Teddy Daniels

**Andrew Laeddis**, also known as **Edward "Teddy" Daniels** is the titular main protagonist of Martin Scorsese's 2010 psychological thriller film, *Shutter Island*. He is a U.S. Marshal who is investigating the Ashecliffe Hospital on Shutter Island after a patient goes missing.

He was portrayed by Leonardo DiCaprio, who also played Amsterdam Vallon in *Gangs of New York*, Howard Hughes in *The Aviator*, Billy Costigan in *The Departed*, Jordan Belfort in *The Wolf of Wall Street* and Ernest Burkhart in *Killers of the Flower Moon*.

## Biography

### 1954

In 1954, U.S. Marshal Edward "Teddy" Daniels, along with his new partner, Chuck Aule are assigned to investigate the Ashecliffe Mental Hospital on Shutter Island, Boston Harbor, after a patient named, Rachel Solando, who also killed her three children, some how escaped. The hospital, led by Dr. John Cawley, give very little information on the case, despite the fact that Rachel's psychiatrist, Lester Sheehan left the hospital for vacation just after Rachel escaped. Also during this time, Teddy has various flashbacks of him being a WWII soldier during the liberation of Dachau as well as dreams of his deceased wife, Dolores, who was killed in a fire by an arsonist named Andrew Laeddis, who is also present in the hospital.

Suddenly, the ward ends up finding Rachel without the help of Teddy, to which Rachel confuses Teddy for her dead husband. After this, Teddy breaks into the restricted Ward C to find Laeddis, instead he finds, George Noyce, a patient who claims the staff are later going to lobotomize him in a near by lighthouse. Teddy later sees Chuck's body on the rocks surrounding the island after attempting to get to the lighthouse. While trying to climb to get to Chuck, Teddy finds a cave, where he finds the real Rachel, who claims to be a psychiatrist working on the hospital. She also claims that the hospital is experimenting on patients. Teddy later returns to the hospital, where he asks Cawley the whereabouts of Chuck, to which Cawley claims that Teddy arrived to the island alone.

Teddy, now convinced they are experimenting on Chuck at the lighthouse, breaks into the lighthouse where he finds Cawley. Teddy attempts to confront Cawley about his conversation with Rachel, however Cawley tells him that Rachel never existed, as well as claiming that Teddy has been a patient on the ward for two years and that his recent headaches are from his medication, Chlorpromazine. Chuck soon arrives at the lighthouse, claiming that he is, in fact, Lester Sheehan, to which Cawley explains that Teddy is in fact Andrew Laeddis and that he was place in the hospital for murdering his manic-depressive wife after he seeing that she had drowned their children, Rachel, Simon and Henry in a nearby lake. Cawley also explains that his persona as Edward Daniels is a ploy to get rid of the guilt he feels for murdering his wife and how most of the staff has been roleplaying with him in a way to make Teddy regain his true identity. Due to the stress of the situation, Teddy faints.

The next day, Teddy recounts the truth to the staff which satisfies them, as previously Teddy made a similar breakthrough 9 months earlier, only to quickly regress back into his delusional state. Cawley also informs Teddy that if he doesn't realize the complete truth, he will be lobotomized, due to his violent tendencies. Later, Teddy is encountered by Sheehan, in which only refers to him as Chuck, presumably going back into his imaginary world. However, just before Teddy is taken away, he asks Sheehan, "Which would be worse, to live as a monster, or to die as a good man?", to which a shocked Sheehan calls him "Teddy", before he is taken away.