Word: euthanasia
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...descent) is recounted in a series of disconnected episodes that recall the pivotal moments in his life in the '30s. In the earliest scenes, the audience learns that Halder is a Goethe scholar at the Frankfurt University recruited by the Nazis for a small novel that he publishes on euthanasia, which the party deems advantageous to its ideology...
...numbers to classical symphonic excerpts. And he has much to be stressed about. His wife Helen (Joy Brooke Fairfield '03) confines herself to the home in neurotic fear. His mother (Cheryl Chan '03) is blind and suffers from an annoying senile dementia that drives Halder to publish his pro-euthanasia book during one of his depressed bouts. His best friend is a Jewish psychiatrist named Maurice (Graham Sack '03) seeking to flee Germany, and his only confidant is a young admiring student, Anne (Emily Knapp '03) with whom he eventually has an affair...
...this is gradually what happens as Halder finds himself first trying to rationalize euthanasia as a compassionate act toward the sick and deformed, then the bonfire of the books, Krystal Nacht, and in what proves to be the play's most shocking (if somewhat farfetched) moment, Auschwitz. As Halder's rationalizations become increasingly strained and desperate, Hitler assumes a more seductive tone in Halder's mind, and his image is accompanied by popular, catchy drinking songs...
Critics of daytime talk shows hailed the hefty verdict as a stinging rebuke to trash television. Amedure family attorney Geoffrey Fieger, who made his name defending euthanasia doctor Jack Kevorkian, insisted that it sent a message to "renegade outlaw talk shows" to clean up their act. "If you wish to engage in these types of shows, at least be forthright," he said. "Tell the people what they're going to get involved in, tell them you're going to be talking about lurid, obscene sexual fantasies, and make sure you don't involve mentally ill people who could later strike...
Kevorkian was candid about his lack of legal expertise. "If I looked inept, I was--in law. But I'm articulate in English." Though peppered with objections, he nevertheless turned his closing arguments into personal testimony on euthanasia and on his crusade. Comparing himself to Rosa Parks on the bus and to Martin Luther King Jr., Kevorkian told the jury that "there are certain acts that by sheer common sense are not crimes. Honestly now, do you see what [the prosecution] calls a killer? If you do, then you must convict. If you don't think I'm a criminal...