10 Days in a Madhouse is a 2015 American biographical film about undercover journalist Nellie Bly, a reporter for Joseph Pulitzer's New York World who had herself committed to the Women's Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell's Island to write an exposé on abuses in the institution. The production was written and directed by Timothy Hines with consultation from one of Bly's modern biographers, Brooke Kroeger. The film draws from Bly's book, Ten Days in a Mad-House, which led to significant reforms in the treatment of mental health patients. The cast includes Caroline Barry, Christopher Lambert, Kelly Le Brock, Julia Chantrey and Alexandra Callas.
10 Days in a Madhouse
Elizabeth Cochrane Seaman, better known by her pen name Nellie Bly, was an American journalist, who was widely known for her record-breaking trip around the world in 72 days in emulation of Jules Verne's fictional character Phileas Fogg, and an exposé in which she worked undercover to report on a mental institution from within. She was a pioneer in her field and launched a new kind of investigative journalism.
Cochran at 26 years old, circa 1890
Portrait of a 21-year-old Bly in Mexico
The New York City Mental Health Hospital on Blackwell's Island, c. 1893
United for Libraries Literary Landmark on Roosevelt Island that mentions Bly's connection to the island