’
Chris has described the training process as a ‘learning curve’ for him and his professional dancer, and hopes to make people laugh when he hits the Strictly ballroom on September 14.
He said: ‘I’ll be having a laugh. There’s no point in me being here if I can’t have a laugh along the way and take the mickey out of myself a little bit.’
There will be things that I probably can’t do or I get wrong and you need to roll with it and be able to laugh at the failures because hopefully I won’t be the only one making mistakes.’
‘That is the problem when we’re doing the group dance, I can’t see the mistakes everyone else is making. I’m only aware of my own mistakes.’
Chris said he was hoping to change people’s perceptions of what blind people can do.
He said: ‘For me it’s not inspiring, I don’t think blind people need inspiring as much as they need representation.
‘I’ve got in a taxi before and someone’s said, “oh wow, you did the stairs on your own.”
‘People think you can’t do anything if you’re blind.’
The Liverpool-born comic lost his eyesight in his early 20s due to a hereditary condition called retinitis pigmentosa and has not watched Strictly before
Chris has described the training process as a ‘learning curve’ for him and his professional dancer, and hopes to make people laugh when he hits the Strictly ballroom on September 14
Chris said he was hoping to change people’s perceptions of what blind people can do
‘So it’s more for everybody watching who isn’t exposed to somebody who’s blind, who has got these really antiquated ideas.’
He added: ‘The only problem with that is if I’m sh** it doesn’t help anybody.’
Speaking to MailOnline about how he was going to dance without being able to see, he confessed: ‘I have no idea! They asked what they could do because I’ve never seen the show for obvious reasons.
‘I can’t even go back and watch it to see what it involves, how intricate the dances are.
‘All we can do is figure it out as we’re going along because I need to be in it and doing it to see what works and what doesn’t.’
Chris continued: ‘Everyone’s been really flexible, really supportive, and me and my partner are just figuring out ways for them to teach me and for me to learn.
‘It’s a learning curve and hopefully the mistakes we make along the way will allow us to have a bit of a laugh, make some funny VTs and show the mistakes, because there will be a lot of mistakes along the way, I imagine.’
Speaking about his visual impairment previously while taking part in Channel 4 series Scared of the Dark, Chris explained: ‘I’m blind but I don’t see black.
‘I still see light and space, I still have an awareness of the space around me, not in terms of objects and things, but in terms of the room and whether there might be something in front of me.
‘It just gives you that awareness that you’re taking that away from me. I’m a slave to my iPhone like everybody else. So on paper you go, ‘Well, I should nail this,’ but in one area I should be more practically adjusted.
‘It’ll be quite interesting to see how quickly everybody else gets to that point. I’m quite looking forward to being the most able bodied person for a while. It doesn’t happen often.’
The Strictly Come Dancing 2024 launch show will air on Saturday 14th September at 19:20 on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.