Cary Grant Is High on LSD in ‘Flying Over Sunset.’ Everyone Else Has a Bad Trip.
Flying Over Sunset is, appropriately for its subject material, a strange trip of a musical—delightful in places, disconnected in others, and mainly a bore and downer. The real draw is that this Lincoln Center musical (to Feb 6, 2022) has Tony Yazbeck as Cary Grant dancing and tap-dancing alongside Atticus Ware as Cary Grant’s younger self. This is dancing, choreographed by Michelle Dorrance, as pure artistry.
The musical, directed by James Lapine, follows an imagined meeting in the late 1950’s between Cary Grant (Yazbeck), Aldous Huxley (Harry Hadden-Paton), and Clare Boothe Luce (Carmen Cusack), all tripping off their faces on LSD at Luce’s glamorous Malibu mansion as their respective trips lead them to confront old demons.
Apart from Yazbeck doing a second, wonderful dance routine, the drug-induced experiences lead to ponderous misery and self-examination. The trio hail their drug-taking as liberating and fun; it sure doesn’t seem that way watching this show. Instead, it just bears out the truth that there’s no worse trip than having to witness somebody else’s.