HBO's New Hit Series "True Detective" Features Synesthete

Matthew McConaughey's complex Detective Rustin Cohle on HBO's new hit, "True Detective," just revealed a new layer—he has synesthesia.

His gift was fully articulated in the third episode, which aired this past Sunday night and is still available as a repeat this week (check your local listings), though there was a hint of it in the first episode when he alluded to literally getting bad tastes in his mouth.

The reveal happened during a scene in which the introspective detective is on a double date with his partner, Detective Martin Hart (Woody Harrelson).

"Just when I thought he couldn't get any stranger, he tastes colors," says Detective Hart.

Source: HBO/Michele K. Short

"So what is synesthes-i-a?" asks his blind date, Jennifer, played by Bree Williamson.

"Synesthesia," Detective Cohle corrects the pronunciation. "It's a misalignment of synaptic receptors and triggers…alcolyzed colors and certain metallics…

"It's a type of hypersensitivity. One sense triggers another sense. Sometimes I'll see a color and it will put a taste in my mouth. A touch, a texture, a scent can put a note in my head."

"I've heard that," says his partner's wife, Maggie Hart, played by Michelle Monaghan. "It can be a side effect of a statin."

"It's not a side effect," Detective Cohle counters.

"So when something feels good does that mean it feels twice as good—like, from two different ways?" asks his date.

(END SCENE)

Here is the clip: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B7-61weeJXCQcW5SSnRMMzlmWmM/edit

I reached out to HBO and the gifted writer and creator of the show, Nic Pizzolatto, with a few questions and was surprised to learn the reason behind giving the detective the interesting trait:

What was the inspiration for making him a synesthete?

Nic Pizzolatto

I myself am a synesthete, although it's dulled somewhat over time. As a child into my early twenties it was very strong, and began to dull as I got older. I don't know why. I've done some tertiary research on it, but I don't understand exactly how it can soften. I didn't learn what it was, that it was even a condition, until my early twenties—maybe when I learned about it, it started to get tamped down somewhat. Maybe it has something to do with that being around the time I discovered things like booze and drugs. As a child and teen it was very confusing, for sure. Stuff I hardly shared with anybody. I remember as a kid saying, "I hate that color Tuesday is, you know?" My friends asked what I meant and I said, "You know. That color. Like that mustardy-green." Their faces said it all, and I'm pretty sure that's the last time I ever brought it up.

What kind of research did you do?

Just the nominal research I'd done in learning about the condition for my own benefit, and then having a character whose sensitivities are such that it made logical, organic sense for him to be a synesthete. The condition informs the neural damage done by stress and drugs on his system, and the attendant visions and everything about him, if you pay close attention to Matthew's performance. It isn't pointed out often, hardly at all, but you can see by the look on Cohle's face that he isn't quite experiencing the world the way other people do. And this, of course, is the origin of Cohle's line in episode one about getting a bad taste in his mouth out there, "Ash. Aluminum."

What kind of prep work/research did Matthew do?

I'm not sure. We just talked a little about synesthesia as a subject, but Matthew's understanding of his character was very deep and complex—he put a phenomenal amount of work into understanding and embodying the character through every stage of his life, and I think he just understood how Cohle was, how he existed within in the world.

More about Nic:

According to his website, www.nicpizzolatto.com, the show is hardly Nic's first rodeo:

He was born in New Orleans and raised in Lake Charles, Louisiana. (The series is set in coastal Lousiana as well). Nic was educated at Louisiana State University and the University of Arkansas, where he received several awards for his writing.

"His work has been published in the Atlantic, Oxford American, Iowa Review, Missouri Review, and other magazines. He has been a finalist for the National Magazine Award, and his collection of stories Between Here and the Yellow Sea was named by Poets & Writers magazine as a top five fiction debut of 2006."