Westfield Resident Who Produced 'The Good Nurse' Dishes On New Film

WESTFIELD, NJ — A new Netflix thriller, "The Good Nurse," centered around one of New Jersey's most well-known serial killers was released on Wednesday.

Michael Jackman, a 20-year Westfield resident and successful producer with FilmNation Entertainment, spoke with Patch about what it was like working with the star-studded cast of the new film.

Jackman said the film, featuring Academy Award-winning actors Jessica Chastain and Eddie Redmayne, is a very accurate depiction of the story of Charles Cullen — a serial killer who confessed to killing up to 40 patients during his 16-year career as a nurse in New Jersey.

Read more: Jessica Chastain, Eddie Redmayne Netflix Thriller Has Westfield Roots

The film is based off a book with the same name "The Good Nurse" by Charles Graeber, which chronicles Cullen's murderous career.

It was later found in subsequent interviews with police, psychiatrists and nurses, that Cullen is suspected of killing around 400 patients by using lethal doses of insulin and other drugs.

He was only convicted of the murder of 29 patients at nine New Jersey and Pennsylvania hospitals. Cullen was also famously known as "The Angel of Death."

Read more: NJ Serial Killer Nurse Is Focus Of Netflix's New Film

In New Jersey, Cullen worked at Saint Barnabas Medical Center, Warren Hospital, Hunterdon Medical Center, Morristown Memorial Hospital and finally Somerset Medical Center (now called RWJ University Somerset Hospital) where 13 patients were killed, according to nj.com.

These murders took place throughout the late '80s and '90s.

Arrested in December 2005, Culled was sentenced to 11 consecutive life sentences in New Jersey and six more life sentences in Pennsylvania in 2006. He is not eligible for parole until 2403, according to nj.com. Cullen is currently 62 years old.

The new film follows nurse Amy Loughren, played by Chastain, who suspects her colleague Cullen, played by Redmayne, is responsible for a series of patient deaths.

Jackman said the film does not take a lot of liberties and stays true to the real story. He said one of the consultants on the film was the real Amy Loughren who helped police build a case against Cullen when other doctors and hospitals were complicit in his killings.

"Amy Loughren's superpower was her ability to to see humanity in this monster because the police could not could not convict this guy," Jackman said. "They couldn't get enough evidence to arrest him because of the way he would be injecting saline bags at the hospitals with insulin, digoxin and other drugs, causing [patients] to die."

In the film, Loughren — a single mother of two — works in the ICU and suffers from a heart condition. Her symptoms flare up during her work as a nurse, but she can't leave the job because she needs health insurance and money.

Jackman explained that Cullen became a close friend of Loughren's and showed compassion for her. But it was through this close friendship that convinced Cullen to confess his crimes.

"The main point of the film was that love and compassion actually brought this guy to justice," Jackman said.

Jackman added that another important aspect of the film is that the nine different hospitals that Cullen worked at all harbored suspicions but failed to take any action against Cullen.

"They gave him letters of recommendation and moved him along [to the next hospital] so that he could kill again," Jackman said. "And they did that to get that out of their liability... And these hospitals lost track of what was the most important thing because they have to make a profit..."

Jackman said it was "a dream" to work alongside producers Scott Franklin and Darren Aronofsky who was worked on films like "Black Swan" (2010) and "Mother!" (2017).

The film is also directed by Danish screenwriter Tobias Lindholm.

Jackman said the actors were "very nice people" and "phenomenal at their craft." He said there's a moment in the script where it Amy "is no longer looking at her friend but in the eyes of killer," and Redmayne has to make his eyes go dead.

"It was a chilling thing to reading the script," Jackman said. "And I thought how was Eddie Redmayne going to do it? Like how does an actor make their eyes go dead? And we watched the scene and thought, 'Oh my God, he did it.'"

Coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic, Jackman said this film holds weight because it "shines a light on the nurses who serve us" and save lives, while also holding hospitals accountable for their actions.

You can check out a trailer of the film, which is now out on Netflix, below:

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