Comments on: Sybil

By: Rene

Rene — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 17:00:00 +0000

I had horrible nightmares about Sybil (more specifically Sybil’s abusive, insane mom) for two years — my mom warned me not to watch it (she’d read the book), but I didn’t listen. I went to bed with a horrible migraine, and I had to wake up to vomit about 20 times. The next day at grade school, all the kids were blithely chatting about it (e.g., “Who’s your favorite personality?), and I got another terrible nightmare, and had to go home. Every fucking night, I’d go to bed hoping that I wouldn’t have a nightmare about Sybil’s mom, and every night I did. About a year later, the show was scheduled as a rerun, and I got a migraine just thinking that somewhere, someone was watching that horrific show. I retired to my bed and begged my mom not to watch it, and she promised that she wouldn’t, but I could hear the faint strains of Chopsticks through the floor, and I had to run downstairs to scream at her. I even got sick one time at my grandmother’s house when Kermit the Frog presented an Emmy award to Sally Field, and they showed a clip from the movie. Kermit the fucking Frog! It was like the whole world was out to get me, like any fucking second some TV puppet would traumatize me.

About 15 years later, I was staying at the North Carolina beach house of my then-boyfriend’s parents, and I came across the book Sybil. I read it in its entirety, thinking, “Hey, I’m a grown-up now, I can handle it,” and sure enough, I got a horrible migraine and had nightmares for the rest of the trip.

Years later, I found out that Flora Rheta Schreiber, or whatever her fucking name was, made the whole thing up. There was no real Sybil. I think I might be cured now, knowing that it was all a pack of lies, including that stuff about the forced enemas and the piano and the button hooks, but I’m not going to take any chances. It’s weird that it came as such a relief to me, finding out that there was no real Sybil and therefore no actual Sybil mom, because horrible abuse happens all the time, all over the place, and I’m sure that it’s just as bad as what the fictional Sybil endured. But I’m not going to take any chances. No Sybil for me. I told Xian that if he ever wanted to rent it, he would have to do so on a night when I was not in the house.

Rene

By: Twisty

Twisty — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 17:00:00 +0000

So I guess you’re saying that “Sybil Dorsett c’est moi” was not the phrase that leapt immediately to your mind after watching the movie?

Because, holy moly, Rene, what an incredible story!

By: emjaybee

emjaybee — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 17:00:00 +0000

You missed The Day After too, which was my nightmare-inducer for many years. I watched a bit this time, and all that struck was that Jonathan Lithgow looked really young, and that the main character was not, in fact, Steve Gutenburg as I’d always thought (I was fooled by the mullet). But I really can’t deal with nuclear-olocaust-aftermath movies, so I kept going.

Sybil should have scared me more, but I think it was just too bizarre; and the enemas! That was fucked up.

We always got shown Brian’s Song at school during the last week, for some reason. It was my first introduction to the idea of a “male weepie.”

By: Mike

Mike — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 17:00:00 +0000

Brian’s Song — written by Michel LeGrand (French!), it was theme music that took over the story and pushed us stoic males to weepitude. Kudos to Sonny and Lando for obliging this sentiment.

The Day After — “I know not what weapons will be used to fight WWIII, but for WWIV it will be sticks and stones” A nation introduced to an Einstein bon mot. Do you remember Testiment? Streamers?

Helter Skelter — Steve Railsback, destined to portray ol’ Charlie. Nice resume builder! “It’s not nice to snitch, Shorty!” Yikes, this one gets my vote out of the bunch as the medium-buster, although nuclear holocaust and multiple-personalities surely are attention-getters on the idiot box.

By: Ron O.

Ron O. — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 17:00:00 +0000

Sybil gave me nightmares too. I coundn’t watch it all the way through when I first saw it as a kid. Years later it was on TV as a 2-night special showing. I was glued to the TV for two nights, then had nightmares about it for a few months. Sally Field was fantastic, but I don’t think I’ll be renting that one from netflicks any time soon.

By: Miriam

Miriam — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 17:00:00 +0000

Sorry to trouble Rene, but Sybil WAS real. They recently revealed the true identity of the woman, whose real name was Shirley Ardell Mason, an artist/teacher living in Lexington who died about seven years ago.

Haha, I was about the right age when I saw it, but I have to say I didn’t think “that’s me!!” Well, I wasn’t part of the right generation, I suppose.
But I hate people who see characters and claim their identities. Bridget Jones is a particular contention of mine.
“No, I really am the real Bridget! I’m in my thirties, I’m single and I’m foolishly in love with High Grant!”
How strikingly coincidental.