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The 36-year-old actor Jon Wellner, best known for his recurring role as toxicologist Henry Andrews in CSI, hasn’t been able to see all that well for a long time. When he was 13, and playing laser tag with friends, he ran into a wall and broke his nose. Recently, rushing to catch a cab outside a Las Vegas hotel, he collided with a glass door, which, thankfully, did not shatter. He trips over curbs, bumps into coffee tables and, occasionally, steps on a dog. Once, after a friend going for popcorn asked Jon to find them seats in a movie theater, Jon ended up in a woman’s lap. “And there’s little you can do to explain yourself in that situation,” he says.
Jon’s a funny guy. In fact, after moving to Los Angeles in 2000, he tried to kick off his show biz career as a standup comedian. But because of expert timing, and a pseudo-geek persona (cultivated in his hometown of Wilmette, Illinois, where, he says, he came late to puberty and, thus, had to fend off bullies with humor), Jon soon found himself being cast in TV roles. “I’m probably not that great an actor that I can do something much different from who I am,” he explains. “So I’m happy to play anything close to me.” That includes resident nerd Henry Andrews, who debuted on CSI in 2004 and has been in 54 episodes since. Humor, in other words, has paid off for Jon, and in more ways than one. Take his ability to deal with his retinitis pigmentosa (RP), for example. Although he now realizes he had night blindness as early as adolescence, Jon wasn’t diagnosed until 2001, after describing his symptoms to a doctor. Following a cursory exam, the doctor told him he probably had RP, and suggested he go to a specialist. Jon, not knowing what RP was (“I’m thinking, I’m going to have to get eye drops or maybe take pills or get surgery”), was told by the specialist he probably didn’t have RP. But after doing some research on his own, Jon signed up for a full slate of tests at the Jules Stein Eye Institute, where the original diagnosis was confirmed. “It was really this roller coaster,” he recalls. Instead of letting it get him down, Jon turned his RP experiences into a stand-up routine – one that helped him land a gig as emcee of the Foundation’s last two VISIONS conferences, where he scored big with his low-vision jokes about auditions and navigating prop-strewn TV sets, among other subjects. On the subject of dating, he quipped: “Being someone with RP, girls think it’s strange when I want to take them to the gym or the grocery store or … Lamp World.” Joking is therapeutic for Jon. “You need to just kick back and notice the humor in it all,” he explains, “because, if every time I banged into something it threw me into depression, I’d be depressed every day.” His other antidepressant: the Foundation. “It’s a community of people who are like me,” Jon says. “And that’s why I like going to the [VISIONS] conferences, and talking to other people, because I don’t have a group of friends who have RP that I can bounce ideas off of.” Plus, FFB’s fundraisers are working hard to get funds into the hands of researchers, who, in turn, “are working so hard to find a cure. So, I’ve met others affected, their families, people who work at and with the Foundation – it makes you feel good when it’s hard to find things that make you feel good.” Because of his relationship with FFB, and a few videos on Youtube linking him with RP, Jon doesn’t exactly hide the fact he has the disease. But he doesn’t wear a sign either, in part because of possible liability issues. “That’s a legitimate concern: ‘We can hire this guy or this guy, who has RP and who might fall off a cliff,’” he says, deadpan. The irony is that CSI “probably has the darkest set of any TV show,” he adds. “It’s dark, and it’s all glass – my nightmare, basically. And I don’t wear my glasses on that set.” He does, however, know it as well as his own living room, so he’s adept at navigation. Plus, a few of his fellow actors are aware of his condition. But Jon, who studied and performed in Chicago, at places like Second City and Steppenwolf Theater, also makes sure he’s prepared, especially for auditions on sets he’s unfamiliar with. If he can, he’ll visit an hour early, to see where things are. “I don’t just have to nail the part; I also have to not bump into and damage equipment in the room, or people,” he explains. “So, I kind of have an extra layer of fear I have to work with. But that just makes me work harder. I have to know the material even more, in case I can’t find the words when I look back on the page.” Jon’s disease has been slow to progress. He needs a flashlight at night, and his wife, Whitney (“Her full name is Whitney Winifred Wellner. He-he,” Jon quips), helps him navigate cast parties in Hollywood bars and clubs. But he still drives and executes most daily activities on his own. “Right now,” he says, “I’m in this phase where I’m just trying to prove that I’m normal, and I can do what anyone else can do – that everything’s fine.” But he knows the day might come when he’ll have to use a cane. With that in mind, he says he may find his niche as “the blind comedian.” He’s also considering writing a TV pilot in which the main character is visually impaired. “Why couldn’t there be a show with someone who’s night blind?” he asks. “There’s a lot of material there.” Meanwhile, with help from FFB and his retinal specialist, Dr. Jill Hopkins, who’s also a Foundation member, he keeps a close eye on research, including upcoming clinical trials for which he may be eligible. And he wants to do whatever he can for the cause. “Emceeing those conferences is the least I can do,” he says of VISIONS. “And I’m always honored that they want me to help. Whatever I can do, I’m there.” Given a choice, however, Jon would be more than willing to forgo certain comic fodder. “I’d be fine if there was a cure and I couldn’t do material on RP anymore. That would be more than worth it.”
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