The real ‘Dead Ringers’: How twin ‘fertility god’ doctors’ 1975 deaths are still a riddle
and features crazed physicians twins, one a gynecologist. But despite Hollywood and publishing’s storytelling imagination and ingenuity, the true account of the life and death of Drs. Cyril and Stewart Marcus still can’t be topped. And today, almost a half-century later, what happened to cause their demise is still something of a medical mystery.Dead about a week, their fetid, decomposing bodies were discovered by a handyman attracted to a terrible odor emanating from Cyril’s locked apartment,10H, in the red brick high-rise at 460 East 63rd Street and York Avenue, where Stewart sometimes stayed. Once inside, even the most jaded veteran NYPD homicide cop was shocked by the scene that greeted them — the twins’ fetid, decomposing bodies – one, in shorts, in a face-down position on a bed; the other, naked, but for only a pair of black socks, lying face up, nearby. And around them was chaos and turmoil.An expensive armchair, likely a costly antique, was stained with human excrement, and the place was littered with half-eaten sandwiches, rotting TV dinner trays, grubby clothing, encrusted dinnerware, also a small amount of cash: $22.But there was no sign of a break-in, or of any form of violence.