Is Painkiller on Netflix a true story? Review, IMDB, Ratings – Netflix has released “Painkiller,” a six-episode dramatization of the causes and consequences of the opioid pandemic. It stars Matthew Broderick as Richard Sackler, the controversial former president and co-chairman of Purdue Pharma, the company that aggressively pushed OxyContin onto the market.
Is Painkiller on Netflix a true story or not?
Although “Painkiller” is a dramatized series, it was inspired by the writings of two investigative journalists: Barry Meier’s book “Pain Killer: An Empire of Deceit and the Origin of America’s Opioid Epidemic” and Patrick Radden Keefe’s New Yorker piece “The Family That Built an Empire of Pain.” Meier is a consulting producer on the Netflix series, while Keefe is the executive producer. Both authors are involved.
In the 2017 New Yorker article, Keefe delves into the background of the Sackler family, who acquired the Stamford, Connecticut-based corporation Purdue Pharma, which went on to produce OxyContin. The Sacklers have previously appeared on Forbes’ list of “America’s richest families.”
Before OxyContin was available, revolutionary marketing strategies that would later become key to the opioid crisis were largely developed by Arthur Sackler, who in the 1960s sold tranquillizers like Librium and Valium. Ten years after his passing at the age of 73, Sackler was honoured by being inducted into the Medical Advertising Hall of Fame in 1997.
Richard Sackler, the nephew of Sackler, who began working for the company in 1971 as Raymond Sackler’s assistant, was named president of Purdue Pharma in 1999. Richard Sackler put a lot of pressure on the FDA to approve OxyContin in 1995, but at that time, no clinical studies had been done to look at the drug’s potential for addiction, according to The New Yorker.
According to a Business Insider story about Keefe’s research, Curtis Wright, the FDA examiner who oversaw the reviewing procedure, left the FDA shortly after the drug was approved and accepted a $400,000 post at Purdue.
Keefe noted that Purdue began a significant advertising campaign under the leadership of Richard Sackler, his father, and his uncle, Mortimer Sackler, “that attempted to… change the prescribing habits of doctors,” noting that “Richard Sackler worked tirelessly to make OxyContin a blockbuster.”
According to ProPublica, a 1997 email conversation between Purdue officials and Richard Sackler shows that they decided “not to correct a misperception among doctors that OxyContin (was) weaker than morphine” even though the drug was actually twice as potent.
Beginning with convincing doctors that OxyContin was safe, Purdue’s promotion of the drug was supported by materials created by physicians with financial incentives from the manufacturer. According to Keefe, “the company funded research and paid physicians to make the case that worries about opioid addiction were exaggerated and that OxyContin could safely treat an ever-widening range of illnesses.” “Sales staff promoted OxyContin as a drug that one should “start with and stick with.” The medication was a lifesaving remedy for terrible agony for millions of individuals. But many others became so dependent on it that they suffered crippling withdrawal symptoms in between doses.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, opioids were implicated in approximately 75% of the 91,799 drug overdose deaths that occurred in the United States in 2020 alone. According to National Institutes of Health studies, addiction to prescription opioids can progress to addiction to illegal drugs.
According to The Guardian, overdose on prescription painkillers has resulted in the deaths of approximately 300,000 Americans over the past 20 years.
Is it the individual who created OxyContin? Or was it the pharmacies that dispensed it or the doctors who recommended it? There are numerous bad guys. To put all the blame on one individual would be too easy, according to Broderick. I sound like Richard Sackler in this sentence. But it’s accurate. Many people have engaged in negative behaviour throughout their lives, yet when questioned, they deny doing so. That is the truly terrifying thing—people’s capacity for delusion.
Although “Painkiller” is a dramatized version of the opioid crisis, each of the six episodes begins with a disclaimer that the series is based on real occurrences, which is read aloud by parents whose children have died as a direct result of OxyContin addiction.
Was Glen Kryger in the “Painkiller” a real person?
In “Painkiller,” Taylor Kitsch’s fictional character Glen Kryger gives the victims of the opioid crisis a face. Kryger is a mechanic who suffers an injury at work and eventually falls into addiction over the course of six episodes.
Kitsch said of portraying the part, “Man, it’s pretty close to me, this thing,” to Netflix’s Tudum. “Unfortunately, I believe that we are all just one step away from an addict.” Pete Berg, the director of “Painkiller” and “Friday Night Lights,” claimed that the fictional figure stands in for “tens of thousands” of people.
According to Berg, who spoke to Rotten Tomatoes, “There have been tens of thousands of Glens; just regular, hardworking family people who got hurt, frequently accidentally, who were in pain, and who were prescribed OxyContin, particularly back in the days when nobody knew what OxyContin was.” “He simply fell victim to the web of addiction. I’ve met Glens. You must have known Glens or, if not personally, you must know someone who does.
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