What a difference a change in medium makes. In Australia, Brett Easton Ellis’ controversial, stomach-churning, and brilliant novel American Psycho is still sold wrapped in plastic, with an R classification sticker prominently displayed. But throw in a few snappy song and dance numbers, and this satirical saga of hollow consumerism and horrific slaughter is fit for the Sydney Opera House. To be fair, the gruesome details have been largely elided; this is no grand Guignol horror show. Still, the razor-sharp satirical intent remains, even if most of the actual razors are absent.
Ben Gerrard (I Am My Own Wife) plays Patrick Bateman, the Wall Street shark stalking his prey in late '80s New York. By day that's figurative, by night, it’s literal. He is a sadistic serial killer, and a seemingly uncatchable one. Or is that because his horrific crimes are all in his head? The book, the film adaptation, and now the stage musical are all ambivalent on the subject. But even if he’s not a multiple murderer, Patrick is undoubtedly a loathsome specimen: shallow, facile, obsessed with status and wealth, incapable of real human connection.
So too is almost everyone in his circle, from fiancée Evelyn (Shannon Dooley, Young Frankenstein) to side piece Courtney (Erin Clare, Heathers: The Musical), and best friend Tim (Mark Hill, A Chorus Line). Then there’s rival Paul (Jason Winston, Assassins) and closeted hanger-on Luis (Liam Nunan, The Golden Age). Are Patrick’s crimes, real or imagined, that much worse than more abstract sins he and his ilk perpetuate every day?
The book by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa hews closely to Mary Harron’s film adaptation in terms of narrative beats and selected scenes, but it’s the way you tell the story of a murderous yuppie that counts. Returning to the work after a run at the Hayes Theatre in 2019, director Alexander Berlage gets a lot out of the minimalist, neon-striped, revolving set designed by Isabel Hudson, seamlessly cramming countless scene changes into the running time.
The focus is on the performances, all pitched (deliberately, rest assured) a little too shrilly for comfort. Rictus-grinning, chiselled Gerrard is a wonderful stage Bateman, his anxieties and narcissism writ large for the cheap seats. The other MVP is Angelique Cassimatis as his naïve secretary Jean, pretty much the only recognisably human character in the ensemble. Her sunny good nature throws the awful antics of everyone else into stark relief.
Musically, you might expect a surfeit of needle drops, American Psycho being a prime candidate for a jukebox musical adaptation thanks to Patrick’s pop music obsessions. However, while some ‘80s bangers get an airing – Phil Collins’ ‘Something in the Air’ and Huey Lewis’ ‘Hip to be Square’ chief among them – it’s the original music and lyrics by Duncan Sheik that resonate most.
This is a production packed with song to the point where it becomes almost overwhelming, but Sheik mostly manages the difficult task of communicating the source material’s themes, culminating in the final song, ‘This is Not an Exit’ (the novel’s final line). It attempts to sum up the whole ball of wax as Gerrard’s Bateman stalks off the stage and into the stalls, erasing the lines between actor and audience, killer and witness, subject and object. If it doesn’t quite match the power of Ellis’ novel, it’s not for want of trying.
Indeed, it’s only in comparison to the original model that America Psycho: The Musical suffers. The novel is a wildly transgressive text but the stage production, for all its polish and brio, plays it safe. There is no risk of walkouts here, and no fuel for angry letters to the editor, which is in marked contrast to the uproar that surrounded the novel’s publication. Is that a missed opportunity? Perhaps, but maybe the commodification of Ellis’ most infamous work into an enjoyable night of musical theatre is the ultimate irony, in and of itself.