British award-winning actor Anthony Andrews is perhaps best known for playing Lord Sebastian Flyte in Bridehead’s Revisited. He more recently played a cameo role in The King’s Speech.
And he has dyslexia.
As a child, he struggled to read very early on in school. After years of reading difficulty, one of his teachers (named Mr Quibble-Smith!) had the idea to cast Andrews in the school play, to give him confidence in reading aloud. It turned out he was also responsible for planting in Andrews a lifelong passion for acting.
He has always struggled with reading scripts as a part of his professional career.
He says: “Whenever I turn to a page my eyes still automatically go to the middle and that is a hangover from school days when I was so terrified I just wanted to get to the end of the text… It’s been a painful process and a struggle over the years for me to unjumble words and learn to read. I still find reading a slog, my spelling is atrocious and I often write down telephone numbers wrongly.”
Perhaps we should sign him up for Easyread!
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Sarah Forrest is a Literacy Specialist for the Easyread System, an online course specially designed for children with dyslexia, reading difficulties, auditory processing issues, and more. Get a free 10-day trial at www.easyreadsystem.com
