2 l October
10 - 16, 2021
Northeast Oregon TV Weekly
Hulu’s ‘Dopesick’ offers a
360-degree view of the opioid crisis
BY GEORGE DICKIE
Michael Keaton stars
in “Dopesick,” which
begins streaming
Wednesday on Hulu.
A talented cast and multiple perspectives help tell
the story of the beginning of the opioid epidemic in a
miniseries upcoming on Hulu.
In “Dopesick,” an eight-episode series based on
the bestselling book by Beth Macy that premieres
Wednesday, Oct. 13, the story of the emergence of
Oxycontin and the subsequent death, suffering and
mayhem it caused is seen through the experiences
of a well-meaning rural Virginia doctor (Michael
Keaton) who prescribed it for an injured coal miner
(Kaitlyn Dever); the chairman (Michael Stuhlbarg) of
the pharmaceutical company that sees the drug as its
financial salvation; the sales reps (Will Poulter, Philippa
Soo) pitching the drug to doctors and hospitals; and
the Department of Justice officials (Peter Sarsgaard,
John Hoogenakker) and DEA agent (Rosario Dawson)
investigating what went down.
At the heart of it, of course, is Oxycontin. It’s an
opioid and thus very addictive but the company’s
time-release formula was supposed to mitigate those
qualities, making it the new miracle drug for sufferers
of chronic pain. But like any narcotic, users develop
a tolerance over time and require increasing dosages.
Soon pharmacies are being robbed, lives are wrecked
and people are dying. And the drug company is
running for cover.
Meanwhile, an epidemic has taken hold, a familiar
story that still plays out today.
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“The ease with which it became epidemic kind
of knocked me out,” says Keaton, also an executive
producer on the series. “It seemed almost too simple
that this happened this way. ... To be honest, I’m
reading (the script) and thinking, well, are we really – is
this too on the head? And then you, after you read Beth
Macy’s book and you start to do any kind of research,
then you realize this is not exaggerated in the slightest.
But that’s the expression, that’s the thing for me, the
ease with which all this happened was sickening.”
The story demands attention as there is a lot here to
digest. It jumps around in multiple timelines and does
considerable character exposition. Pulling it all together
was an enormous task but executive producer Danny
Strong felt that to do it any other way wouldn’t do the
story justice.
“I really wanted to do something that felt like it was
telling the totality of the story because I felt as if one
story wasn’t the full story ...,” Strong explains. “My
main goal was to expose what happened, the crimes
that were committed ... and then to dramatize, in real-
time, their victims. I thought by going back and forth
between the people that are suffering (and) the people
that are making these decisions, that feel like even
petty decisions that they’re making, could really shine
a (light) on what they did and could also give a sense
of empathy and understanding (for) people that are
suffering from addiction.”
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