cuckoo

That’s a big dose of Murphy, who co-created both projects with flourishes familiar to fans of his oeuvre, including “American Horror Story,” “Feud” — the most recent installment of which focused on Truman Capote’s crash-and-burn relationship with ladies of New York high society — and “Ratched,” a macabre and admirably vivid prequel to “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.”

And yet California has massive rates of poverty, cuckoo housing costs that are forcing people to flee, and a shameful number of homeless people, many suffering from addiction, mental illness or both.

Many of the needle drops littered throughout Tilman Singer’s horror flick “Cuckoo,” released in theaters Friday, were written into the script’s first draft in 2019.

Just like costuming or set design, music is a world-building tactic in “Cuckoo,” Singer said.

In the psychedelic horror trip that is “Cuckoo,” music serves as an emotional and narrative guide, telling “a different story” than the surface-level plot, Singer said.