by
David Schultz
Homicidal maniacs and
killers have graced the boards on Broadway before; most notably in Sondheim’s Sweeny
Todd in 1979. Other less notable villains have been seen before,
though it is a rare occurrence that they star in their own musical. The
portrait of this cult figure was initially introduced to us in Bret Easton
Ellis’s book published in 1991. This killer-driller-thriller was condemned in
many literary circles and was sighted for being extremely misogynistic and
extraordinarily gory. Times have changed; the film version has achieved a
certain cult status in many circles, and over the decades has become a time
capsule of the 80’s. This psychopathic murderer has evolved into an antihero….
who knew?
Composer Duncan Sheik (Spring
Awakening), along with book writer Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa has created a
musical with an arch satirical tone that attempts to give our hero a patina of
emotional reflection before he carves out his wanton murders. The narcissism of
the decade, and materialistic greed of these shallow denizens is unearthed to
good effect.
Morgan Weed, Alex
Michael Stoll, Benjamin Walker, Dave Thomas Brown, Jordan Dean and Heléne
Yorke.
The evening begins as the
monster at hand ascends from the stage lying in a tanning booth, clothed in
just his tighty-whities, singing boastfully of his accoutrements at home and
his daily cleansing regimen. This “Opening (Morning Routine)” dialogue
is lifted directly from the book, and sets the tone for the evening. Acerbic
verbiage is sung directly to the audience as the stage is shot through with
visual projections of commercials of the day, shallow empty shills for the
consumer dollar, co-mingled with snippets of president Reagan pontificating to
the masses. Capitalism and politics blur as the musical starts out on its
bloody inevitable trail of horror.
Benjamin Walker (Patrick
Bateman) takes this rather one-dimensional character, a young Wall Street
investment banker, and transforms him into a tortured conflicted soul filled
with subterranean remorse just below the surface. He is cool and distant with his
shallow fiancée Evelyn (Helene Yorke), perfectly captured in a shrill and
amusing reading of this role. In addition to his fiancée Bateman has snared
Evelyn’s best friend Courtney (Morgan Weed) as his mistress.
Morgan
Weed and Helene Yorke
The office that Patrick
works for is filled with overly cocky and confident men clawing their way
higher up the ladder of success. Standouts are Timothy Price (Theo Stockman)
and Paul Owen (Drew Moerlein) who will get his comeuppance at the close of the
first act, shown in bloody detail. Overseeing the office for Patrick
is his dutiful secretary Jean (Jennifer Damiano) who attends to his every whim.
The cast is loaded with
various businessmen who populate the office, but they, no doubt a director’s
conceit, blend into one another and it’s frequently hard to distinguish one man
from the other; they seem to be cut from the same overconfident cloth.
Patrick’s depressed and medicated mother (Alice Ripley) oversees her son in a
confused mindset. She only chooses to recall her son as a young boy, and turns
her head away from a creeping sensation that something is amiss. Ms. Ripley is
largely wasted in a very small role, but she is nonetheless gripping in her few
moments onstage. The violence begins early on with Patrick thinking ‘its just a
phase’ that he is going through. But incrementally, with each additional death
piling up, he finds his true calling, as each monstrous act seems to salve his
uncontrollable desires for a while, until the next time he finds a new victim
to slaughter.
The extreme violence
within the musical is kept at arm’s reach. The show is buoyed along with its
wink-wink asides to the audience, mingled with its pitch-black comic moments.
An undeniable sense of alienation has created this monster. Finding the
right savage mood is the tricky thing, and as hard as it tries, this musical is
frequently at odds with its seesawing tone. Switching gears and shaking up an
audience is surely a good thing, but in retrospect, the musical still is
missing that ephemeral ingredient to make the thing pop and truly make an
impact and cohere.
There is still much to
recommend, first and foremost the physical design of the piece. Scenic designer
ES Devlin has concocted a claustrophobic box-like minimalistic interior, all
the better to allow Video designer Finn Ross to run riot with a plethora of
phantasmagoric projections onto the space. This visual space is shockingly
alive as it gives a propulsive life to the musical. Mr. Sheik’s electronic-pop
score has a distinct 80’s sound as it amusingly replicates the dance music of
the era. The lyrics are arch and in keeping with the tone of the original book
and film. This score works well within the confines of the interior mind of
these characters.
As the play nears its
conclusion, as the body count reaches an exceedingly high amount; a passing
comment from a detective puts a spin on what we have just been sitting through
for the last two hours. Some theatergoers will see it as a cop-out, others will
possibly see it as a brilliant commentary on the lead character’s disturbed
mind. The open-ended question sits there in your cranium. Does it make all the
joyful butchering violence any more palatable? Your guess is as good as mine.
Love it or hate it, this Psycho is one of the more unusual offerings running on
Broadway right now.
Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre
236 West 45th Street
Telecharge.com
212-239-6200
AmericanPsychoTheMusical.com