M&M: Takin' Over The Asylum

Dear reader,

something new today, which I hope I'll be able to do once a month: M&M: Movie of the Month. With that I want to introduce you to a movie, I know and like.

To start this of: the mini series „Takin' Over The Asylum“. This is a series of 6 episodes, each about 50 minutes long, which came on tv in 1994 and brought fame to the two main actors Ken Stott and David Tennant. I didn't know Ken Stott before and looking back I only watched a couple of movies he was in, which are listed on his imdb.com profile. Because I was and am watching lots of Doctor Who, I certainly knew David Tennant very well. Although it was quite amusing and strange seeing him that young: 23 years old.

The characters and story:

One of the most important persons is Eddie, played by Ken Stott. Eddie is salesman for double glazing windows and he's got an alcohol problem. His passion is being a radio D.J. Right at the beginning of the series, he gets fired from his job as a D.J. however. Although he is offered a new job at the St. Jude's hospital, which once had a radio station and they want to start it again. Eddie agrees to help and can tell his colleagues, who are standing with him after the termination notification that, “He didnae dump me. I've been promoted, if you must know.” The colleagues want to know where he will work. He tells them, St. Jude's. They start laughing. Eddie asks them why they are laughing. “St. Jude's is a loony bin!”

When Eddie goes to St. Jude's the first time, he meets Campbell (David Tennant). He shows Eddie the radio station, which looks more like a storeroom. Campbell tells Eddie that the station was working once. But rumour has it that the next day 122 patients went to their shrinks saying they were hearing voices. They prescribed about £ 6000 worth of major tranquillisers, before they realised it was the radio and the radio station was closed after that. Campbell doesn't believe it though. He can't believe 122 patients could not be watching television at the same time.

Campbell is a manic-depressive (bipolar). Although in the series we only see him manic and totally enthusiastic about the radio station. Eddie teaches him to be a D.J. and Campbell finds not only his job, but quite possibly his calling, too. One time Eddie asks Campbell, “Are you sure you're not manic?” Campbell: “I'm inspired, Eddie!” Eddie: “What's the difference?” Campbell: “Inspired is when you think you can do anything. Manic is when you know it.”

Rosalie (Ruth McCabe) is compulsive. She often makes lists and is cleaning all sorts of things. When Eddie arrives at the radio station the second time, Campbell and Rosalie have cleaned it all up and put things in order in just one day. “Much as I hate to take advantage of someone's illness, but she did insist”, says Campbell. Eddie asks, if they really did all of that in just one day. “Don't you wish, you were manic?”, asks Campbell. Eventually Eddie appoints Rosalie to be the station manager. One time there's a health day. Since the radio station needs a new mixer and that needs financing, the group decides to use that day to do some fund-raising. Who's organising the day? Rosalie, of course, who finally can use her lists for some good and pretty much assigns everyone at the station with tasks to do and hands them lists for what to do exactly.

Francine (Katy Murphy) is very depressed and also self harms. Eddie once sees her putting out a cigarette on her arm. “I couldnae find an ashtray”, she says about that. Later on she does use an ashtray Eddie hands her. Francine, too, gets training from Eddie to D.J. Francine and Eddie like each other and become friends.

Another important role for the radio station is with Fergus (Angus Macfadyen). He's a schizophrenic electrical engineer, who helps the group with everything electronical. Every now and then he'd run away from the station to come back some time later the same day. At first he just goes away, because he's bored. Over the course of the series however he runs away in more or less spectacular ways to get a new mixer for the radio station and other stuff.

Apart from the hospital there are some more people worth mentioning: Eddie's grandmother (Elizabeth Spriggs), with whom he's living together. She's from Lithuania and has her very own thoughts about Eddie's future. For example she's not that sad when he tells her that he got fired from his D.J. job. And at the age of 38, he should please marry soon! When Eddie tells her, he just didn't find the right one yet, his grandma replies with, “You think I find the right one? You think your mother find the right one? All blue eyes and itchy feet. We find misery. But God put us on this Earth to suffer. That's how He invent Stalin.”

And then there are also the colleagues and the boss of the sales company. All highly motivated. Eddie keeps that job with more luck than brains for that job and it's a real miracle that he becomes the “salesman of the month”. But sometimes one may wonder if Eddie's colleagues should be the ones in the mental hospital and the group from there should be the ones out.

In the series there are some quite serious psychiatric illnesses shown. Personally I think, they totally do not stultify it though, but do it with the appropriate seriousness for the illnesses and yet in a funny way. For me the group of the radio station is very likeable, especially with and because of their quirks, each of the illnesses brings with them.

Until next blog,

sarah