For three seasons, hit reality show America’s Next Top Model opened its competition to both men and women vying to become a face in the fashion industry. Nyle DiMarco won the 22nd season of the show in 2015 and made history in the process. Since then, DiMarco has gone on to make a name for himself in the entertainment world, expanding his horizons from TV to the page.
Nyle DiMarco was the first Deaf winner of ‘America’s Next Top Model’ in 2015
Nyle DiMarco made history when he was cast on America’s Next Top Model as the first Deaf contestant on the long-running reality show. He shined throughout the competition, earning two first callouts for his stellar work on camera.
In the end, he emerged victorious as the first-ever Deaf winner of the show, breaking barriers for Deaf and hard-of-hearing models in the fashion industry.
Nyle DiMarco was the first Deaf winner of ‘Dancing With the Stars’ in 2016
DiMarco was able to quickly parlay his success on America’s Next Top Model into more reality competition fame. In 2016, the year after he snatched the ANTM title, he entered as a competitor on Dancing With the Stars, becoming the second Deaf contestant in the show’s history.
Throughout the season, DiMarco showed that his talents weren’t just limited to modeling, demonstrating his talents as a dancer. At the end of the season, he was crowned the winner of Dancing With the Stars, making him the first Deaf winner of the beloved series.
Nyle DiMarco’s acting work
Both before and after rising to fame on reality TV, DiMarco worked as an actor in various TV productions. He appeared in three episodes of the groundbreaking family drama Switched at Birth, which was the first mainstream TV series to have multiple Deaf and hard-of-hearing series regulars among its cast and scenes shot entirely in American Sign Language.
Following his turn on Switched at Birth, DiMarco appeared on various other shows including Difficult People, This Close, and Station 19. In 2022, he appeared on the revival of the beloved TV series Queer as Folk; in the years since coming out as sexually fluid following his ANTM win, he’s also been an outspoken advocate for the LBGTQ community and the issues facing them today.
Nyle DiMarco’s success behind the camera
After winning the title on not one but two separate competition shows, DiMarco had a massive platform as a Deaf activist. The same year he won DWTS, he created The Nyle DiMarco Foundation, a non-profit organization providing access to resources for Deaf children and their families.
In 2020, he took his talents behind the camera, serving as an executive producer on the Netflix reality series Deaf U. The show follows students at Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C., DiMarco’s alma mater dedicated to the higher education of Deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals.
In 2021, he was an executive producer on the Netflix documentary short Audible.
Nyle DiMarco is a published author
In 2022, DiMarco had the opportunity to tell his life story in his own words: he released his memoir, Deaf Utopia: A Memoir―and a Love Letter to a Way of Life.
“If someone had told me five years ago that I would have won two different reality TV shows, that I would’ve produced two different docuseries on Netflix, that one of those would nominated for an Oscar, and that I would be writing a book, I would absolutely say it was impossible,” he admitted in a 2022 interview with Good Morning America. “I’m achieving [Deaf Utopia]. I think slowly, bit by bit. But I’ll never be satisfied; I’m insatiable and I always want more.”
