"The Truman Show Delusion"
Joel Gold, a psychiatrist at the Bellevue Hospital Center, revealed that by 2008, he had met five patients with schizophrenia (and heard of another twelve) who believed their lives were reality television shows. Gold named the syndrome "The Truman Show Delusion" after the film and attributed the delusion to a world that had become hungry for publicity. The syndrome predominantly affects young white men.
Gold stated that some patients were rendered happy by their disease, while "others were tormented". One traveled to New York to check whether the World Trade Center had actually fallen — believing 9/11 to be an elaborate plot twist in his personal storyline. Another came to climb the Statue of Liberty, believing that he'd be reunited with his high-school girlfriend at the top and finally be released from the show.'"
In August 2008, the British Journal of Psychiatry reported similar cases in the United Kingdom. The delusion has informally been referred to as "Truman syndrome," according to an Associated Press story from 2008.
After hearing about the condition, writer of The Truman Show Andrew Niccol said: "You know you've made it when you have a disease named after you."
Read more about this topic: Truman Burbank
Famous quotes containing the words truman, show and/or delusion:
“Damn it! What a way to fly into a war—unarmed and out of gas!”
—Larry Forrester, U.S. screenwriter, Hideo Oguni, and Ryuzo Kikushima. Richard Fleischer, Toshio Masuda, Kinji Fukasaku. Major Truman Landon (Norman Alden)
“It’s dogs that bite that do not show their teeth.”
—Chinese proverb.
“Don’t tell me what delusion he entertains regarding God, or what mountebank he follows in politics, or what he springs from, or what he submits to from his wife. Simply tell me how he makes his living. It is the safest and surest of all known tests. A man who gets his board and lodging on this ball in an ignominious way is inevitably an ignominious man.”
—H.L. (Henry Lewis)