8 Fictional Movie Villains Inspired By Real People
7. Kevin Wendell Crumb (Split) - Billy Milligan
In M. Night Shyamalan's Split, Kevin Wendell Crumb is a man suffering from dissociative identity disorder (aka multiple personality disorder), resulting in his body harbouring the essences of 24 completely different people.
The character is inherently complex, but because DID is a real-life condition, Shyamalan was able to look to people who have it, to help him get a sense of how to accurately portray Kevin.
One of the director's primary influences was a man named Billy Milligan. Milligan, like Kevin, had 24 distinct personalities all living inside his body, including 10 "desirables", 13 "undesirables", and The Teacher, a fusion of all the other personalities.
Milligan was also the first person in history to be acquitted of a crime - raping three women - who suffered from DID. Milligan pleaded insanity, claiming that two of his other personalities carried out the crimes, and he was sentenced to time in a mental hospital.