Dr. Eugene Landy asked (yelled) for an Arnold Palmer. Were these drinks available in the 1980's? I don't think so as the drink was sold under the Arnold Palmer name by Innovative Flavors since 2001.
shareRight: and it was impossible to get a gin and tonic before they started selling them in premixed cans....
shareI was a little confused about that scene. I assumed Eugene Landy wanted a cocktail. An Arnold Palmer is a beverage consisting of iced tea and lemonade, named after legendary golfer Arnold Palmer. The alcohol based "Arnold Palmer" is called a John Daly. That drink would not have been called a John Daly back in the '80s. Daly won his first major golf tournament in 1991.
He just wanted an Arnold Palmer: iced tea mixed with lemonade.
shareDidn't Landy demand that Gloria make him an Arnold Palmer , than when she did he screamed at her again to make him one and she already had? I didn't get that?
shareShe handed him the drink but it was ice tea only (no lemonade)...so he screamed at her to make it right. An Arnold palmer is half ice tea and half lemonade.
shareThat sounds right to me, though I don't remember the scene in perfect detail.
shareWow . I wonder why Gloria just gave him Iced tea at first? He did clearly ask for an Arnold Palmer! Was it because she was flustered or I'm thinking she did it on purpose, knowing he would scream at her, so Melinda could really see what a mean d*ck he was. Of course at that point she already knew!
And how rude, him not offering Melinda a drink!
Not the only anachronism in the film (but usually there are a lot more in a movie of this type done 50 years later). In 1966 Brian uses the line "Cuckoo For Cocoa Puffs!" which I don't believe was developed until the 1980s--certainly not around in 1966.
sharePer Wikipedia: The mascot of Cocoa Puffs is Sonny the Cuckoo Bird, whose catchphrase is "I'm cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs!" was introduced in 1962.
I grew up in the 60s and remember that catch phrase from back then.
Oddly enough in the same vein, I just got into a huge fight with my wife over a similar incident. I just wanted a tossed salad.
shareI don't think Gene's phrase "self-medication"in the film was in use yet in the 60's. I do wish script writers would take more care with such time-related errors, they seem to happen so often. Or do they keep them in to make movies sound more "hip?"
shareI don't think Gene's phrase "self-medication"in the film was in use yet in the 60's.
That's true, you are right. Well, that is still 30 years ago - 40 years ago if you go back to Landy's first treatment of Brian. Can't say I know for sure when "self-medication" first came into common parlance, so I may be wrong in this case. However I do often hear modern phrases used in films set in older periods, and wonder why these slip through the script editor's check...
share"Self-medication" was being used in journal articles in that time period (thanks Google), so not so strange that a psycho-therapist would use it.
Ref:
Khantzian, E.J. (1985). The self-medication hypothesis of addictive disorders: Focus on heroin and cocaine dependence. American Journal of Psychiatry
Wikipedia claims the source of the phrase - in the context of heroin use - was articles published by the same guy (Khatzian) and others, dating back to 1974. As you note, Levy's a trained therapist, so it would be natural for him to use it even if it wasn't widely used among the general population.
FWIW, the term "self-medication" (or, less frequently "self-medicate") appears in the New York Times quite a few times, going back to 1893. The meaning wasn't exactly on point, though - referring generally to the fairly normal use of OTC medications like antacids and the like, or to more controversial attempts to do a doctor's work yourself without paying for it.
It was, I think, first used to refer to the use of alcohol, opiates and the like in response to emotional or psychological problems in 1974:
"Unlike some specialists who view drug use and alcoholism as slow surrogates for suicide, Kiev [a psychiatrist in New York] believes they are attempts at self-medication which are addictive and may lead to accidental deaths."
In 1980:
"... many of them went on chocolate binges when depressed. 'Chocolate is loaded with phenylethylamine,' he said. 'The binging may be an attempt at self-medication.'"
As the lede of a 1985 story:
"'Many elderly people use drink as self-medication for depression and loneliness,' said Dr. Michael L. Freedman of the New York University Medical Center."
As an aside, some anachronistic language does "slip though a script editor's check," for a good reason: The purpose of the dialog is to communicate with an audience that speaks modern English. Very few people have memorized the complete etymology of the English language, so mild anachronisms* shouldn't be noticeable, and they're worth the improvement in communication. In any event, since the people who are inclined to keep a keen ear out for perceived anachronisms seem to get them wrong as often as right, pleasing them would require undertaking the fool's errand of eliminating everything someone might think is an anachronism, even if it isn't.
It's like the very, very common practice of having characters who should be speaking some other language speak English in movies (or whatever the language of the audience is ... even if that involves dubbing the actor's lines). That's not "right," but it works.
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*Like, say, using the word "lobotomized" in the 1920s. More extreme anachronisms - "Whoa dude, just chillax!!" - are generally avoided, unless for the purpose of humor.
She made the drink properly, but he screamed at her to put on a show of authority. Anyway who really cares? RIP Arnold Palmer who died last night. https://youtu.be/fuH8tS-Zv_Y
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