The Acrobat

by Edward J. Delaney

“Everyone wants to be Cary Grant,” mused the world’s most famous leading man. “Even I want to be Cary Grant.”

It is 1959, the year of his greatest successes but also at the zenith of a charmed career, and the 55-year-old man who calls himself Cary Grant is on a deep journey into the self. Introduced to the wonders of LSD as part of his therapy at The Psychiatric Institute of Beverly Hills, he embarks on the hundred or more trips into his past, to the long-ago person he knows to be Archie Leach.

The Acrobat combines fact and fiction to explore the life of Cary Grant, from his start in English vaudeville as an acrobat and stilt walker to the pinnacle of his Hollywood success. Alternating between Grant’s past and his present in the late 1950s, the narrative brings to life the actor’s inner world and his relationships with some of the people that mattered most to him: Howard Hughes, Randolph Scott, Blake Edwards, Tony Curtis, and two of the five women he married.

Amidst the endless versions of himself and the characters that he played, who was Cary Grant, really? Who was he meant to be? Who in the end did he want to become? This riveting dramatization of the actor’s life and mind takes us beyond places that mere biographies have tread. It is an imaginative exploration written by a fiction master craftsman, and a must-read for classic film buffs, actors, and for all readers intrigued by radical journeys of self-exploration.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction, Film, Biographical Fiction, Adult

280 pages, Paperback

Published November 1, 2022

Reviews

[Chrissie Whitley · Rating 4 out of 5]

In The Acrobat, Edward J. Delaney blends fact and fiction to explore the enigmatic life of Cary Grant. Set in 1959, at the height of his fame, the book imagines an introspective journey through over a hundred LSD therapy sessions, revisiting his past as Archie Leach, an English vaudevillian acrobat. Grant grapples with the many roles he played — both on and off screen — while trying to discover who he truly is if he isn’t really Cary Grant and is no longer Archibald Leach.

Alternating between Grant’s golden Hollywood years and his LSD therapy sessions, Delaney crafts a fascinating and vivid portrait of the man behind the icon, offering an engrossing exploration of identity, fame, and self-discovery.

This would make an excellent fiction-nonfiction pairing with Scott Eyman's Cary Grant: A Brilliant Disguise.

[Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

Delaney uses the raw facts of Grant's life–his birth in Bristol, early performing as a child acrobat, his move to Hollywood, and his experimental use of LSD under a psychologist's supervision–as a way to create a character that reflects contemporary identity formation. Delaney's Grant is a cypher to himself as much as to his audience. He's worried that he is little more than surfaces, playing himself as a man playing himself playing a character in a movie. It's deliciously relevant that one of his most famous roles (in "North by Northwest") has him playing a man mistaken for another man who does not even exist.

Structurally, the book is a college of moments from his past as well as depictions of his LSD trips. Don't be put off by the latter. They aren't surreal, tedious psychedelic trips. Instead, they are emotionally revealing dreams that link his past to his present. You'll have little bits of frisson as you recognize other famous Hollywood stars who make cameos throughout the book.

[Morgan Hamel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cary Grant baby!

[Karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

And into Cary Grant’s head we go—drug enhanced at times but a very creative and well written journey of this actor’s beginnings and stardom. Intimate. Love the flow. Want to read more!

[Mike · Rating 3 out of 5]

Arriving in Hollywood, Archie Leach’s dreams had finally come true. But years later, the man now better known as Cary Grant wonders who he might have been without the magic of Tinsel Town.

A fictionalized biography of Cary Grant that, although prominently mentioned on the book jacket, rarely delves into his LSD therapy, but paints a fascinating and affecting portrait of a legend who struggled with his own success.

[caro · Rating 3 out of 5]

this started so strong with a cool and unique way of looking at a historical figure and devolved into a wikipedia mcflurry

[Philip · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great way to end the year. Cary Grant’s life as a novel. Very well written. Entertaining and informative even if as a novel.

[ROBYN MARKOW · Rating 4 out of 5]

An unique ,absorbing biography about iconic movie star Cary Grant. This isn't a typical bio in that it explores his use of LSD while under a Dr's care) When under its influence,he recalls his life from growing up the only son( he had an older brother who passed away before he was born) of working- class parents in Bristol,England. With a distant father who worked as a presser and a mother who left when he was a pre-teen, Archie Leach found his escape in watching Vaudeville acts and early silent movies. Later he asks to help out for no pay since he doesn't want to go back to his dreary home life and ends works the spotlight at a local Music Hall . That leads to wanting to perform himself, joining an acrobat troupe( hence the title of this book):which tours England & then America ,when Archie decides,w/a friend /fellow troupe member to try their luck in New York City. The friend gives up and goes home,but Archie stays on,getting small parts in stage productions then becoming a supporting player.He then makes the decision to go to Hollywood ,where he changes his name & becomes the film star we know today .
However,he feels that he's losing himself by becoming the polished performer ( awa being married several times ) so he does LSD therapy as a way to recover the piece of himself that he felt he's lost.
It says that this a "Fictionalized" biography which made me wonder which events mentioned in it actually happened, but other than that ,this was an interesting bio which I recommend..

[Steve Carter · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Acrobat by Edward J. Delaney

This is a fictional biography of a fictional person. It includes the contemplations of the real person who transformed into a celebrity and what he makes of the happenstance of this bizarre international movie stardom.

The real person fictionalized here is Archibald Leach, the son of, not even a tailor, but a pressor born and raised in Bristol, England. The fictional person fictionalized is Cary Grant. The novel deftly time travels through the early years of the acrobatic vaudevillian, gently bouncing us to the mind of the 50 to 60 year old star as he looks back at what was that all about while deciding what to do next.

The Acrobat, published in late 2022, is also timely in that it explores the LSD psychological therapy he undertook. There is a 21st Century resurgence into the idea of using psychedelics as a powerful tool for personal growth and renewed understanding of oneself.
The novel fits in with the work of popular best selling author Michael Pollan’s How to Change Your Mind about his late in life explorations of various psychedelics. A follow up book This is Your Mind on Plants expands that study. How to Change Your Mind has been adapted into a four part Netflix documentary series which is bound to reach far more people than the diminishing number of book readers in the moving image age. The series serves as almost a commercial for psychedelics in that it is a far more positive view of this stuff than mainstream commercial entertainment did the first time around when it ping ponged from ridiculous and ineffective propaganda such as Art Linkletter’s unfortunate daughter, this is your mind egg in a frying pan PSA TV ads. All this after an extremely confusing introduction of the substances via hit new music, Are Your Experienced, rock star Beatles, and Leary evangelical promotion.
Another art LSD project played NYC last year. This one oddly enough was a Broadway musical Flying Over Sunset (FLYING OVER SUNSET - Montage). This musical is by James Lapine, a hit show maker with Stephen Sondhiem in the past and played at Lincoln Center. It is about the psychedelic explorations of Aldous Huxley, Clare Boothe Luce, and Cary Grant. (This writer has not seen or read this show's book.)

This reader tries to stay clear of celebrity, movie, rock star biographies. The notion being that after the early wannabe years in which bio info of stars might be practical and instructional, there is little point at gazing up at the kings and queens of our culture. Their lives are so extreme and odd they provide little useful info to the common person. We are all complicated and human, it is really more interesting what the simple complicated folk do to get by than the rags to riches freaks among us.

So why read The Acrobat? This reader was interested in the popularization of LSD, the new interest in it and how it was going to be shown in the novel. It was not new information that Cary Grant was an advocate and participant in LSD therapy. This reader in fact asked the star about this in a Q&A segment of a traveling live show Grant did 38 years ago at Proctor’s Theater in Schenectady, NY in 1984. The question was about LSD and he didn’t back off in the slightest. The battle shaming him over this was almost 25 years in the past. He said it was a significant experience for him. https://www.carygrant.net/articles/sc...

Cary Grant oddly enough was one of the first high profile personalities to talk publicly about LSD therapy and how he felt it benefitted his life. There was Huxley of course but not a movie star and not the biggest of movie stars at the top of the heap like Cary Grant. In this novel it involves a situation of mentioning it off hand and off the record to a showbiz reporter, but Grant thought this could harm the business of two movies he had in the can: Operation Petticoat and North By Northwest. So he denied ever having spoken to the reporter which couldn’t work out for him since the reporter had recorded an audio tape and also had photos. The reporter sued the star for defamation and they settled in a way that involved a wider distribution of the LSD story. Ultimately it was not a problem and had no effect on his career.

Grant was introduced to the therapy through one of his marriages, to Betsy Drake. They had met on her very first movie Every Girl Should Get Married. So naturally he married his co-star who should get married and did. They were married from 1948 until 1962, his longest marriage and her one. Betsy Drake never remarried and eventually got a Masters of Education from Harvard and became a child therapist while having no children herself. With the two of them hings had gone bad when he had an affair with Sophia Loren while they were making a movie together and wanted to go off with her except she then married Carlo Ponti. So Drake went to Dr Mortimer Hartman as part of dealing with the upset in their marriage and suggested that Cary do as well.

The novel handles the LSD experience quite well. This is done by staying away from dealing with it directly. The chapters tend to begin with an italicized page of two of dream like scenes, These could be interpreted as compilations during the blindfolded LSD sessions, but Delaney doesn’t tell us directly that it is a function of the LSD. This is the safe route. LSD, psychedelic experience is not easily or at all explainable through text and speech, and it’s the type of thing that one cannot assume is like alcohol or some other drug or cannabis. From reading the novel it is impossible to tell if the author himself is experienced and that is just fine. The focus of the novel is the turning point of an aging man in a very odd position in life that he doesn’t entirely understand since his life had become the role of Cary Grant. This gives the novel the appeal of a story that the average reader can get something from. Aren’t we all in masks, playing a type of role that is us but also oddly not? The novel is good in that it focuses on the point of the therapy, not the tools used in exploration or the razmataz special effects that the tool is famous for.

This fine, entertaining, short novel (267 pages) is packed with info on the early years of Archibald Leach through to the early 60s when he is pushing 60 himself and then stops. If the reader is already aware of the biography of this man, they might still get an interesting take on the star from Delaney’s point of view. Others will get an adequate amount of bio information to suffice and a good story about the inner workings of an aging and somewhat alienated man. It also shows how a difficult situation of a boy child and his mother, a confusing separation, can cause the man to perhaps have a hard time staying and trusting a long term relationship with a woman, a marriage or facsimile.

Recommended
The book was a New York Public Library brand new paperback.
Free ride.

[Jason Kasting · Rating 5 out of 5]

The premise sounds thin but it is very good and extremely well written.

[Lily · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this although it kind of went nowhere. Enjoyably so! Edward J. Delaney tells a biography of sorts, zooming in on the twilight of Cary Grant's career, a period where he took experimental LSD as prescribed to him by his Timothy Leary-esque doctor, Dr. Hartman. He goes on dreamlike trips and flashes back to critical moments in his life.

Cary Grant--or rather Archibald Leach--was not by any means posh or upper-class. His father was a tailor's presser and he grew up in Bristol. Far from his Hollywood persona. He joins up with a circus, and with his talent for mimicry gets discovered by Hollywood producers. He models his whole shtick off of Douglas Fairbanks, himself on the downturn at the advent of the Talkies. He marries a couple times, has no children, and learns his mother in fact did not die in his childhood but instead was taken away to live in a mental institution. Oof.

This was frankly very well-trod territory: famous man seemingly at the top of the world wonders what it's all for. Deep ennui, existential dread, depression, and a fear of his current stagnation. In fact, Bojack Horseman does all of these themes much better and with more pathos, but this one was still a fun and quick read. I kind of liked the fact that Delaney never calls him Cary Grant, only refer to his name change early on in his career. He refers to him as The Acrobat, Arch or Archie (meaning Archibald Leach, real name of Cary Grant.) The name change really hit home the who-am-I, celebrity-is-meaningless stuff.

One last quibble, the LSD trips were very unrealistic and hack. I obviously haven't taken any psychedelics, but from all of my Beatle research and that one episode of Mad Men where they all take LSD in the office, I happen to know that this was more a drug of opening one's consciousness to the present moment and heightening their senses. In 1965, Pattie Boyd famously freaked out in the elevator because the red light made her think there was a fire. She didn't start dreaming she was floating and flying in a technicolor sky, for god's sake. Cary Grant's LSD trips in this book were all like walking through crowds of beautiful synchronized swimmers à la Big Lebowski, and even falling in a tuxedo (more Mad Men!)

But other than that--and the fact that at the end, he learns nothing from all of these trips inward and just kind of moves on with his tortured existence--I really enjoyed reading this! I don't know, it was fun to visit Old Hollywood and catch references to movies I've seen and old celebrities I recognize. He weighs whether or not to do Charade because of the age difference (which is plainly ridiculous, but god what a movie!) He recalls meeting Katharine Hepburn and taking on her accent, fully shedding his past British self! That kind of stuff was fun.

[kat · Rating 4 out of 5]

high 3/3.5 but rounding up

this book was on the “new and recommended fiction” display at the library and the cover caught my attention and i’m glad i ended up taking it — this is what i imagine blonde by joyce carol oates is like, except this doesn’t have the weird exploitation aspect.

i love old hollywood & so i really enjoyed all the old movie talk — but my curiosity got the best of me causing me to constantly grab my phone and look up people, movies, events etc — kinda reminded me of once upon a time in hollywood and a bit of the seven husbands of evelyn hugo

the jumping back and forth in time was an interesting choice & i like how the character was referred to as either Arch or The Acrobat, as opposed to Cary, since that was just a made up hollywood name.

but there wasn’t much of a story, just sort of a timeline of events, but still enjoyable. i liked how it humanizes hollywood stars, specifically the protagonist, showing that even though they have fame and fortune, they can still be lacking something (archie not truly knowing who he is bc he’s changed his name and persona, not having a family, etc.)

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a fairly brief fictional account of Cary Grant's life - not his complete life, but enough to get a feel for the man and the myth. Some of it is told through his experiences using LSD under a psychiatrist's care in 1959. The rest jumps around in time, much of it in the 50s while he's filming Operation Petticoat. As opposed the last book I read about Rita Hayworth and Orson Welles, I never felt like I was reading his filmography even though the reader definitely gets a taste of his movie-making days. While not overt, the author does imply Grant's bisexuality. My favorite parts were when he was interacting with Randolph Scott. While I don't think anyone really knows for sure, I strongly believe that they had a relationship and were truly in love. For all his debonair ways, he probably really was always more Archie Leach than Cary Grant. As he, himself, said, "Everyone wants to be Cary Grant. Even I want to be Cary Grant." He's a gem.

[Jess · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sadly, this book was kind of a drag. I guess, after reading BLONDE, any bio-fiction of icons will be lackluster. Growing up, Cary Grant was one of the greats in my house, and I thought this book would dive into his rumored homosexuality, drug experimentation, etc. It did address both, the former INCREDIBLY BRIEFLY and coded when he's living with his friend, and the latter was just kinda boring. I felt like I didn't learn much except that his birth name was Archibald Leach and just like EVERYONE he was consumed by imposter syndrome.

Honestly like fine. I was spoiled by BLONDE so here is me saying go read that!!! Like idk, it's a short book and it was still a drag to get through by the end.

Reminiscent of:
BLONDE
MR. VERTIGO

[Zach Abbruscato · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think its do funny to know that Cary Grant has done so much LSD through psychotherapy that a fictionalized retelling of it almost makes the story seem way more unbelievable. I think that’s owed to the dialog feeling ripped from how Grant would talk in his own films. Admittedly though, I easily became lost with how the book jumps through time. I’m not a big fan of when books do that since I have to jump back a bit to remember where I am (or in this books case what year I’m in). Yet, I’m able to make the case here cause it’s a retelling of one of Hollywoods greatest stories through very imaginative eyes.

[Dee · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’m probably just not a fan of “fictional biography” as a genre to begin with and I admittedly know next to nothing about Cary Grant so this one was a bust for me. I also really don’t enjoy books that time hop, which happened here a lot. I would’ve never chosen this book on my own but I appreciate the varied selection that book clubs force me to explore. I wouldn’t recommend this personally, but it was a relatively quick and easy read overall. Just not sure how much truth/reality is actually conveyed in the story. Onto the next one!

[Amanda Vrany · Rating 3 out of 5]

Unique interpretation of Cary Grant's life, looked at through the Lense of a man trying to figure out who he is and searching through the help of LSD. A fictionalized account, based on real fact, of his life in Bristol as an orphan, his coming to the US as an acrobat and then his subsequent rise to fame. The author grapples with his relationships with women, and men, and brings you a different look of the beloved actor. No one has a perfect life, even Archie Leach.

[Matthew J · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book to be a real pleasure to read. The prose flows well, and the construction of the time jumps keeps things moving. It’s a fictional biography but really doesn’t need to be, I think that just allows for some shortcuts with regards to setting up the character(s). You probably won’t learn anything about Cary Grant but you will have read a solid, short novel about how being a “performer” affects one’s self view through life.

[Chris Lewis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some very clever (fictional) recreations of scenes from his life, punctuated at chapter beginnings by imagined LSD visions that I found far less interesting. There is also, generally speaking, an idea running through the book that Grant, now successful, was haunted by some kind of remorse or discomfort about having risen from poverty, which may or may not be true. Who knows? But I felt a little weird buying into that assumption as I read.

[Jeanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Having read and enjoyed Delaney's short stories, I wanted to sample one of his novels, as I very much appreciate his succinct writing style. He brings Gary Grant to life with an introspective account of a successful Hollywood star/legend who was never quite sure who he was, or wanted to be. Highly recommended.

[Sam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty good! As someone who is very interested in Cary Grant as an actor but didn’t know much about his personal life it was an intriguing read, but this definitely has its shortcomings, I wish it went deeper into his professional life and inner emotions

[Hugh Atkins · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book. Although it is a fictional narrative on the life of Cary Grant, I'm sure I learned quite a bit about him. My only issue is that it seemed to end a bit abruptly and didn't cover anything about him after about 1960.

[Erin Pacitti]

Loved loved loved this book! The writing was fantastic, the plot was interesting but never tried to do too much, and I loved how the whole plot was based on real life. The only thing I didn’t like was how years jumped around in the older timeline—I wish it was more chronological.

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

(3.5 stars) - Purposefully hazy yet introspective, the pacing is better in the first two thirds of the novel.

[Erin Haught · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really great writer. I enjoyed the book even though the ending led to nowhere. Cary was an interesting character to learn about. Would definitely read this author again if he came my way.