A whole generation was raised watching Marc Summers guide young contestants through physical challenges and the green slime on Nickelodeon's Double Dare from 1986-92. He has built a career in the television game show industry, but there have been some serious bumps in the road. Summers has talked about the fact that he has OCD for years, and once he got himself under control then Summers decided to use his position in the public eye to help educate others. In 1997, Summers went public on Oprah, but unfortunately not everyone was ready to be supportive.
In fact, in a recent interview for Oprah: Where Are They Now?, Summers admits that being honest about his OCD actually cost him work.
"I never knew what OCD was. I just thought, 'There's got to be something wrong with me. Am I crazy?' And If you watch the first 65 episodes [of Double Dare], I never got a drop on me. For some reason, people in the industry weren't ready for it. Rumors got spread that I was a freak and that I was difficult to work with. I was signed up to do the Hollywood Squares version that Tom Bergeron actually did. The next thing I knew, I was fired before we even got started, supposedly because my reputation was that I was difficult to work with because of the OCD," says Summers.
In his interview, he also makes a really good point. Celebrities are almost expected to battle drug and alcohol abuse. There is no stigma attached and they are given loads of opportunities to show that they can pull their lives together.
For some reason, a clinical diagnosis of something like obsessive-compulsive disorder still has that stigma connected to it even though it can be controlled with proper medication. It is amazing that many in Hollywood would still prefer hiring an unpredictable junkie over someone with a mental health issue.
Check out Summer's interview below for yourself and tell us your thoughts in the comments section.
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