Critics' choice theatre shows in Melbourne

When Michael Douglas’ Wall Street wanker Gordon Gekko said, “Greed… is good,” in filmmaker Oliver Stone’s 1987 triumph, Wall Street, he nail-gunned the decade’s selfish excess to the wall so hard it basically birthed Patrick Bateman.  Set two years later and released in 1991, American author Bret Easton Ellis’ gruesome third novel, American Psycho, is hung on the self-centred Bateman, a 27-year-old preening predator in a pinstripe suit.  An ambitious investment banker obsessed with horror movies, Huey Lewis, his skincare regime, business cards, restaurant reservations and one-upping the competition, Bateman is an empty shell of a man. Lurking in the darkening void where his heart should be is a far more odious truth. Worshipping “The Donald,” he shares the now-President’s malignant narcissism.  That, and he’s also a cold-blooded serial killer. Christian Bale breathed baleful life into this slick-haired monster in Mary Harron’s menacingly marvellous 1998 film. If you pay close attention to See You Sunday’s return season production of the musical – with a book by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa and music and lyrics by Duncan Sheik – you’ll spot a cameo by Bale.  Wait, what? Is Christian Bale in American Psycho: A Musical Thriller? Sort of. Directed by Mark Taylor in conjunction with musical director Aaron Robuck, See You Sunday’s spectacular production at Chapel Off Chapel stars chillingly precise Heathers bad boy Conor Beaumont as the Valentino tuxedo buttoned-up psychopath. But in...