Is Netflix’s Ratched a true story?

NURSE Ratched became a figure of nightmares when she first appeared in Kesey's One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest.

Louise Fletcher brought her alive in the 1975 movie of the same name, and now it's Sarah Paulson's turn to reimagine the iconic sadistic nurse in Netflix's psychological thriller Ratched.

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Is Ratched based on a true story?

Ratched is based on Ken Kesey's classic 1962 novel One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest.

One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest follows Randle P. McMurphy as he attempts to escape the mental asylum.

Nurse Ratched is the head of the ward, and is the main antagonist in the novel.

She takes food and drink privileges away from her patients if they get on her nerves, and conducts her own psychotherapy experiments on them.

Ratched's character was inspired by the head nurse of the psychiatric ward where author Kesey worked as a nursing assistant.

He later ran into her at an aquarium, realising "she was much smaller than I remembered, and a whole lot more human".

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Worry not, Ratched herself is not based totally on one real person.

Rather, Ratched represents the oppressive mechanisation, dehumanisation, and deterioration of modern society.

Power has corrupted her, and Ratched should be getting professional help for her obvious psychopathy and violent tendencies, rather than "treating" other sick people.

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What is Ratched about?

Ratched, starring American Horror Story's Sarah Paulson as the titular character, is the origin story of Mildred Ratched.

It follows her journey from well-meaning nurse to sadistic tyrant.

The official Netflix synopsis reads: "The wheels are always turning and as she begins to infiltrate the mental health care system and those within it, Mildred's stylish exterior belies a growing darkness that has long been smoldering within, revealing that true monsters are made, not born."