CHAPTER9
Addiction
as
a Menage aTrois
Days
of
Wine
and
Roses
W7hen
a
Man
Loves a W'oman
Imet the love
of
my life over
the summer after my junior year
of
high
school.
\%i« we had a blast. She made me
la,ugh,
made all my friends
la,ugh,
and had this great way
of
making everybody feel awesome when shewas around. She had this funny way
of
bringing out my good side, making
me feel
popula,r.
Things were
getting pretty serious between
us,
and she ended up coming tocollege
with me. I wanted
to
get great grades, so
we didn't
see
much
of
each
other during the week, but on the weekends we made up for lost time. I
eventually joined a fraternity and of
course all my frat brothers loved her
too.
As my career took off, we settled into a nice routine. She'd come with
me on my business trips on private jet, and be my date at all the la,vish
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Hollywood
parties. I
had
an
expense account
and
spent a iot
of
it
on
her.
Sometimes
she
got
a little too clingy
and
I would break up with her for a
few
months
just
to get some
space.
I worried that I was too reliant on her
for
my
happiness,
fan,
and
success.
But
she was
so
captivating,
so
alluring,
so availa.ble, any_where
and
anytime, that eventually I would take her.
back
and
we'd
pick
up right where we
left
off.
She
was also a really great "wingman" when
it
came to meeting
·'
women,
and
she encouraged us to have an open rela.tionship.
We
had one
..threesome after another
and it
workedgreat most
of
the time. Occasionally •
the
other woman would get jealous or think we were spending
too
much
time
together
and
leave us. Like any rela.tionship, we had our share
of
breakups
and
recondliations,
and
as I got
older,
I started to realize the ·
rela.tionship was
in
trouble. So after a really big fight where I ended up
in
jail,
I
knew I'd had
enough.
Breaking up with her was probably the most difficult decision I'd ever
faced. I missed her
so
much. She
had
been such an important part
of
my
life
and
we'd
had
so
many great times together that I felt like I had lost a ·
key
part
of
my
identity. Nothing seemed as
fun
anymore. But over time, I
realized
that
wasn't true.
Im
having way more fun now without
her.
Sure,
every
now and
then I really want to get back together. After all I did love
her.
But it
wasn't real love.
It
was a selfish love, a love based on possession.
I
just
wanted
to own her,
but in the end, she owned me.
B Ou might have figured out that the "love
of
my life"y
now
y .·
. s alcohol The point I'm trying to underscore here
1s
in this story wa . .
1 like me maybe like
you-who
get addicted to drugs
that peop
e--
, . . . . h th .
I h 1 h ve an ongoing and important rela.ttonshzp wit eir
and
a co o a
f hoice. It's a love affair that can span decades. And
substance o c . . th
b • partner or spouse who also drmks or uses into e
when you rmg a . . . . .
. b mes a menage a tro1s with add1ct1on.
ation, it eco . .
equ there is plenty of evidence-both practical and
.·
Of course . .
that the majority of these three-way rclat1onsh1ps
clinical-that says
Ted Perkins
will eventually self-destruct. Addiction
is
clearly a key factor
behi
nd
many failed marriages, including
my
own. But when
it
comes
to
alcohol, this generalization may not be totally true across
the board.
There's a University
of
Michigan Study that found that couples
who
drink together report higher levels
of
marital satisfaction.
25
Said
the
study's author, "We think that the takeaway
is
that it appears couplesh
,,
with similar drinking habits are less irritated with one
anot
er.
But then again, take this with a grain
of
salt, because the report waspublished in Men's Journal and their whole revenue model revolves
around ads for liquor and erectile dysfunction.
However, upon further investigation I found an actual scientific
study26 underwritten by the National Institutes
of
Health
that
concluded that people tend to drink more when they're
with theirspouses, and when they do, they report higher levels
of
marital
satisfaction. An interesting caveat: Women who also drink with others
outside their marriage report higher levels
of
satisfaction,
but the same
is
not true
of
men. Maybe this explains why I was always happy whenmy wife went out with her wine-o-clock friends, but she wasn't
toohappy when I hung around with my beer buddies.
But again, these results only tell one side
of
the story because
the study only captures a small snapshot in time. Over the course
of
a whole marriage, alcohol and substance use becomes increasingly
problematic and destructive, especially when you throw kids into
the mix. And also keep in mind these results are 15 years old. The
pandemic changed everything. Married couples were forced to spend
more time together in isolated, stressful, unstructured environments.
Out-on-the-town fun and carefree drinking was replaced with at-
home-bored and burned-out drinking. Divorce rates went up 34%
during lockdown.
25 https://www.mcnsjournal.com/health-fitness/ the-key-to-a-happy-marriagc-
drinking-togcthcr-w430182/
26 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nlh.gov/pmdarticles/PMC6489547/
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And
this is
not
to
say that relationships
or
marriages soaked
tn
alcohol can't work at all. A former girlfriend
of
mine once took
me home
to meet her parents over Thanksgiving. I planned to be
on
my
best behavior,
but
I realized much to my delight that mom
and
dad
were living in a different booziverse. These were two very
well-established, successful medical professionals who could drink me
under
the
table.
Cocktails every weekday at
5pm
sharp. Promptly starting at
noon on
the
weekends. A wine cellar worth over a million dollars.
A
liquor
"closet." They were perfect
parents-happy
and healthy,
affectionate with one another, and still very much in love after 40
years
of
marriage.
I'm
sure they had their fair share
of
Who's
Afraid
of
Virginia Woolf? moments after the guests had all gone home for the
night. But
from what I could gather, their menage atrois with alcohol
was
an
unqualified success. They were having their cake and eating it
too.
A lot
of
it. Every day.
And
I wanted what they had. I considered
proposing
to their daughter that very night.
Were they outliers?
Not
at all. Many successful marriages, like
many
a peace treaty
or
business deal, have alcohol to _thank. Cynics
would
say you'd have to be drinking just to choose to get married
to begin with.
My own parents enjoyed a successful marriage where
alcohol wasn't just part
of
their social lives,
it
was a key component
of
my
father's career in the Foreign Service. He was paid to get foreign
dignitaries drunk so our government could forge useful alliances with
them-so-called
"soft power."
Alcohol is so pervasive and socially acceptable that it's largely
s nonymous with love itsel£ You can buy T-shirts that read "Some
;ople
wait their whole lives to meet their drinking buddy. I married
. ,, Alcohol can certainly help couples feel less inhibited, more
mme.
h mo re intimate, more "in love," but is this really the right kind
onest,
fl
;,
And is it actually love for the other person, or for the other
0 ove.
and their drinking habits?
person
Ted Perkins
h . t t films
that
To explore these questions, I c ose two 1mpor
an
.
d. d • · Released mtake
on
the subject
of
alcohol use 1sor
er m marriages.
1962, Days
of
Wine
and
Roses explores the complete
story
cycle
of
alcohol addiction from the
point
of
view
of
two people (played
by
Jack Lemmon and Lee Remick) who slowly go
down the rabbit
hole
together. When a Man Loves a W'oman
is
a
1994
film
starring
Meg
Ryan and Andy
Garda
about a marriage that's being
torn apart
by
only one spouse's drinking. Both
of
these films
not
only
offer
great
insights into love's relationship to alcohol (and vice-versa)
but
force
us
to consider the very nature
of
love itsel£
In the early' 40s, Alcoholics Anonymous had been gaining
traction
thanks to the publication
of
a game-changing Saturday Evening Post
article about
it in 1941. 27 In 1945, The
Lost Weekend cracked
the
window open on society's dirty, little secret
of
"alcoholism." Even
though it went on to win a Best Picture Oscar, Hollywood was
hesitantto roll the dice on another film about the controversial subject.
But with post-war prosperity and America
in
a generally festive
mood, alcohol continued to take its toll,
not just
on
individuals,
but
on family members too. AA founder Bill Wilson's wife set up Al-Anonin the early '50s to provide support for family members whose loved
ones were struggling with alcohol. By 1962 the market was ready for
(and probably needed) a film like Days
of
Wine
and
Roses. The pitchwas simple: Alcohol and love don't mix. The producers went so far as
to advertise that fact in their own marketing. Some versions
of
themovie posters read: "This, in its own terrifying way, is a love story."
Days
of
Wine and Roses was directed by Blake Edwards, whose
body of work and influence in Hollywood can't be overstated. Edwards
is remembered as a comedy film director, but when he made Days ofWine and Roses his hilarious Pink Panther films were still many years
off. After Breakfast at Tiffany's, Edwards had the box-office clout to
27 https:/ /www.saturdaycveningpost. com/2015/ 12/aa/
Addicted
in
Film
.,·
rnake
filrns
ab b'
h
out
su
Jects e cared about,
and
one
of
those subjec.
trs
·
=alcohol
abuse. I
had dinner with Edwards and his wife,
Ju!l
'ic '
.
drews,
in the
late '90s at some really expensive Italian restauraritr /
in
Brentwood
CA I d , .
. • •
on
t remember what project we were there
todiscuss; I
just
remember
telling
him
how much he had influenced my :
career
as a
comedy
writer.
He
seemed indifferent to the praise
and
toldl ·
me he
would
rather
I
be
inspired by his more serious films. I asked '
him
which
ones
he
recommended.
He
told me a few I hadn't seen and, ·
ended
with
Days
of
Wine
and
Roses. l distinctly remember the waiter ;
coming by at
that
precise
moment
and asking us
if
we wanted to see_a
wine
list. There was a brief pause, Edwards sighed, and then Andrews
abruptly
said
"no."
A
story about
alcohol probably came naturally to Edwards because .
he
already
had
a long-time pre-existing relationship with it. Joining
the Coast
Guard
after
high
school, he got drunk
and dove into a
shallow swimming
pool. 28
He
narrowly avoided paralysis and spent
five
months in
traction.
He and
Jack Lemmon drank heavily before
and
after the production
of
Days
of
Wine
and
Roses, and both ended
up
checking
themselves
into
rehab about a year after it came out. Even
after quitting,
Blake maintained a nostalgic working relationship with
alcohol, no
more evident than in his film 10, where Dudley Moore's
character
stays plastered for most
of
the film. 29
But it
went a bit deeper
than
that.
Blake
had bouts with depression (then again anybody
working in
Hollywood probably does), and almost committed suicide
on
a beach in Malibu after a string
of
box-office failures. I wonder
if
his past relationship with alcohol or perhaps other palliatives had
something to do with that.
28
I also did chis once when I was in high school, and almost broke my neck. But I
. p:ng on acid, not drunk.was tnp ...
, " dorable drunk" persona brought him tremendous box-office success
29 Moore~te: when he scarred in Arthur. I sac next to him in British
AiC-:Vays
First
cwo years H ch w to L.A. once. He went through three bottles of wme all by
Class from ea ro
himself.
Ted Perkins
d
cir
.
ki PR
Casting Jack Lemmon to play
the part
of
har
- m
ng
executive Joe Clay must have been a difficult pill for
Warner Bros
to swallow at the time. Remember
that Lemmon
was a
comedy
juggernaut coming
off
two huge Billy Wilder hits, Some Like
it
Hoe
and 1heApartment. It would be like having
Jim
Carrey
do
Schindler~
List right after Ace Ventura:
Pet
Detective. The Studio
brass
fearedthat such a heavy drama might tarnish Lemmon's image,
so
they
had
him film a sit-down in-person
pitch to
audiences as
part
of
the
filmstrailer.30
Lemmon, looking very earnest
as
he
puffs
on
a cigarette,
states
that the film is very important to him,
but
stops well
short
of
saying
why--or
ever once saying "alcohol."
Lemmon was probably attracted
to the
project because
he too
had
a pre-existing relationship with alcohol. His struggles were a
well-keptindustry secret for years.
Perhaps this role was a way to process his issues,
or to
justify hiscontinued behavior. 31 Either way,
he
delivered a searing
performancefor which he was nominated for
an Academy Award for Best Actor.
He later said it was one
of
his favorite roles
in
his career.Lee
Remick was also nominated in the Best Actress category forthis film.
Her
performance as a level-headed secretary
who
crosses over
to the dark side to find love is considered her absolute finest.
To "act
drunk" convincingly is harder than it seems.
And Remick absolutely
kills it. The authenticity
of
her performance may be due to the fact
that Remick also had a pre-existing relationship with alcohol.32
30 The trailer can be found on the Apple iTunes score.
31 In interviews years later Lemmon spoke about his drinking issues and how they
hie a head a few years after production of the film. Lemmon's challenges continued,
however, and he was arrested for drunk driving in 1976.
32 There is a bizarre confluence of how both actors, the subject of alcohol, and me
writing this book serendipitously intersect. Once, 20 years ago, when I went jogging
in Beverly Hills, I came across Jack Lemmon, walking in the middle of the street,
disoriented. I stopped to help him. He told me he couldn't remember the way home.
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Addicted in Film
In
another
example
of
art imitating life imitating art, she also
sought
help
for
her
drinking after the
film-just
like Lemmon and
Blake did. Both
Remick and Lemmon visited detox wards at state
mental
hospitals to prepare for their roles.
Who
knows, perhaps these
experiences,
and
even acting in the film itself, were informing their
own
real-life recovery journeys
as well? ,
lhe
film starts with Joe Clay (Lemmon) living the life
as
a top
executive for a public relations agency. At the time it was one
of
those
new-fangled
"communications" jobs that seemed
sexy,
cool, and
mysterious-like
being
an
advertising executive. And
as
Mad
Men
showed
us
in
lovingly rendered detail, day drinking held an outsized
profile
in
these industries. Back then pretty much every white-collar
job
carried
with it
the promise
of
the "three martini lunch."
Unlike blue collar types who had to stay sober to save their arms
from
getting chopped off in assembly lines, white collar
typ~
at most
only
risked getting their fingers caught in a pencil sharpener. A well-
stocked bar use~ to be a given in every C-Suite. Now, it's cause for
termination.
The
film starts with Joe procuring beautiful single women for. a
rich
client's yacht party. Basically, he's a glorified pimp in a toxic 1960s
work
culture drenched in male chauvinism and alcohol. Kirsten
Arneson
(Remick) joins the party, and Joe mista~nly assumes s~e's
_a
b f h d -hoc harem he's assembled. But It turns out shes his
mem er
o t e a . , .
,
He
offers her a drink. She tells him she doesn t dnnk.
boss secretary.
ak • hallenge an affront to his view
of
how reality should
J
oe
t es 1t as a c '
And from that moment on he's on a mission to have Kirsten
operate. · · h al h 1
h l 'ty and
J"oin
his menage a tro1s wit co O •
bend to
t at rea i
. • no pushover: at least for now. Back at the office,
But I(irstens ' .
al Joe tries to cajole her into a dinner date with a
over as usu ,
hung
. d one-liners. When that doesn't work, he tries to cut
•ft d some tireg1 an c. hes: "I'll tell you what special qualifications you
d wn a rew note
her
O
'd" I
ak Y medications or drunk alcohol. He sai No, never
- · ·f he had t en an b dd Le O • k' .
1 asked ham 1 • high school, my first drinking u y was e "'em1c s niece.
. k ,, Separately, an
drin ·
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have," Joe
says
to her
as
they ride down an elevator, "You're pretty-
[And your boss] loves to have you around to look
at and
lean
on when
he gets drunk, like he did last night, and who knows what
else."
Wow,how's that for mansplaining, 1960s style? Any girl who doesn't
go
out
with him must be a prostitute, right? Kirsten lets
him off
easy
with
a bitch-slap to the face, the standard mid-century response
to
a guy
getting "fresh." Today, a comment like that could get
you
jail time. 33
For reasons that don't make sense until shortly afterwards,
Kirstenactually takes Joe up on the dinner invitation and they go
to
a
nicerestaurant. But eating
is
the last thing on his mind. He's
befuddledby the fact that she doesn't order a drink. Angered by it,
in
fact.
So
when he discovers that she actually has a vice, chocolate, he orders
her
a Brandy Alexander. She likes it
but
doesn't know it contains alcohol.
It's basically the 1960s version
of
spiking a girl's drink or slipping
her a roofie. Perhaps it's not entirely fair to paint Joe as a predator
on
the prowl for the perfect drinking buddy.
He
probably finds Kirsten
to be intelligent, personable, and witty. But it's her unconditional
acceptance
of
his drinking that makes him truly fall in love
with
her.
Fortunately for Joe (not so fortunate for Kirsten), his scheme
works. Kirsten gets tipsy, loves the feeling booze gives her, and stays
out
late with Joe instead
of
going back to her roach-infested apartment.
And it's then that we learn the reason why she'd go
out to dinnerwith the same man she slapped in the elevator a few scenes earlier:
simple loneliness. She grew up without a mother's love, her widowed
father comes from emotionally constipated Scandinavian stock,
andshe's struggling to get by in the big city. But thanks to the magic
of
a
few Brandy Alexanders, for once she doesn't
feel
isolated, physically
objectified, or judged. .
She finally feels heard as a woman, not spoken down to by a man.
Alcohol does this. Why else would humans like to drink it so much?
33 When I watch these scenes today, I see how so much of the #MeToo Movement
was probably fueled by decades of pent-up resentment resulting from millions ofthese kinds of mlcroaggressions over time. ·
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The
feelings
it
enhances
or
disinhibits are all neurochemical precursors
to
falling
in
love. It's biology's favorite feedback loop. But
is
Kirsten
actually
f:
11·
• l "tha
mg
1n
ove
w1
Joe the person, or the Joe who makes her
feel
_less
lonely
and
unloved when they drink together? Conversely,
is
Joe
Just falling
in
love with the Kirsten who'll never stand in the way
of
his
drinking?
Regardless
of
what kind
of
love
it
is, they both fall into it. But
for
their
relationship to really succeed, Kirsten's consumption has to
catch
up to
Joe's. She needs to be groomed, slowly and purposefully;
so
that
she can go from
no
drinking, to occasional drinking, to always
drinking, to
always drinking a lot. Feelings
of
"love" and intimacy
are eventually only made possible by how much and how often they
drink
together. Alcohol has become their love tonic, aphrodisiac,
and
antidepressant.
When
they announce their marriage to Kirsten's
father, Ellis (played by the grim-faced Charles Bickford), he rebuffs
them. To
overcome the pain, it's no surprise Kirsten wants to go drink.
Cut
to
a year later
and
they've had a baby. Kirsten
is
off the booze
because she's lactating. Joe comes home drunk from a party and has
a
sloppy temper tantrum because she won't party with him. It seems
the
"fun" is
out of
their marriage. So he becomes her pusher again,
just
like
on
their first date. His message is clear:
If
you don't drink with
me, you don't love me.
Or
is
it
I don't love you unless you drink with
me? Lonely, financially dependent, and scared, Kirsten pours herself
a
drink and hops right back on the hamster wheel. And this is how it
goes for many people who forfeit common sense for love. You finally
. · the pusher The pusher becomes your dealer. The dealer now
give
mto
·
owns you. Checkmate.
Predictable consequences follow. Joe's work performance suffers.
d O ted to a crappy account and spends all his time traveling.
Hegets em. gl cts her daughter, Debbie; drinks all day; falls asleep with
I(irsten ne e
. . and burns the apartment down. None of this is her
a lit cigarette, .
. d It's Joe's fault for being away on business all the time.
fault, nun you.
Ted Perkins
She's lonely. There's nobody to drink with. All the "love" has gone
out
of
their relationship. Which means they'll just have to
drink togetheragain to rekindle it. And so
on
and so
on ...With Joe eventually losing his job and Kirsten a danger
to
herself and her daughter, they finally arrive at a point
of
reckoning.
I'm sure most couples with drinking problems
end up in the sameplace eventually. I can tell you from experience, it's
not
a pretty place.
Both spouses know they have to quit. They make solemn promises
to themselves and each other. But now two people in the habit
of
enabling and excusing each other's addiction suddenly have to
do the
opposite. And let's not forget that they're in a menage a trois
with
alcohol. This vertex point
of
the threesome will do everything
in
its
power to split the defense and get everybody back together again. So
actually quitting devolves into a childish game. I'll
quit
if
you quit.
Will you quit
if
I quit?
You
stop drinkingjirst. No, you stop drinkingfirst.
If they make it past this level in the game, the next level
up
is a
tap dance around the truth with the help
of
confirmation
bias-the
tendency to only consider facts that agree with one's preexisting beliefs
about reality. Adverse consequences
of
alcohol abuse are assigned
different levels
of
"factiness," or discounted entirely. I just burned our
apartment down. But
it
doem't mean I have a problem. These kinds
of
accidents happen all the time.
Remarkably, Kirsten and Joe do manage to quit. They move in
with Kirsten's father to work in his landscaping business and regroup
financially. After two months sober, they seem to inhabit the same
pink cloud, chase each other around like children, and make out on
a
haystack in the barn. It's their little sober wonderland, with a side
ofbucolic. Alcohol seems to be the farthest thing from their minds. Joe
kisses Kirsten tenderly, and for the first time in the movie he appears
to feel love, genuine non-artificially-induced love.
"I can't remember us ever feding this way before," he says,
brimming with hope.
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"Except after a
couple
of
drinks ... " she answers.
.
And
just
like that, it happens. By equating love and alcohol, ·
Kir st
en
opens that door juuuuuuuust a crack. Feelings
of
emotional
love
get
replaced by that visceral hungering, the all-too-familiar
craving for something you love instead
of
someone you love. Their
sober wonderland facade begins to disintegrate, revealing a prison
ofabstinence behind it.
And
what's the point
of
prison if not to serve
your
time
or
escape from it?
34
So the little games start all over again.
Will she drink
if
I drink? Will I drink
if
she
drinks?
Will
he
relapse
first?
Or
should I? Weve
been
so
goodfor
two months.
Don't we deserve it?Yes,
of
course you both
deserve it, alcohol kindly reminds them. And so
the
threesome is up and running again just like old times, and it's got
a
lot
of
catching up to
do.
Needless to say, Joe
and
Kirsten get loaded and do stupid shit. Joe
destroys his father-in-law's plant nursery in a frantic quest to find a
bottle
of
whiskey he hid
for later. Kirsten tries to make out with her
own
father
and then slaps her daughter around. All terrible things, but
amateur-hour stuff when compared to what happens every day in real
life. Domestic spousal and child
abuse-where
alcohol plays a starring
role-was
another one
of
society's dirty, little secrets that wouldn't
surface
in
the public discourse until the early '70s. 35 Hollywood finally
tackled the
subject in 1984's 'lhe Burning Bed with Farrah Fawcett.
For Days
of
'Wine
and
Roses to be truly authentic, we should have
seen Joe drunkenly assault Kirsten, verbally or physically (or vice-
versa). But hey, baby steps. .
Joe ends up in a straitjacket in a detox ward. Lemmon channel~
Ray Milland's 'lhe Lost Weekend delirium tremens terror, but turns
d Ki rsten 1
•oke around that they are "inmates" and Kirsten's father is the
34 Joe an
warden.
The World Health Organization (WHO) esti_mates that roughly 55% of
.35 . b rpecrators were drinking alcohol prior to the assault. Women who
domestic a use pe al h l
cd 15 times more likely to abuse co o .
are abus are
Ted Perkins
the volume up to
11 as
he bites the orderlies and snarls like a vicious
animal. It's all a bit over the top and veers into Reefer Madness
hyper-alarmist territory when you consider that only
2%
of
people
with
severe alcohol use disorder ever experience the terrifying "little
greenmen" hallucinations that Joe has. 36 Still,
if
one
of
the aims
of
the
movie was to sound the general alarm about the dangers
of
alcohol
addiction, this scene certainly does the trick.
Enter Jim Hungerford, played by America's favorite
TV
sports-writing slob and medical examiner Jack Klugman.
He
visits Joe
in
the rubber room, passes him a cigarette through the porthole, 37
and
somberly announces he's from Alcoholics Anonymous.
Who
knew
AA made house
calls?
But back in the day they did. Whereas
todaypeople from drug and DUI courts are funneled to AA meetings
by
default, 38 in the first decades after its founding the organization
had
not yet scaled, so it needed to actively recruit converts in detox wards,
shelters, and hospitals. And good thing they did because before
themental health industries caught up with the problem, AA was really
the only game in town besides the funny farm
or
prison. Klugman
does a wonderful job
as
their brand ambassador: he introduces
thedisease concept, takes Joe to his first meeting (where he admits to
being an alcoholic), and becomes his sponsor. The film is credited
with greatly helping Alcoholics Anonymous to grow its worldwide
reach and impact in the ensuing years.
Joe encourages Kirsten to follow down the 12-Step path that has
allowed him to stay sober and begin to heal, but she refuses. Her reasons
are reflective of the common objections people sometimes have to
12-Step programs: The label "alcoholic" doesn't sit well with her; she
36 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6286444
37 I'm convinced that this scene became the inspiration for an identical scene in
Apocalypse Now between Dennis Hopper and Martin Sheen.
38 Several court rulings now mandate ·chat evidence-based alternatives to AA be
offered in drug and DUI sentencing.
Addicted in Film
believes she hi b . .
l can ac eve so nety with her willpower alone (producers
e~ve
out
any
mention
of
a "Higher Power"), and she's simply too
prideful
t "d d
,,
h• 0 egra e erself in front
of
a bunch
of
strangers. JP
Miller,
the
screenwriter
of
the film,
is
said to have consulted carefully
with AA representatives to make sure the film conveyed these (valid)
objections; otherwise
it
could have come off
as
one big puff piece.
But
the
biggest reason Kirsten doesn't want to try the program
is
that
she
simply doesn't want to quit drinking. Like Nic's relationship
with meth
in
Beautiful Boy, she thinks reality
is
broken and will
always stay that
way unless she drinks. "The world looks so dirty to
me
when I'm not
drinking," she tells Joe
as
he tries to rescue her from
a
cheap hotel room, her hair a mess, dress dirtied, and drool on her
face. It's Kirsten who's broken,
not
her reality.
Like
many
spouses
of
people with alcohol use disorders, Joe thinks
his love can save her
. But he forgets that the anchor
of
their three-way
relationship was,
and
still is, alcohol. "We always knew that we were
in
love,"
he
tells Jim, "we just knew it; there was no doubt about it."
Well, apparently there is, because Kirsten has replaced Joe with other
more
dependable drinking buddies. "She [only] loves the drunk you,"
Jim
reminds him
. And in typical deluded "alcoholic thinking," Joe
completely forgets the fact that he pushed Kirsten to join his alcohol-
centered
reality from the get-go: "I just can't believe this is happening
to
me."
He
may as well have said, " I'm so pissed I got exactly what I
wanted
."
Days
of
Wine and
Roses ends on both a high note and a low one.
Joe chooses a life
of
total abstinence and a loving relations~p with
his daughter Debbie. His chances of a happy, healthy, sober hfc arc as
d any one's in recovery.. But as much as he wants love, real love,
goo as ,
..
d . ·macy from Kirsten, both know she cant give him that unless
an 1nt1
1_ drinking. So Joe issues the ultimatum: "Just room for you
she ~eeps
d N threesome." And sadly, Kirs~en walks. She'll have to seek a
an me. o . . . .
.i. a trois with someone else, and likely die trymg. And this
new menage
-
i.-~
..
.. -·
.,
__,,_
Ted Perkinsis
how it goes for many marriages where alcohol is a key
component.
In the end, love can't conque~ all unless it's the right
kind oflove
from
the very start.
,"
%
ANDY
.
GARCIA
~IEG RYAN
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So what exactly
is
the "right" kind
of
love? That
question-as
well
as
many other aspects
of
the alcohol menage a
trois-are
explored
in When a
Man
Loves a Woman, starring Meg Ryan
as
a
high schoolcounselor with a severe drinking problem and Andy Garcia as
an
airline pilot forced to confront some difficult realities in his marriage
as
a result. The film grossed over $170 million
in
worldwide
box-office revenue, which makes it by far the most commercially successful
film we'll discuss in this book. The timing
of
the project
could
not
have been more perfect in terms
of
packaging: Both actors were
white
hot at the time they signed on. Meg Ryan could do no wrong afterher adorably effervescent performances in W'hen Harry
Met
Sally
and Sleepless in Seattle, and Garcia was a much-sought-after
Oscarnominee whose star power went supernova with
The
Godfather
Parl
Ill
While Ryan's and Garcia's draw made the film successful,
it
was
the chemistry between them that made it memorable. To help create
that chemistry, Touchstone Pictures (a Disney film subsidiary
in the'90s) turned to Luis
Mandoki-perhaps
the finest, most underrated
romantic drama directors
of
his generation.
Originally from Mexico, Mandoki is a kind, graceful intellectual
who seems out
of
place in Hollywood, but whose early successes
helped pave the way for the careers
of
Guillermo Del Toro, Alfonso
Cuar6n, and Alejandro Gonzalez Ifi.arritu. He's a very lyrical storyteller
who wants every scene he shoots to be as beautiful and emotionally
evocative as possible. When I was at Universal Pictures, Mandoki
pitched me several films he wanted to do as part of a multi-picture deal
we were negotiating. Each project was more romantically sprawling
than the next. The guy was just born to tell stories about love. But
as
When a Man Loves a Woman clearly shows, it wasn't just romantic
love that interested him.
From the first frame of the film, it's clear Alice (Ryan) and Michael
(Garcia) are mad about each other. They engage in sexy role play at a
Addicted in Film
local
bar and
th
k' en
ma
e
out
like horny teenagers while all the patrons
gawk. Back t h
th
h
d a ome, ey ave the picture perfect family with two
a orable yo d h.
ung
aug ters Casey and Jess (the latter played by the
incredibly tal d h"ld T· . . .
ente c 1 actor ma MaJormo). That night they go to a
great restaurant, dance the night away, then return home and (at least
try
to) make
sweet, passionate love. If perfect marriages looked like
anything,
this would be it.
But
appearances deceive. Any marriage, no matter how seemingly
cc
£
,,
per
ect,
must
conceal
at
least some cracks and fissures. And nothing
smooths
out
the
sharp edges
of
reality quite like love and alcohol.
Because he's so smitten with Alice, Michael
is
willing to excuse her
behavior later
that
night when she throws eggs at a neighbor's car
because its alarm keeps going off.
He
even joins in the drunken revelry,
albeit reluctantly because he drinks responsibly and probably wouldn't
do
crazy shit like that even
if
he were drunk. Cognitive dissonance
kicks in. Alice isn't "too drunk," he's probably telling himself, "she's
just
adorably spontaneous and brave." Okay sure, we know Alice
is
too drunk, but
when Alice is drunk Alice
is
cute, cuddly, frisky, and
fun. She's the "awesome first date" version
of
his wife--except she's
like
that
every night
of
the week thanks to alcohol. What husband
wouldn't want his wife to be like Alice sometimes, or even all the time?
Welcome to the vast gray area
of
so-called "enabling" behavior.
Whereas in Days
of
Wine
and
Roses Joe was actively pushing Kirsten
to drink, in
this film Michael is simply standing by and passively doing
nothing to stop Alice from getting blitzed. Sure, he knows her drinking
has become an issue, but until it causes any adverse consequences, who
is he to try to change who she is and how she expresses herself? There's
hi W rong with him trying to maximize his "marital satisfaction,"
not ngas cited in the study above. Her alcohol use has become a key part of
how she "loves" him and is loved by him, emotionally and sexually.
He feels needed every time he cleans up her messes and puts her to
d I , th "spark'' in their marriage. But a point is reached where for
be . ts e
It
..,:.~•"
.
Ted Perkins
Michael to stand by and let Alice self-destruct just so he can keep
that
spark alive would be selfish, irresponsible, and potentially dangerous.,
The first breaking point comes when Alice gets
drunk on
a couples
vacation with Michael in Mexico, falls off a boat,
and
almost drowns.
Both Alice and Michael see it
as
a positive outcome.
The subject
of
her drinking has been broached, and now Michael doesn't
look
like
"the bad guy" who challenges Alice
on
behavior that
he
himself hasbenefitted from emotionally. And Alice claims that the accident is
the
"best thing that could've happened to me," because
it
will force
her
to take stock
of
her problem. Focus on the word "force" here.
While
accidents and health scares are great motivators for change,
they
are
still externalities that don't always affect whether the addict
is
prepared
to change on the inside where it really counts.
And Alice
is
clearly not ready to change. Back at home, she makes
a half-hearted attempt to throw
out
her secret stash
of
vodka,
but
then ends up drinking it instead.
With
Michael gone for work, she
can really push the envelope. She returns home from a school
happyhour completely tanked and orders their nanny (played gracefully by
Lauren Tom) to go home. Now it's just her and the kids. They're
part
of the menage a trois now too.
The scene that follows
is
heartbreaking to watch,
but important tosee. Alice's daughter Jess shows her a drawing she did
on
a computer.
Alice drunkenly rebuffs her and orders her to do her homework. Jess
is
crestfallen. This
is
where "fun mom" ends and child abuse begins.
Alice doesn't have to hit Jess (that happens a few scenes later) to abuse
her. An equally sinister form of child abuse is neglect. And from the
look on Jess' face, we can tell this neglect has been going on for some
time.
It was brave but probably risky to include the subject of child
abuse in such a mainstream Hollywood film. Depicting child abuse
of any kind in films has long been considered taboo. No mainstream
Hollywood studio film had ever dared broach the topic. But avoiding
Addicted in Film
a
topic
doesn't
ak . . . ,
J m e
lt
go away. Whereas m
Days
of
Wine
and
Roses
oe and
Kirs ' d
fil
J
tens
aughter, Debbie, plays a very minor role, in this
m ess
and
her
younger half-sister Casey (played by Mae Whitman)
are central
ch •
th
fil
aracters m e m. They are affected by their mother's
drinking·
h
Just as
muc
(or more) than Michael is, and Mandoki doesn't
shy_
away from
showing us that. Seeing the unfolding drama through
their
eyes
adds another much-needed-yet-seldom-seen dimension to
the
story.
The
final breaking
point
comes when Alice slaps Jess and then
drinks half
a bottle
of
vodka to try to forget
it
ever happened. She
passes
out
in
the
shower
and
crashes through the glass. Poor Jess has
to
call
her
father to tell
him
she thinks her own mother has died. You
can imagine the
effect this kind
of
trauma would have on a child in
real
life.
There
is already ample evidence that the addiction epidemic
in
America
has created a mental health crisis among the children
of
addicts,
many
of whom-like
Jess-find
themselves dialing 911 when
both
their
parents
OD.
Compounding the tragedy, in many cases the
children
of
addicts
turn
to the very same substances to help them
cope, and the
cycle
of
addiction continues into the next generation.
We will
touch on
some aspects
of
cross-generational addiction in our
chapter about the documentary film Recovery Boys.
Michael
files to Alice's hospital bedside and she finally reveals the
truth about the
extent
of
her drinking. All day, every day, a quart
of
dka d
y.
"How
come I couldn't see this?" Michael asks. "Because
vo
a
a.
I
hid
it," Alice answers. And it's at this point that we realize how that
area
of
enabling has come back to bite Michael in the ass. What
gray h b d doesn't notice when his own wife
is
drinking a quart of
sane us an d th" b
d
;>
He had to have known. But he chose to o no mg a out
vodka a ay. · · h r k · h
hi mn children's safety at nsk m exc ange ror eepmg t e
.
He put so... . .
it.
h" 1
·age Michael is suffering from the same delusional
kin
1s
marr ·
spar that allowed Alice's addiction to flourish to begin
th .oking patterns1 • th" moment of crisis where bottom lines should have
·th Jn fact, 10
lS .
wt · M" chael extends the delusion even further.
been struck, 1
\f[{:';:\l~i1t~=
Ted Perkins
Jess just got smacked by her mother. But she's "fine," Michael tells
Alice.
Um,
no,
she's
not.
"We're gonna' get you better so it doesn't happen again,"
hecontinues.
It alt
sounds
so easy,
doesn't
it? Like checking a
box.
"Please don't hate me, because I'll die
if
you do," she continues.
"The thought would never enter my mind," Michael replies.
Really?
Here you begin to see just how surreal a menage a trois
with
alcohol can become for everyone involved. It's magical
thinking
on
steroids. Michael immediately tries to sweep the last five years
of
their marriage under the carpet.
He
doesn't even stop to ask Alice
why she drank a quart
of
vodka a day.
Not
because
it
doesn't matter,
but because he knows it should have mattered, and he should have
done something about
it-way
before it got to this point. To deflect
his own guilt, he turns this whole mess into a quick cleanup
on
aisle
three. He can fix anything that's broken, even Alice.
'Tm
going
to find
you the best treatment; the best in the fucking world," he tells her, as
if that's something he even understands, much less totally controls.
This
is
a key point in the story where the focus turns away fromAlice's problems and begins to reveal Michael's as well. The way
herelates to Alice while she's in rehab paints a picture
of
a man who's
impatient, overconfident, and unwilling to accept the complexity
of
the problem he had a part in creating. When Alice calls him after
detox, he doesn't ask her how she's doing; he's just happy the "hard
part's over." He defaults to his winning formula
of
sexy role play,
imagining that she's naked, desperate to rekindle the spark in their
physical relationship that's under threat now that Alice is sober. As
she hangs up the phone, Alice looks like she wants to jump out of her
own skin.
It would have been easier to keep the focus on Alice as she goes
through rehab and emerges right as rain on the other side. But instead,
E ES t l ,.,l~k
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Addicted
in
Film
screenwrit
R .ers
on
Bass (Rain Man) and
Al Franken (yes, Senator Al,
~ranken)
take
us
on
a
much
more emotionally complex recovery
J~utney
that
examines
the tumultuous
interpersonal dynamics in
the
~e
period
after Alice completes rehab. This
had
never been explored
10
a
mainstream
film before,
but
it's
the most important
part
of
a
pers
'
on
s recovery
. Rehab is
the
easy part . Afterward,
the
real
work
begins.
And
it's
hard
work,
not
just for Alice,
but
for Michael too.
Film
critic Roger
Ebert-himself
in
recovery from
alcohol-said of
the
film, «It's
about
Michael's recovery from Alice's recovery."
The
first
warning
signs
of
a post-rehab shake
up in
their
relationship come
as Michael goes to pick her up at the completion
of
her
program.
What
becomes immediately apparent: She doesn't need
him. Her
focus is primarily
on
her
daughters :
He
seems completely
out of
place
and
irrelevant as
he
wanders
the
grounds,
in
control
of
nothing. More
unsettling still is
the
fact
that
Alice has forged deep
and
meaningful
friendships
at
the
rehab
facility-including
one with
Gary, played
by
Philip Seymour Hoffman
(sadly, in another life-
imitating-art moment, Hoffman would die from a heroin overdose
twenty
years lacer). Michael is clearly jealous
of
Gary,
but not in
any romantic
context. It's because
he and
all
of
Alice's new friends
threaten to
kill his starring role as her savior, protectc:,r, and dean-up
crew.
When
Alice tells Michael how much
these people mean to her
recovery,
he
tells her she can now talk to him
instead. She's less than
thrilled.I
don't want it to sound like Michael is the antagonist in chis film.
Let's
not
forget he was the guy holding down the fort while Alice
was in rehab.
He took care
of the kids, supported them as they cried
themselves co sleep, changed his whole work schedule around them,
risked his career, and paid all the bills after Alice lost her job. He has
every right to feel angry and resentful for what Alice has put the family
h h Bu
t the Alice who's come home after rehab is not the same
t roug •
Who W ent in He'll have to communicate with her in a whole
person ·
Ted Perkins
new way,
without
alcohol
to smooth
out
her rough
edges.
He's
now:
vital part
of
her
recovery,
but
just
not
under the terms
he
believes
hes
entitled
to--with
entitlement being the
operative
term
here
.
The period after a spouse returns from
treatment
is easily
the
most difficult
part
of
their recovery.
Yes,
overcoming urges
and
reassimilation into sober life are challenging,
but
the
greatest
threat
to success can sometimes come from their spouse,
who
feels
entitled
to an explanation for
what
has happened. But sometimes there isn't
one .
Or
the explanations come
off
as
petty
excuses.
They
feel
entitled
to some sort
of
repayment
of
an emotional debt
for
the damage that's
been done. Bue chis puts even
more
pressure
on
the
spouse
in
recovery.
They feel entitled to an
apology,
but
no
apology seems
genuine
enough.
I've experienced all these things firsthand
in my
own
relationship. It's
quite
common
for people ·
to
relapse
due to the
stresses
created
by
their spouse's demands for closure, reciprocity,
and proper atonement.
With
so much pressure being applied,
it can sometimes feel like
the
spouse wants their partner
to
relapse.
In Michael's case
he
feels like Alice is rejecting
him,
physically
and emotionally. She won't reciprocate his physical advances, a key
ingredient
of
the spark their marriage once had. A.rid
when he
offers
to help, it comes off as too controlling . Because
it
is.
Often, spouses
automatically assume their partner needs
and wants their help,
and when they don't accept it, resentment builds even further.
Buta person in recovery is under no obligation to
follow their spouse's
advice, or even listen to it. Yes, Michael can feel Alice is ungrateful
for everything he's done to help her so far,
but that doesn't entitle himto control her recovery process going forward. Healing will conform
to Alice's timeline, not his. He needs to let Alice do Alice and realize
that this new version of Alice doesn't need him to pick up the pieces
anymore.
As their marriage deteriorates, Alice suggests they try couple's
counseling. It doesn't go well. They both realize there needs to be more
Addicted in Film
to their
relat· h·
th
• htons tp
an
Just p ysical intimacy. Their total reliance
on
that
· · £Wtnntng ormula no longer works. For too long Michael has
used
it
as a
way to
gloss over all the problems in their marriage, in the
same
w Al. d al . .
ay ice use cohol to ignore
or
forget them. Alice herself ·
says,
"Maybe
I should start to learn to live in reality instead
of
trying
to
escape from it." But reality has jagged little edges. Sanding down
those
edges takes time
and
hard work.
And
since Michael can't control
that
process,
he
feels ambushed. Alice feels unheard.
Next he
tries going
to
an Al-Anon meeting. That goes just
as
badly.
Michael
simply can't understand how people in these meetings feel a
need
to
talk
about
their feelings instead
of
acting on them.
He
views
their
lack
of
control as a weakness. For him it's all black or white.
No
gray
area.
Do
or do
not, there
is
no try. But
as
family support
programs
always remind us, control over another person's addictioi:i
is
an
illusion. Trying to control a person's recovery
is
toxic. Control
is
one
of
the
problems that has led Alice and Michael to this place ·
to
begin with. During
a .fight that almost turns violent, Alice says
itr
·
best, "I think I could love you again
if
you could just once say 'I don't
know
.... Instead, Michael packs his bags and the couple separates.
To
say this is a painful point in the story is an understatement.
I
know
because I've lived through it. Physical separation
is
hard
enough, but
the
recriminations, resentments, should-have-could-
haves, feelings
of
being unheard, being taken totally for granted, the
guilt-it
all comes barreling at you at on~e at 500
mi_les
an hour. And
then throw in
having to explain everythmg to the kids.
How should
1 · "alcoholism" to a six-year-old? Do you?
Is
there any way
you exp am . .
t a divorce? Mandoki includes several touchmg scenes of
to sugarcoa
Michad struggling to explain some of these things to Jess: He tells.her
•t:. • ,
c.
· "probably one of the most oft used phrases m parenting.
"Lue
isn
t ratr,
Or at least it should be. . .c.
telv. this is how it ends for many marriages built upon
Unrortuna J'
• ,
aky
c. dation where love, intimacy and nitty-gntty real-worla
a sh roun
~
~
Ted
Perk.ins
problem solving are mediated by one or both spouses' addiction.
The
rough edges lead to cracks that cannot ever be repaired. But When a
Man
Loves a Woman
is
a Hollywood film, after all.
And
while perhaps
improbable in real life, creating a happy Hollywood ending whereMichael and Alice reconcile
is
a tremendously satisfying resolution
that teaches
us
quite a bit about how to end the addiction menage a
trois gracefully and definitively.
One
of
Michael's epiphanies comes in the form
of
a group share
in an Al-Anon meeting.
He
tells the group that he "can't get a handle
on things. Everything
is
loose and
fuzzy."
By saying this, he's .finally
acknowledging that he has lost control, or perhaps never had it.
And
that's okay.
He
has come to accept that he needs to be loved for
whohe
is,
not whether or not he can fix everything.
Alice's epiphanies come out in an emotional six-months-of-
sobriety speech at her 12-Step meeting. She finally reveals how her
father's alcohol problem and her mother's emotional abuse factored
into her own addiction. But she doesn't blame them for her problems;
she accepts responsibility for her own choices. She confesses a deep
truth about her relationship with Michael and why she chose to stay
medicated throughout it: "I knew if he ever really saw the real me,
who I was inside, he wouldn't love me."
Michael's in the audience and has heard all
of
this. They come
together to talk. Both
of
their hard-earned epiphanies have opened
up the possibility of unconditional forgiveness, atonement, empathy,
and trust. But more importantly, they have created a space in which
to build a new relationship upon the foundations of unconditional,
selfless love. They kiss each ~ther passionately, just like they kissed at
the bar at the beginning of the film, but without the bar this time.
It may sound trite to say that Alice's alcohol addiction is the best
thing that ever happened to them, but maybe it is. Yes, addiction is
terrible, but it can also be transformational. It pushes couples to an
unavoidable fork in the road that can't be ignored or glossed over
Addicted in Film
with alcohol or drugs. Recovery forces spouses to confront who they
really were so they can create the person they want to be. They have
to create a whole new life. That includes a factory reset on who they
want to love, how they want to love, and how they want to be loved.
Without drugs and alcohol, a clearer picture of what real love is begins
to emerge.
,i
j
'(
.,,!.
deep analyze with key points and quotes