
Sign up to save your podcasts
Or
This is the story of America’s fight against authority.
Ken Kesey had worked in a mental hospital, but his first novel was really a parable of what happens when you stand up to the Man—a counterculture fable that doesn’t end well. Despite his far-reaching influence, Kesey was shut out by filmmakers who turned the story into an Oscar-sweeping phenomenon. “Cuckoo’s Nest”changed how many people thought about mental illness and institutions. Sherman Alexie debunks the myth of the silent Indian; we visit Oregon State Hospital, where the director played himself on screen; a psychiatrist explains how the movie gave mental hospitals a bad name, with tragic consequences; and actress Louise Fletcher takes us into the mind of one of the most fearsome movie villains, the sweet-faced Nurse Ratched. “She doesn’t see her behavior as it really is. Who does? Who sees that they’re really evil?”
(Originally aired September 20, 2013)
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
4.5
664664 ratings
This is the story of America’s fight against authority.
Ken Kesey had worked in a mental hospital, but his first novel was really a parable of what happens when you stand up to the Man—a counterculture fable that doesn’t end well. Despite his far-reaching influence, Kesey was shut out by filmmakers who turned the story into an Oscar-sweeping phenomenon. “Cuckoo’s Nest”changed how many people thought about mental illness and institutions. Sherman Alexie debunks the myth of the silent Indian; we visit Oregon State Hospital, where the director played himself on screen; a psychiatrist explains how the movie gave mental hospitals a bad name, with tragic consequences; and actress Louise Fletcher takes us into the mind of one of the most fearsome movie villains, the sweet-faced Nurse Ratched. “She doesn’t see her behavior as it really is. Who does? Who sees that they’re really evil?”
(Originally aired September 20, 2013)
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
467 Listeners
9,129 Listeners
3,746 Listeners
38,692 Listeners
308 Listeners
43,935 Listeners
318 Listeners
90,613 Listeners
38,151 Listeners
911 Listeners
11,531 Listeners
29,128 Listeners
32,085 Listeners
931 Listeners
1,401 Listeners
330 Listeners
8,245 Listeners
43,482 Listeners
6,677 Listeners
59,388 Listeners
1,865 Listeners
15,941 Listeners
1,515 Listeners
15,326 Listeners