The Flight Attendant (2020) — LoveDrunk Murder on Cloud 9
By: Derek Lu
Tags: Gender Equality, Trauma, Addiction, Pop Culture, TV Series

One of the most pleasant televisual surprises of 2020 has been The Flight Attendant, starring Kaley Cuoco as Cassie Bowden, a flight attendant who has a one-night stand with a good-looking passenger named Alex Sokolov (played by an alluring Michael Huisman) and wakes up next to his deceased body. She becomes the prime suspect of his murder and sets out to prove her innocence. The caveat: she can’t remember large swaths of their time together, due to the copious alcohol they consumed. Upon first viewing of the trailer, I was in. A sky-high whodunit awash with enviable destinations and punctuated by Cuoco’s trademark affable, kooky persona. My only question was: Would there be any depth to this character, or is she playing another version of Penny, the hot blonde next door? The verdict: Although the show takes a meandering, turbulent route to reach its chilling climax and destination, the payoff is ultimately worth it.

Kaley Cuoco stars as a flight attendant who finds herself in way over her head. Image: WarnerMedia.

The show may be billed as a frothy murder-mystery, but the actual murder at hand is rather conventional. Alex is not who he seemed, and his family’s empire and vast wealth is tied up in some super shady dealings. The more interesting narrative that lurks underneath is a deeply considered character study of a young woman in the grips of alcohol addiction and repressed traumas. That’s not to say that the character Cassie is entirely sympathetic. During the first half of the series, I frequently found myself screaming at my television/computer screen, aghast by her persistent indulgences and confoundingly terrible decisions. At times, I even felt compelled to root for her demise, because her character is wholly narcissistic and relentlessly self-involved. But that’s precisely how someone who is consistently not of the right mind and unable to confront the gravity of her circumstances — and her addiction — would behave. The series forces viewers (it certainly did me) to confront possible biases they might possess about the often vexing behavior and self-sabotage that addiction begets.

Don’t judge this show by it’s trailer!

Cuoco is terrific in her first major post Big Bang Theory outing. She sells Cassie’s manic desperation to cling to “normalcy” and willful denial about her addiction as she spins one lie after another to her co-workers, her brother, her best friend, and her mind. Rolling Stone noted in their review that “Cuoco is sharp and likable throughout, two necessary ingredients for playing a character who makes a scene wherever she goes.” Though I feel hesitant to rely on tired, wholly subjective, and rather sexist notions of a woman’s “likability,” it is true that Cuoco is commanding and charismatic in this role. Even though the character could easily be played off as a stereotypical “dumb blonde”/”hot mess party animal,” Cuoco imbues Cassie with a thready vulnerability, always seeming like she is one shot away from completely falling apart. That is to say, as we soon realize, there are real layers to this character, as much as she would like to keep them buried.

Cassie’s “mind palace” offers a sanctuary from her demons. Image: TVLine.

One of the most interesting storytelling devices this show employs is the “mind palace” to which Cassie escapes in order to make sense of her increasingly insane situation. It’s a magical realist space she somehow shares with *spoiler alert* Alex, the man she is accused of murdering, who she is also quickly falling for. It’s also the one place where Cassie is able to be brutally honest with herself, often with Alex’s goading. However, it should not be a surprise to say that Cassie’s rampant alcohol abuse stems from some deeply repressed trauma, including her twisted bond with her wholly negligent father; she has so thoroughly re-membered and re-written the entire narrative of her childhood such that it perpetually strains her relationship with her older brother. The show, consequently, is much more than a surface level depiction of the travails of a flight attendant battling addiction; it’s a decidedly granular and interior exploration of the ways in which traumas gets passed on and lives on intergenerationally. Try as she might, the emotional residue from her interrupted girlhood cling to her as intimately as the fictions she weaves about herself.

I can’t forget to mention the stellar supporting cast here. First, there’s Rosie Perez as Cassie’s co-worker Megan, who happens to be involved in her own criminal conspiracy. It’s refreshing to see Perez in a fun, light-hearted role such as this, given that she’s built a career off playing gritty, tortured characters, like in Fearless and Birds of Prey. I’m still not sure exactly what to make of this friendship, as it’s never really explained why Megan takes a liking to the party animal that is Cassie. T.R. Knight plays Cassie’s brother David, who at first comes across as very vanilla and the complete opposite of Cassie. He’s married to a Black man, with whom he has two kids together, and he’s wary about his daughters spending time with their aunt due to her drinking. Yet, he’s battling his own childhood demons, and his past with Cassie will prove to be consequential to their mutual healing. [Editor’s note: This year marks an unexpected but wholly welcome TR Knight renaissance, between this and his surprise return to megahit Grey’s Anatomy.]

TR Knight is one of several key supporting players on Flight Attendant. Image: Deadline.

Zosia Mamet portrays Cassie’s best friend and partner in crime Annie, a lawyer whose skills and shady clients Cassie relies on for getting her out of trouble. Mamet’s sharp tongue complements Cuoco’s sweet nothings, and Annie does have a more level head and attempts to steer the sinking ship that is Cassie, until Annie, too, reaches a breaking point. It’s my introduction to Mamet as a performer, but apparently she has quite the devoted fan base on Twitter. Finally, there’s mysterious hitwoman Miranda Croft, played by a perfectly sardonic Michelle Gomez. I won’t reveal how she plays into the whole Alex Sokolov conspiracy, except to say that the showrunner keep their cards close to the chest, never revealing whether Miranda wants to kill or rescue Cassie, or both, until the end of the season. Gomez strikes a perfect balance between menacing and desperate, and steals every scene she is in.

Michelle Gomez plays a mysterious mercenary. Image: RadioTimes.

Finally, I want to praise the career moves Cuoco has been making since Big Bang Theory concluded. With the millions she earned from BBT, she started her own production company, Yes, Norman Productions, and optioned the rights to the book The Flight Attendant in 2017, with plans to both star in and executive produce the series. She sold the show to WarnerMedia through a first-look production deal in 2019, and it has become HBO Max’s first breakout hit, already renewed for a second season. This is in no small part thanks to both Cuoco’s business savvy and her frantic, magnetic lead performance. [After all, she achieved pay parity with her white male co-stars before gay equality was a national conversation in Hollywood.] I’ve been of fan of Cuoco’s since her breakout role on the family sitcom 8 Simple Rules, and I’ve always felt that Cuoco was a much better performer than the stereotypical material she was given on the nerd drivel that was BBT. But it made her a household name and provided her with the financial freedom and cultural cache to pursue projects of her choice. I can’t wait to see what she does next.