Impact On Popular Culture
- David Vetter's story, along with that of aplastic anemia patient Ted DeVita, directly inspired a 1976 made-for-television movie "The Boy in the Plastic Bubble," starring John Travolta and Diana Hyland. The movie was not authorized by Vetter's family.
- In 2006, the PBS documentary series American Experience aired The Boy in the Bubble, a program about Vetter's life and death.
- David himself was featured regularly on "3-2-1 Contact".
- Vetter's story inspired the 2001 comedy film "Bubble Boy", starring Jake Gyllenhaal.
- The video for Simply Red's "The Air That I Breathe" is also a nod to Vetter's story.
- An episode of Seinfeld was loosely based on the bubble boy concept.
- The 1986 film "Crystal Heart," originally released as "Corazón de Cristal," was also inspired by his life.
- The opening song on Paul Simon's 1986 album "Graceland" is titled "The Boy in the Bubble". The lyrics deal with the complex human consequences of modern technology, and include the lines "Medicine is magical and magical is art/The boy in the bubble/And the baby with the baboon heart." (The latter reference is to Baby Fae, who was the subject of another widely publicized medical experiment that also ended in tragedy.)
Read more about this topic: David Vetter
Famous quotes containing the words impact on, impact, popular and/or culture:
“Too many existing classrooms for young children have this overriding goal: To get the children ready for first grade. This goal is unworthy. It is hurtful. This goal has had the most distorting impact on five-year-olds. It causes kindergartens to be merely the handmaidens of first grade.... Kindergarten teachers cannot look at their own children and plan for their present needs as five-year-olds.”
—James L. Hymes, Jr. (20th century)
“Conquest is the missionary of valour, and the hard impact of military virtues beats meanness out of the world.”
—Walter Bagehot (1826–1877)
“The press is no substitute for institutions. It is like the beam of a searchlight that moves restlessly about, bringing one episode and then another out of darkness into vision. Men cannot do the work of the world by this light alone. They cannot govern society by episodes, incidents, and eruptions. It is only when they work by a steady light of their own, that the press, when it is turned upon them, reveals a situation intelligible enough for a popular decision.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)
“The white dominant culture seemed to think that once the Indians were off the reservations, they’d eventually become like everybody else. But they aren’t like everybody else. When the Indianness is drummed out of them, they are turned into hopeless drunks on skid row.”
—Elizabeth Morris (b. c. 1933)