Dr. Dean Brooks has spent his adult life advocating for persons with mental illnesses. And he has not slowed down even though he now is 94 years-old and is living in an assistant living facility not far from the Oregon State Hospital in Salem that he used to oversee. 
He first burst on the national stage when he appeared in the 1975 movie, One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, as the hospital’s chief psychiatrist, Dr. John Spivey, M.D. It was a clever irony because Dr. Brooks was actually in charge of the hospital at the time of filming. In the movie, he can be seen interviewing Jack Nicholson to determine if he has an actual mental disorder or is faking it.
