A blockbuster book was published back in 1973 that would go on to become a cult classic and sell millions of copies.

SYBIL, written by American journalist Flora Rheta Schreiber (1918 – 1988), told the story of a woman with 16 personalities.

Such was the impact of the book, which three years later would be made into a telemovie starring Sally Field as the title character, (re-made in 2007 with Jessica Lange playing the role of the psychiatrist) it became a cultural phenomena and changed, at least for a number of years, the course of psychiatry.

Years before either of these films were released, another movie based on a real-life case of Multiple Personality Syndrome was leaving it’s mark on audiences.

THE THREE FACES OF EVE was a 1957 American film that earned Joanne Woodward the Academy Award for Best Actress. It was based on a book written by two psychiatrists about a woman named Christine Sizemore who was thought to be ‘inhabitated’ by three distinct indentities.

In an inspired piece of casting, Joanne Woodward would be cast years later as the pyschiatrist in the 1976 movie SYBIL.

If THE THREE FACES OF EVE was popular culture’s entre to the world of Multiple Personality Syndrome, SYBIL was the full- blown, ten course, ‘finest silverwear’ banquet.

Only problem was, many of the details of the real life case concerning the woman that the world would come to know as SYBIL were fake. This is according to a book published in 2011 by American journalist Debbie Nathan.

‘Fake’ is maybe too strong a word. ‘Greatly exaggerated’ is proabably a better description for the mix of half-truths, distortions and outright fabricatons that were used to create and publicise the world’s most famous Multiple Personality Syndrome case.

Over the next few weeks, SCENIC WRITER’S SHACK will seek to seperate fact from fiction and uncover the truth of SYBIL.

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