Embarrassing Illnesses

Embarrassing Illnesses At The Movies

However cringeworthy your condition, you can guarantee there’s nothing so embarrassing that it hasn’t played a starring role on the big or small screen. Whether it’s been presented sympathetically or played for cheap giggles is another story – but they do say laughter is the best medicine. Welcome to an unscientific pick of the top five most Embarrassing On-Screen Illnesses…

EXPLOSIVE DIARRHOEA

FEATURED IN: DUMB AND DUMBER (1994)
It ain’t exactly Shakespearean tragedy, but perhaps the dark, pebble-dashed revenge enacted on dumb Harry Dunne (Jeff Daniels) by dumber Lloyd Christmas (Jim Carrey) will serve as a cautionary tale. The lesson worth learning: never betray a mate for a woman, especially if he has easy access to a can labelled “Turbo Lax… for fast and safe relief.”

Incredibly, that’s not the most highly-strung piece of digestive misrule to hit our screens. That honour goes to an episode of perennial student fave The Young Ones, when Rik (Rik Mayall) has a major hissy fit and attempts a comically over-wrought suicide using what he doesn’t realise are in fact laxative pills. As hippy flatmate Neil (Nigel Planer) queries: “uh, can you, like, actually kill yourself with laxative pills?” (Off-screen, unfortunately, the answer is yes, so if you’re unlucky enough to overdose on laxatives, seek medical help straightaway.)

PREMATURE EJACULATION

FEATURED IN: AMERICAN PIE (1999)
When Jim Levenstein (Jason Biggs) secretly videotapes naked foreign-exchange student Nadia (Shannon Elizabeth) for broadcast to his Internet buddies, karma steps in. Rather than shooting a hottie for instant upload Jim ends up instantly shooting his own hot load, becoming premature ejaculation’s latest casualty – in front of all his friends. As one viewer puts it, “god bless the internet.”

Coming too quick is one of the most common of all sexual dysfunctions – in a survey of thousands of British blokes, roughly 10 per cent admitted sometimes having this problem. American research reports average lasting time of men who ejaculate prematurely as 1.8 minutes, while ‘normal’ chaps lasted an average of 7.3 minutes. Luckily, it’s a treatable problem that in any case tends, like fine wine, to improve with age. In less serious cases, while mild local anaesthetic gels can help prolong sex, they also dull sensation for the woman, so instead we’d recommend special ‘long love’ condoms, which have the anaesthetic gel on the inside only, meaning it still feels the same for ladies.

SYPHILLIS

FEATURED IN: SCRUBS, ‘MY COLD SHOWER’ (2007)
Dealing with the double whammy of the geriatric booty call and a nasty STD, Scrubs demonstrates exactly why (1) safe sex matters, no matter how long ago you registered for a free bus pass and (2) why syphilis is called “the great imitator.” When a sweet old lady and gent from a nearby rest-home turn up presenting a colourful array of symptoms, Carla (Judy Reyes) and Elliott (Sarah Chalke) are stumped, testing for every disease under the sun, before the appropriately named Doctor Cox (John C McGinley) steps in to solve the riddle, reminding everyone: “When people get old there are certain things they are no longer able to do, like drive a car over 20mph or smell like the living, but the one thing they sure can do is have sex until they croak.”

Syphilis is an STD known for its huge range of possible symptoms, including fever, swollen lymph glands, sore throat, patchy hair loss, headaches, weight loss, muscle aches, fatigue, difficulty coordinating muscle movements, paralysis, numbness, gradual blindness, and dementia. In other words, plenty of factors associated with growing old. While syphilis is easily treated if identified during the first year of infection, it can kill if left untreated. None of which stops Scrubs’ resident jock surgeon Todd responding by turning up in a t-shirt bearing the legend “GILF.”

HEAD LICE

FEATURED IN: SOUTH PARK, ‘LICE CAPADES’ (2007)
Between references to everything from The Day After Tomorrow to The Thing, and coming to a happy ending in the warm haven of Angelina Jolie’s pubic hair, this typically crude-but-smart episode presents a pretty accurate depiction of a lice outbreak at an elementary school. Leaving aside the presentation of society in microcosm via a colony of lice on a lice-infested head, that is.

School teacher Mr Garrison’s refusal to name the infected child when he warns his class of a lice outbreak however, may ring distant bells of childhood trauma, as the kids begin a witchhunt to find the Unclean One. True to life, it turns out pretty much every child has headlice, even witchhunter general, Cartman. Of course, nits aren’t a sign of bad hygiene, and are easily treated with insecticide shampoo and wet combing, but no self-respecting eight-year old ever let the facts get in the way of a good bullying.

PSORIASIS

FEATURED IN: THE SINGING DETECTIVE (1986)
Although around one in fifty people will suffer from this itchy, flaky, inflammatory skin condition at some point, its depiction on-screen remains rare. The Singing Detective’s Philip E Marlow (Michael Gambon) suffers to an unusual degree, resembling a sun-dried tomato more than he does an aging author, covered as he is head-to-toe in painful sores.

Despite its potentially unsavoury appearance, psoriasis is not infectious and has nothing to do with personal hygiene. Although series’ creator Dennis Potter himself had psoriasis and arthritis, the presentation of Philip E Marlow’s experience is extreme. In most cases treatment is non-invasive and can include cortisone cream, vitamin D cream, light treatments, antibiotics by mouth, antihistamines, topical tar preparations, moisturisers and even chemotherapy such as methotrexate. Someone should really inform Freddy Kreuger.

Please note: Unfortunately Channel 4 cannot respond to individual inquiries. If you have any concerns, you can check out the Channel 4 Health site or NHS Choices, but ultimately it is always best to check with a health professional.

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