Ad on MSNBC for Passages Malibu, a $67,550/month addiction rehab facility

[Bozita]

Addiction: Buying the Cure at Passages Malibu
At upscale "rehab," all you need is faith. And $67,000 a month
Comments (263) By Mark Groubert Wednesday, Jun 25 2008


Perched on a bluff abovePacific Coast Highway, Passages Malibu Addiction Cure Center looks more like a prefab movie set than a place to kick hard drugs. Near the entrance of the garish $23 million mansion stands a glass-enclosed gym filled with the latest high-tech equipment, on which men and women work out feverishly with the assistance of hands-on trainers. Beside a well-stocked koi pond, two stone-carved lions with gargoyle-like faces guard the marble walkway to the imposing front door, which is framed by a Parthenon-style stone portico and supported by eight 20-foot-high Ionic columns. Marble is everywhere.

Inside the cavernous main hall — there are two other buildings on the 10-acre facility — are yet more columns, a cascading staircase and a gaggle of pretty young guys and gals. These are the personal assistants. Each client at Passages gets his or her own personal assistant, which is kinda cool when you’ve been hammer-heading (combining Ecstasy and Viagra) for months and need a Himalayan goji-berry cocktail brought quickly to your bedside so you don’t miss the next installment of Intervention on your personal 46-inch plasma TV while waiting for your kick meds to kick in. The 29 comfortable beds here are currently filled with patients who pay $67,550 a month for them. Passages, owned and run by Chris Prentiss and his son Pax, is the most expensive, luxurious and controversial residential drug-treatment center in the world.

more...
http://www.laweekly.com/2008-06-26/news/buying-the-cure/


Buying the Cure at Passages, Malibu: June 27, 2008
After patients say they didn't find the addiction cure, the center's Chris Prentiss makes an ad that won't go away
A A AComments (51) By Mark Groubert Wednesday, Dec 31 2008


And then what happened? Well, I’ll tell you.

After my article “Buying the Cure” came out in late June, I was inundated with calls, e-mails and letters from ex-employees, former clients and disgruntled parents detailing additional horrors regarding Chris and Pax Prentiss and their “addiction cure” facility. When a major law firm researching a class-action suit against Chris Prentiss contacted me, I figured his days were numbered.

With mass marketing nothing could be further from the truth. After a brief lull, Chris Prentiss seemed to be everywhere. Most disturbing was seeing the elfin white-haired huckster hawking his “cure” on CNN just milliseconds before the historic speeches of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama from the convention in Denver. There on the screen was Prentiss holding up his latest self-published book: “Don’t go through another holiday season with someone addicted to drugs or alcohol,” he hyped. “Read my book, The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure. To get it, call: (888) THE CURE.”

The ads continue to this day. Apparently the Cure King has money to burn.

more...
http://www.laweekly.com/2009-01-01/news/june-27-2008/

[JuniperLea]

1. I keep seeing TV ads for this place...

How in the hell can you advertise a CURE for addiction?

I knew I smelled something...

[Initech]

6. Yeah that just sounds shady doesn't it?

[brooklynite]

2. Do they cure Gayness too?

I understand its a real moneymaker in Minnsota...

[NightWatcher]

3. for that kind of money, you can afford a really nice habit

[StarburstClock]

4. TV sells exploitation for the highest price they can get

and there are plenty of advertising sociopaths willing to pay for any attention they can get.

[Cleita]

5. Isn't that where Lindsay Lohan went?

Doesn't seem like it worked very well.

[demosincebirth]

7. They advertise it as not a 12step program.