Morgan: A Suitable Case for Treatment

Morgan: A Suitable Case for Treatment
French poster under the title Morgan!
Directed by	Karel Reisz
Produced by	Leon Clore
Written by	David Mercer
Starring	David Warner Vanessa Redgrave Robert Stephens Irene Handl Bernard Bresslaw Arthur Mullard
Music by	John Dankworth
Cinematography	Larry Pizer
Distributed by	British Lion Films
Release date	27 January 1966 (UK)
Running time	97 minutes
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English

Morgan – A Suitable Case for Treatment (also called Morgan!) is a 1966 comedy film made by British Lion. It was directed by Karel Reisz and produced by Leon Clore from a screenplay by David Mercer, based on his BBC television play A Suitable Case for Treatment (1962), the leading role at that time being played by Ian Hendry.

The film stars David Warner, Vanessa Redgrave and Robert Stephens with Irene Handl and Bernard Bresslaw.

Morgan Delt (David Warner) is a failed artist, who was raised as a communist by his parents. His upper-class wife, Leonie (Vanessa Redgrave), has given up on him and is in the process of getting a divorce in order to marry Charles Napier (Robert Stephens), an art gallery owner of her own social standing. Given the innately rich and personal world of fantasy Morgan has locked himself into, he goes off the deep end. He performs a series of bizarre stunts in a campaign to win back Leonie, including putting a skeleton in her bed and blowing up the bed as her mother sits on it. When these stunts fail, Morgan secures the help of his mother's wrestler friend Wally "The Gorilla" (Arthur Mullard) to kidnap Leonie, who still nurtures residual feelings of love tinged with pity for Morgan. The plan fails, and Morgan is arrested and imprisoned.

On his release he crashes the wedding reception of Leonie and Charles dressed as a gorilla, for which scene Reisz borrows clips from King Kong to illustrate Morgan's fantasy world. Morgan flees the wedding on a motorcycle with his gorilla suit on fire. He is subsequently committed to an insane asylum. Here, Leonie visits him looking visibly pregnant. With a wink, Leonie tells him he is the child's father. Morgan returns to tending a flowerbed as the camera pulls out to a longshot of the entire circular flowerbed with the enclosed flowers arranged into a hammer and sickle.