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Donick Cary Brings Comedy, Culture, Toads, and Have a Good Trip 2 to Psychedelic Science 2025

The filmmaker behind Have a Good Trip is back with a psychedelic sequel-in-progress, a cartoonish tribute to 5-MeO toads, and a party lineup featuring Reggie Watts, Flying Lotus, and Jim James.

Next week, Donick Cary — the director of Netflix documentary film Have a Good Trip, and former writer on The Simpsons and Late Night with David Letterman — is about to take over Denver. Not literally, but the sheer scope of what he’s bringing to Colorado for MAPS’ Psychedelic Science 2025 conference makes it feel that way.

Cary is hosting a lineup of panels, screenings, and parties that reflect psychedelic exploration, celebrity storytelling, and comedy as a gateway to spark deeper conversations about psychedelics. At the center of it all is Have a Good Trip 2, the follow-up to his original documentary, which featured stars like Sting, Anthony Bourdain, and Carrie Fisher opening up about their most mind-bending drug trips through absurd reenactments and animations that capture the cosmic joke of it all.

This time around, Cary’s aiming to go a bit deeper. “Part one was really a look back at the last 50 years and the stigma that got attached to [psychedelics],” Cary tells DoubleBlind. “Part two really is like looking at the next 50 years, all the ways that psychedelics are affecting culture and mental health and addiction and PTSD… We really see the celebrity stories now as more of a jumping-off place for experts.” A sneak peek of Have a Good Trip 2 will screen at the Cinematique at the Denver Convention Center on Thursday from 4 to 5 PM.

One of the most gripping elements of the original documentary is the number of posthumous drug tales it features, including ones from Carrie Fischer, Anthony Bourdain, and Fred Willard. Cary tells DoubleBlind that Have A Good Trip 2 features more interviews with beloved celebs who have since traversed to the great beyond. “We did get probably David Crosby’s last extended interview,” says Cary. “We did not know that’s what it was going to be.”

Few things are more psychedelic than pondering the concepts of mortality and existence. Have A Good Trip continues to thematically emphasize that birth and death are on opposite sides of the same spectrum. Life (and drugs) are what happen in the middle. Cary’s uncanny ability to tap in with people and capture them in the homestretch of their lives is what makes the Have A Good Trip project so compelling — prescient, even.

But the second coming of Have A Good Trip isn’t finished yet. Cary says he’s looking for help to finish it. “If you’re looking for a way to have a large, nuanced conversation about psychedelics with a huge audience… and also looking for a place to spend some money and get a tax write-off, and then have a really fun time being part of getting a movie made,” says Cary, “please come and talk to us while we’re [in Denver].”

Attendees can also catch a glimpse of Trippy Toads, Cary’s new animated series that follows a family of endangered 5-MeO-DMT-cotntaining Bufo alvarius toads juggling life as parents to 300 little toads (who play soccer, need to go to college, and have other life needs) and work as operators of a psychedelic retreat center. “We’re going to show a little preview of that,” Cary says. “It’s a big, fun, funny, family buddy cartoon where the toads are also grappling with their own extinction.”

Cary is brilliant at discussing big, nuanced issues through disarming artistic mediums, such as animation and comedy. We see this in The Simpsons. He’ll be discussing that publicly in a pre-event panel titled “Psychedelic Simpsons“ (Tuesday at 1 PM at the PORTAL Dome), which explores how the iconic cartoon incorporated psychedelic messaging into mainstream family TV. “No other sitcom has had all four leads and everyone in the town be on psychedelics,” Cary says. “That’s kind of amazing.”

He’ll also moderate a conversation with Vic Mensa and Reggie Watts that promises both levity and gravity. “It’s a combination of psychedelic stories and psychedelic therapy,” Cary says. “There’ll be a funny side… and then there’ll be stories that give a template of how to talk about grief and dig into it.”

Cary and his team are also hosting the official MAPS kickoff concert: A psychedelic variety show featuring DJ sets from Jim James, a full music and comedy set from Reggie Watts, and a headlining visual feast by Flying Lotus. Indigenous Enterprise dancers will open the night, alongside live painting from Denver-based collective THREDA and a liquid light show that will make you feel like your brain is pleasantly melting.

Through all of this, Cary’s goal is simple: to normalize psychedelics through storytelling, comedy, and culture. If you want to be part of that mission — or better yet, be in the credits of Have a Good Trip 2 — he and his team are open for business.

“You can get a tax write-off and help make a movie,” Cary says. “And get a credit on a movie. So yes, we are looking to find, see who we meet at MAPS this year who might be interested in being a part of that process.”

Roll up. Tune in. And of course, have a good trip.

Around the Web

• The Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians just voted to legalize marijuana on tribal land, making them the first jurisdiction in the state to take that leap. Read more from Marijuana Moment.

• Nearly a decade ago, a group of priests, rabbis, imams, and other religious leaders took high doses of psilocybin in a bold scientific study. Now, the long-delayed results reveal that for many, the trip was one of the most profound spiritual experiences of their lives. Read more from Nautil.

• Amanda Feilding, the eccentric countess who championed psychedelics long before it was fashionable, has died at 82. Her visionary research through the Beckley Foundation helped transform LSD, psilocybin, and MDMA from counterculture curiosities into serious tools for mental health treatment. Read more from NYT.

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