Misunderstood

Client: Tourettes Action

Tourette’s is one of the UK’s most misunderstood neurological conditions. For many, it is a punchline - “the swearing disorder.” In reality, swearing only manifests in 10% of cases. But in every case, people have to deal with ignorance, mockery and avoidance. We needed to shift perception from stereotype to empathy. So we reimagined the song Misunderstood, originally performed by Nina Simone, and placed it in the voices of those who live that reality every day. Fronted by Grace Cope, an emerging singer with Tourette’s, and backed by a choir made up entirely of people with the condition, the film follows Grace through a day marked by judgement at school and caution in public spaces. Through the lyrics, she doesn’t explain Tourette’s, she makes you feel it. As the choir joins her, individual experiences become a collective call for understanding. The film reframes Tourette’s not as disruption, but as another branch of humanity - complex, emotional, and often misread. Distributed across social and picked up by national media including BBC outlets, the campaign reached audiences far beyond the Tourette’s community. It gave Grace, the choir and the charity a mainstream platform to challenge misconceptions directly, sparking conversation and deepening understanding. As the film concludes, Tourette’s can be a lot of things - twitching, grimacing, shouting, blinking, pain, fatigue, rage or insomnia. But it is almost always misunderstood.