Andy Behrman has traveled to more than forty cities in the U.S. and Canada promoting Electroboy. It has sold more than 50,000 copies in the U.S., 150,000 worldwide and is published in seven other countries. He speaks at universities, support groups and hospitals. Visit www.electroboy.com and drop him a line. Tell him you read his interview in City Voices.
Actor/Producer Tobey Maguire's production company, Maguire Entertainment has joined Endgame Entertainment and Raw Entertainment to bring Electroboy to the big screen. Maguire will produce the film and is eyeing the title role. Andy's book is a turbulent spin through the life of a twenty-eight-year-old manic-depressive art forger and con-man, chronicling his sexual escapades, drug binges and treatment with electroshock therapy (visit www.newyorkcityvoices.org to read an Electroboy book review and Andy's first interview with Voices). Matthew Chapman (Runaway Jury) is writing the script. Production is expected to start over the summer.
Voices: Did you ever imagine a film would be made of your book?
Andy Behrman: I never imagined a film. A book was enough for me. I was editing the book one day when I received a phone call from a producer who was interested in optioning Electroboy for a movie.
Voices: I saw you a year or two ago at a Barnes & Nobles in New York City promoting your book and you looked very nervous. Why are you going to great lengths to make your personal experiences so public?
AB: It was around the first time I had ever appeared in front of an audience. I want the world to see me as someone who struggles everyday with a mental illness. I didn't go to great lengths to make my story public, I just wrote a book. It was easy—not a stretch. It was a story I had lived for twenty years. It just came right out of me, though it wasn't always pleasant.
Voices: But you did it anyway. You may be taking a gamble. The world may see you as nothing more than a crazy, criminal, drug addict.
AB: That's the stigma of mental illness, that everybody thinks drugs, crazy, criminal. That's the backwards way to view mental illness. It is not the way I believe most people will view it.
Voices: Was it at a high point in your life when you started to write the book?
AB: I started writing it in 1999. That was at the end of my recovery from mental illness.
Voices: But recovery is an ongoing process without an end. Do you disagree?
AB: I fight mental illness to this day, but it was at the end of my crisis period. I haven't been in crisis for five years. I've been taking medication for another 13 or 14 years. The illness is laying low.
Voices: How are you feeling these days?
AB: Peaceful is the perfect word for how I feel.
Voices: But you said you struggle every day with mental illness.
AB: I still live with the fact that it can come back. Everyday that I take the medication, I am reminded that I do have a mental illness, that I am taking the medication so it doesn't come back.
Voices: And yet this is a more peaceful period for you.
AB: Yes. I am careful with my meds. My old manic-depression lifestyle is out of the picture, no drinking, no drugs. Sleeping well and exercising definitely plays a role in how I'm feeling today.
Voices: The most famous example of a mental health book made into a movie was A Beautiful Mind, where the facts of the book were distorted. How will you make sure that doesn't happen to your book?
AB: I'm working very closely with the screenwriter who makes a huge effort to learn an incredible amount of material on manic-depression. I sent him everything I could find on the web. If anything does not seem accurate, I make a note. I'm reading everything he writes.
Voices: I see.
AB: When I was diagnosed 10 years ago, I thought it was a terminal illness. I had no access to the Internet to learn more about it. Today, there are thousands of mental health websites. I've had 500,000 unique visitors to my own website since I started. I respond to over 300 emails from consumers every week. They ask me many things, including what is happening in my life. Some of the questions are very specific about their illnesses.
Voices: What do you tell them?
AB: I tell them as much as I can within the boundaries since I am not a mental health professional.
Voices: Is there a second book on the way?
AB: Yes, but I never imagined a second or third book until I realized the success of the first.
Voices: What will it be about?
AB: It's about leading a very quiet life with manic-depression after having lived a very dramatic life where you've been riding a rollercoaster.
Voices: This one sounds more interesting.
AB: It is more interesting, but not as dramatic, not as fascinating, sometimes dull.
Voices: Do you ever miss the manic highs?
AB: No, I don't. I've replaced the highs with other things.
Voices: What have you replaced them with?
AB: A more normal way of living, enjoying life and people in a different way—something as simple as going to the movies. I would have never had the patience to go to the movies where you can get away. I think it's normal and healthy to get away from time to time.
Voices: While manic you lived in the fast lane, making lots of money in criminal art forgeries. Then came the breakdown, hospitalizations and ECT. Now you are again in the fast lane after a highly successful book and a movie deal about your life in the works. This will make you quite famous. Are you trying to relive your manic highs with your current, high-octane life?
AB: That's a good question, but I'm not living in the fast lane. My life is calmer than ever and I'm just working on the sequel to Electroboy. And, like everybody else, I'll just go see the film version of Electroboy.
Voices: Is there nothing fast-paced about your life now? Is there no resemblance to the manic highs?
AB: No, none. It's nothing like it. I mean, no, I live in the suburbs, my life is calm. I have two cats and two dogs and I'm married.
Voices: Tell me, does your wife help you on those sleepless nights?
AB: I don't have those sleepless nights [Andy giggles]. No, no sleepless nights!
Voices: Well, Andy, that concludes our interview. Is there anything at all that we missed—
AB: [Background noise: dog barking] The dog is barking, the dog is barking! Hold on. [Andy sees to the dog and returns] Yeah, a really big issue for me now is the more than 500,000 mentally ill people in our prison system in this country. And I don't think anyone is doing enough about it. And I'm talking about mentally ill patients who've committed non-violent, victimless crimes who wind up in prison and are barely even allowed access to psychiatrists or their own medication. I am advocating for a client with manic depression here in L.A. County who will begin serving a twelve-month term for the most ridiculous crime.
Voices: The plight of the mentally ill in prisons is not a good one. I'll try to connect you to Heather Barr, an attorney fighting for the rights of imprisoned consumers in NYC. That's it, Andy. Thank you for a wonderful interview.