Shock Theater
Summary:
Leaping into the life of Sam Beederman, patient in a mental institution who suffers from acute depression, Sam undergoes a way too high doses of shock therapy, which makes him forget who he is, thinking himself to be several people he once leaped into. If Sam doesn't get a second electro shock to get his personality back, Al might lose contact for good ...
Episode Number: #3.22 / #52
German Title: Schocktherapie
Italian Title: Oh Mamma!
French Title: Choc en retour
Personal Review: Fast paced, exciting and full of drama. It's one of my favorites.
Original Air Date: Wednesday, May 22, 1991
Writer: Deborah Pratt
Director: Joe Napolitano
Producer: Chris Ruppenthal
Co-Producers:
Paul Brown
Jeff Gourson
Supervising Producer: Harker Wade
Executive Producer: Donald P. Bellisario
Co-Executive Producers:
Deborah Pratt
Michael Zinberg
Regular Cast:
Scott Bakula as Sam Beckett
Dean Stockwell as Al Calavicci
Guest Cast:
David Proval as Dr. Masters
Bruce A. Young as Butch
Scott Lawrence as Tibby Johnson
Robert Symonds as ??
Candy Ann Brown as Dr. Verbena Beeks
Nick Brooks as Freddie
Lee Garlington as Nurse Chatam
Also Starring:
Frank Collins as Mortimer
Ralph Marrero as Oswald
Kevin Page as young doctor
Harry Pugh as older doctor
Howard Matthew Johnson as Jesse Tyler/mirror
LeRain Chabut as Samantha Stormer/mirror
Brad Silverman as Jimmy LaMotta/mirror
Jean-Pierre Doleac as mental patient
Guest Cast Notes:
David Proval was born May 20, 1942 in Brooklyn, New York.
Robert Symons had a recurring role as Dr. Jonas Edwards on Dynasty.
Kevin Page had a recurring role as Stu on Seinfeld.
Guest Cast who appeared in other Belisarius Productions:
 Scott Lawrence had a recurring role as Cmdr. Sturgis Turner on J.A.G.
Guest Cast who appeared in other QL episodes:
 Candy Ann Brown played Dr. Verbena Beeks in The Leap Back (#4.01), too.
 Howard Matthew Johnson appeared as Jesse Tyler's mirror image on The Color of Truth (#1.07), too.
 Le Rein Chabut appeared as Samantha Stormer's mirror image in What Price, Gloria (#2.04), too.
 Brad Silverman could be seen as Jimmy LaMotta's mirror image in Jimmy (#2.08) and Deliver us from Evil (#5.07). He also played Pete in Mirror Image (#5.22).
Jean-Pierre Dorlac, the show's costume designer, wasn't credited but is known to have played the patient who said "Butcher, baker ..."
Place: Havenwell Mental Institution, Pennsylvania
Leap-date: Sunday, October 3, 1954
Leapee's Name: Sam Beederman
Date at the Project: 1997
Project Trivia:
The holographic image is tuned to Sam's brain waves.
The project is called Quantum Leap.
Little kids, animals, and mentally unstable people can see Al.
Verbena Beeks is the project's psychiatrist.
They put a rap song into Ziggy's memory banks for some reason.
Other people can go into the Imaging Chamber, but they must touch Al skin-to-skin to be able to see/will be seen by Sam. But the contact only projects the image so Sam isn't able to hear them.
Ziggy is referred to as 'he'.
handlink: colored cubes version
Future Trivia:
The air is filthy and the cars are still on the ground. But they are working on it.
Sam Trivia:
Sam is a doctor and comes from Elk Ridge, Indiana.
He holds seven degrees, one of them is medicine, another is in quantum physics.
Sam hates rap music.
Al Trivia:
He spontaneously made up some rap lyrics to teach Tibby the alphabet.
Al/Sam Trivia:
Al gave Sam his first break.
Sam was the only person to believe in Al when Al had given up believing in himself.
Sam brought Al on the project.
Miscellaneous Trivia:
The lyrics of the rap song are different from the ones on the QL soundtrack.
People from former leaps Sam believes to be:
Samantha Stormer / What Price, Gloria (#2.04)
Jesse Tyler / The Color of Truth (#1.07)
Herbert 'Magic' Williams / The Leap Home, pt. 2 (#3.02)
Capt. Tom Stratton / Genesis (#1.01 & #1.02)
Kid Cody / The Right Hand of God (#1.04)
Jimmy LaMotta / Jimmy (#2.08)
Songs:
- Alphabet Rap Song (sung by Al)
Predicted Outcome:
Tibby gets out in 7 years and lands on the streets. He won't be able to find a job for he can't read. Ziggy gives it a 94% chance that Sam is there to help him.
Altered History:
Tibby learns to read - thanks to Al's rap performance - and gets a job when he comes out of the hospital.
Al's Outfits:
1. red jacket; white shirt with black buttons; narrow red-and-black tie; white slacks; red shoes
2. golden jacket, slacks and tie; black shirt with golden threats
Sam's Outfits:
1. white hospital shirt and trousers
2. he later wore a checked gray-and-black night-gown and a pair of matching slippers over it
Dubbing Bloopers:
They translated 'nozzle' with 'Jedinase'. Who the hell came up with that expression!?
Best Scene:
When Masters pulls his psychological tests on Sam/Jesse while Nurse Chatam explains the situation to some doctors behind the one-sided mirror:
Masters: "Would you like to play a little game with me, Jesse?"
Sam: "I'm too old to be playing games. Besides, I can't read."
Masters: "No, no, you don't have to read. I just want you to look at some pictures and tell me what you think you see. Please, sit down."
Al: "It's okay, Sam. I got power. I'm here."
Nurse Chatam: "This is Jesse Tyler, a second personality. He seems to be a 70-year-old Negro who feels unjustly persecuted in some sort of civil rights disturbance. He believes he's living in 1955."
Masters: "Now just tell me what you see. Huh?"
Sam: "A mist. I see no picture."
Al: "He wants you to use your imagination, Sam."
Masters: "Sure there is. Look a little closer."
Sam: "Burned Chitlins. A whole mess of burned Chitlins."
Masters: "All right, that's whatever you see. Now this one. Try this one."
Sam: "That's blood."
Masters: "What blood, Jesse?"
Sam: "That's Nell's blood. They ran my granddaughter off the road and I found her. She was bleeding bad. Mrs. Melny and me we took her to the hospital. But it was the white hospital in Legada and they wouldn't take her. Mrs. Melny told them, you had just better. I knew what to do. I knew the proper medical procedure. And I told those doctors."
Al: "That's because you are a medical doctor."
Masters: "But I thought you said you couldn't read."
Al: "Sam Beckett is a medical doctor."
Masters: "What is it, Jesse?"
Al: "Just leave him alone. Sam, you got seven degrees."
Sam: "I can't read."
Al: "Yes, you can."
Masters: "But then you couldn't know the proper medical procedure."
Al: "Jesse can't, but you can."
Sam: "No, I can't. No, sir. We were sharecroppers. My folks been slaves. They didn't know no readin' and writin'."
Doctor Whickless (to Nurse Cahtam): "Who is he talking to?"
Nurse Chatam: "Dr. Masters believes it's a hallucination. His name is Al."
Younger doctor: "Doctor Whickless, this Al, is that another one of his personalities?"
Docktor Whickless: "No, an external personality would be the abortion of a schizophrenic. Not someone with MPD."
Sam: "What thing about Willis, he tried teaching me, you know. But no, I'm as stubborn as a mule and twice as slow."
Al: "Sam, sit back down and if you have to talk to me, don't look at me any more."
Sam: "Why not?"
Masters: "Are you having a problem with your friend, Jesse?"
Al: "Because this nozzle here can't see me and I don't want him to think you any more crazy than he already thinks. So please, let Dracula here finish drinking your brain."
Sam: "What?"
Masters: "I said are you having a problem with your friend?"
Al: "Just sit down and finish the test so we can get the hell outta here."
Sam: "There ain't no problem. I'm gonna sit right down here and finish this test so we can get the hell outta here. And I don't know who Dracula is but I got me a powerful thirst, too. What does it take to get a man a glass of water .. around here?"
Masters: "We'll have water in this room from now on. What do you see?"
Sam: "Well, this here is the subatomic structure of a quark. What the hell is a quark?"
Masters: "I don't know what a quark is, Jesse."
Al: "A quark is a micro particle of a proton or a neutron. You got a degree in quantum physics, too, Sam."
Quotes:
Nurse Chatam: "What happened to Mr. Beederman happens to lots of people."
Freddy: "Yeah, they get committed and then go crazy."
Nurse Chatam (to Dr. Masters): "But what's he looking at?"
Tibby: "The guy. The guy in the red jacket."
Al (to Tibby): "You can see me?"
Tibby: "Sure. Nice jacket."
Al: "Oh, great. I'm tuned into little kids, I'm tuned into dogs, and now I'm tuned into the mentally absent. Why not blondes?"
"He's looking at you like you were a frog in bio No. 1." (Al)
"I gotta check my medication." (Tibby)
Sam/Jesse: "I'm in a loony bin?"
Freddy: "We like to call it: an institution for the mentally unstable."
"I can leap? Son, I can hardly walk. I got the rheumatism, you know." (Sam, thinking to be Jesse)
"I'm as stubborn as a mule and twice as slow." (Sam, thinking to be Jesse)
"Well, this here is the subatomic structure of a quark. What the hell is a quark?" (Sam)
Open Questions and Logic Flaws:
When the holographic image began to fade, Al looked at himself as if he had seen the fading. As did Verbena later on. But for Al (and Verbena) it would be Sam and everything around him that fades, not the holographic projection of himself.
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