
Netflix has recently released a film that explores a lesser-known aspect of the crisis, building on the narratives of the Peabody-winning miniseries Dopesick from 2021 and The Painkiller this year, which both highlighted the Sackler family’s and Purdue Pharma’s role in the widespread proliferation of highly addictive opioids and the ensuing overdose-related deaths in the United States.
In the movie Pain Hustlers, Chris Evans and Emily Blunt play two workers at a pharmaceutical company that uses deceptive tactics and a hard sell to profit from a highly addictive drug. However, they quickly get into too deep of a hole when they become entangled in a criminal conspiracy.
Based on a journalistic exposé of opioid profiteering, Pain Hustlers
Wells Tower wrote the screenplay, but Evan Hughes’ 2018 New York Times exposé The Pain Hustlers served as a major inspiration for the film’s plot.
The article described the strategies employed by the pharmaceutical company Insys Therapeutics to promote its highly addictive fentanyl-based painkiller Subsys in the market. These strategies included hiring a charming and driven team of sales representatives and enlisting physicians to endorse the drug to other prescribers through its “speaker program.” The speaker program, which was ostensibly a marketing tool, was actually a cover for bribes.
Important players in this tale—which Hughes eventually developed into the factual book The Hard Sell: Crime and Punishment at an Opioid Startup—included Alec Burlakoff, the sales manager, speakers Xiulu Ruan and John Patrick Couch, and founder of Insys John Kapoor. Now all of them are behind bars; Ruan and Couch were accused of operating a “pill mill,” and Kapoor and Burlakoff were found guilty of racketeering. Hughes also repeatedly cites Tracy Krane, a former Insys employee who is no longer employed in the pharmaceutical sector, as a source.
Pain Hustlers presents fictionalized versions of these personalities. Emily Blunt portrays Liza Drake, a recent hire at a pharmaceutical firm who might potentially replace Tracy Krane. Chris Evans plays Pete Brenner, an aspirational businessman who is likely meant to be a stand-in for Burlakoff. Andy Garcia makes an appearance as their supervisor, akin to Kapoor.