What do these famous people have in common?
Colour Blind Awareness Day 2017 (07 September)
Yes. Now you know! Christopher Nolan, Meat Loaf, Prince William, Mark Twain, Bill Clinton, Howie Mandel and Mark Zuckerberg are colour blind! Here’s a list of famous people who are colour blind or reportedly so:
Bill Clinton (42nd President of the US). William Jefferson “Bill” Clinton has red-green color blindness. He needs a special light in order to determine the color of a certain object.
Bob Dole (United States Senator from Kansa from 1969 to 1996). Bob Dole ran against Bill Clinton in the 1996 Presidential Election. He also has trouble seeing reds and greens. During his campaign for presidency, he needed special lights to know when he was appearing on camera.
Bing Crosby (Singer of White Christmas). Bing Crosby got green and blue confused. “He will think something is a beautiful blue,” his wife once elaborated, “and it will turn out to be a bilious green.” He had even worn two different colored socks (black and red) and thought that they matched.
Christopher Nolan (Director & Producer, notably for “Batman”, “Memento”, and “Inception”). Christopher Nolan has a keen eye for cinematic beauty, but the Dark Knight director is red/green color blind.
Eddie Redmayne (Actor and Singer in the movie Les Miserables). Eddie Redmayne has stated in interviews that he is color blind. The only color he can see clearly is blue. Which is why he wrote his dissertation on the artist Yves Klein who was famous for his electric blue color paintings. He explained, “I wrote 30,000 words on this color, and I never grew tired of it. The pigment is staggering. It’s amazing that a color can be so emotional. One can only hope to achieve that intensity in acting.” Redmayne also admitted that he depends on his girlfriend Hannah Bagshawe for matching his clothings. Whenever he is going for premieres and events, he will check with her on whether his clothes matches. “I'm lucky to be with someone who is very supportive.” said Eddie.
Emerson Moser (Crayola’s Senior Crayon Molder). Crayola’s senior Crayon maker Emerson Moser didn’t tell anyone that he had a mild color blindness until he had retired, and by then he had overseen the creation of 1.4 billion Crayons in his 37 years career.
Fred Rogers (Mister Rogers, American educator and host of popular long running children’s TV program Mister Roger’s Neighbourhood). Fred McFeely Rogers (March 20, 1928 – February 27, 2003) was an American television personality, musician, puppeteer, writer, producer, and Presbyterian minister. Rogers was famous for creating, hosting, and composing the theme music for the educational preschool television series Mister Rogers' Neighborhood (1968–2001), which featured his kind-hearted, gentle, soft-spoken personality, and directness to his audiences. Rogers was red–green color blind. Mr. Rogers was known to ask people if a soup was tomato or pea because he could not tell from the colour. The reason he cared was that if it was tomato soup, he would put some sugar in it to sweeten to taste.
Howie Mandel (Host of variety show “Deal or No Deal”). Other than struggling with OCD and ADHD, Howie is color blind too. While it probably doesn't really hinder him carrying out his job on Deal or No Deal. But it was a problem back in the day when he was selling carpet. "There were a lot of ugly homes in Toronto because of me," he said in an interview. Howie mentioned in another interview that his wife just wanted for his involvement for everything. He will be asked for an opinion on the decoration on the house, even if the constant reply is “The color crashes”.
Hugh Downs (Winner of 6 Emmy Awards). Hugh Downs was reportedly 90% color blind. During his childhood, Downs aspired to become an artist. But that dream was shattered when he discovered that he was color blind at age 13. Thanks to his dad’s influence, he picked up broadcasting instead and started his career as an announcer. Being severely color blinded, Downs depends on his wife to help him with clothing choices. She set up a number coding system where she will label one group of matching clothing and stick “1” on all of them, “2” on another group and so on.
Jack Nicklaus (“The Golden Bear”. Most accomplished professional golfer). As Sports Illustrated puts it, dude “couldn’t tell you a green number from a red on a leader board if the winner’s check depended on it.” The world famous golfer has red-green color deficiency. He has to depend on his wife for his clothes color coordination and his cabbie to tell him the colors on the leaderboard.
John Dalton (Scientist famous for Atomic Theory & Colour Blindness). In 1793 John Dalton published the first academic paper about color blindness: Extraordinary facts relating to the vision of colors”. As both he and his brother were colour blind, he recognised that the condition must be hereditary. Dalton thought the condition was caused by a blue tint in the vitreous humor of his eyes. He instructed that his eyes should be examined after his death, but the autopsy revealed that his eyes were clear. In a 1995 experiment, DNA extracted from Dalton’s preserved eye tissue showed that he was a deuteranope: lacking the green-absorbing photopigment of the retinal cone cells. Besides the blue and purple of the optical spectrum, he was only able to recognise one colour, yellow, or, as he said in a paper. "Daltonism" became a common term for colour blindness and daltonien is the French word for "colour blind".
Mark Twain (Novelist). Mark Twain was red-green color blind.
Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook founder & CEO). He's red-green colorblind. In an interview, Mark Zuckerberg said that Facebook logo is blue because he has red-green color blindness. "Blue is the richest color for me. I can see all of blue," he tells reporter Jose Antonio Vargas.
Matt Lauer (Host of NBC). What’s amazing about Matt is that he has been named best-dressed man on several lists (including Vanity Fair’s International Best-Dressed list in 2008) despite having mild color vision deficiency.
Meat Loaf (Michael Lee Aday, Hardrock musician and actor). In an effort to escape military, Meat Loaf tried to fail the Army fitness test by deliberately gained 68 pounds in over one month and listing his numerous ailments: he was color blind, had a trick shoulder and was prone to concussions.
Paul Newman (Actor, Winner of 1 Oscar, 1 Academy, 6 Golden Globe and 1 Emmy Awards). The late actor had to give up his dream of being a pilot due to color blindness.
Prince William Windsor. According to Katie Nicholl, an unnamed military source reveals: "There's a rumor that William is slightly colorblinded, which would pose a problem for night helicopter flying. He has been advised that the Welsh Guards is a safer regiment."
Keanu Reeves (Actor). Keanu Reeves has stated in interviews that he might be colorblind. From a 1991 interview, he composed a poetry on the spot which he often does: "I think of black and I think of blue / I think of red and I think of you / I think of yellow and I think of mauve / No more colors do I know…" the absence of mentioning green may indicate that he is a color blind.
John Kay (Leading British Economist). The Steppenwolf frontman has revealed, "I'm totally colorblind, which means that my world is black and white and gray."
Rutger Hauer (Greatest villain actor of all times). Like his grandfather, he was color blind. The color vision deficiency stopped his track of furthering his career as a sailor. In another interview, the interviewer said: "You still cuts a dash, dressed all in black – just like in the Guinness adverts.” "I always dress like this; I'm colour blind," he explains.
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