Theatre / American Psycho

"I am needing so much more
Every pleasure is a bore
I am something other than
A common man
I'm not a common man..."

— Patrick Bateman, "Not A Common Man"

A musical version of American Psycho. Duncan Sheik (Spring Awakening) wrote the music, and Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa wrote the book.

Like the novel, the show follows Patrick Bateman, an investment banker during the 1980s Wall Street boom who seemingly has it all: looks, charm, wealth, high-flying associates, and a beautiful girlfriend. Beneath this well-off facade, however, Bateman is secretly a psychotic serial killer whose grip on reality declines throughout the musical.

The show premiered in 2013 at London's Almeida Theatre, featuring Matt Smith as Bateman, and ran in 2016 at New York's Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre, starring Benjamin Walker.

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Tropes:

• The '80s: The story is set in the late-1980s with a substantial focus on the fashion, music, and lifestyle of yuppie culture of the decade.
• Adaptational Alternate Ending: There's one small change to the ending of the musical that doesn't occur in the other sources. Patrick never dumps Evelyn, and by the closing number, they're expected to marry.
• Adaptation Personality Change: In the American version, Bateman is still disgusting in the usual ways, but a lot more outwardly anxious and despairing, with Jean as a quasi-Morality Pet ("I almost hurt someone good") and a BSoD Song at the end.
• Adaptational Name Change: Prostitute "Christie" becomes "Christine".
• All Just a Dream: There is the possibility that the murders and other events recounted by Bateman only take place inside his head.
• Almost Kiss: Bateman and Jean nearly kiss, before he realizes she really needs to leave and screams for her to go. It's also after this moment, not a massacre like in the book and film, that he tries to confess.
• Always Someone Better: Patrick is driven to kill Paul Owen because Paul's own successes make Patrick feel deeply inadequate.
• Amazingly Embarrassing Parents: Bateman's mother is heavily medicated at all times, hates Evelyn, passive-aggressively tells Jean she should dress better, and sings about Patrick being a nice child (which might not be true).
• Ambiguous Ending: What will happen to Patrick? Is he really a murderer, or is just crazy? We do not get an answer.
• Armored Closet Gay: Maybe Bateman, as Luis hits on him more often and a deranged Bateman bites him, but Luis is seen after, completely unharmed. There's also some subtext with Paul Owen, as he whines about Paul's great body and Evelyn complains this is just the latest "neurotic obsession" of his. Thirdly, in "Common Man", a man is miming a blowjob to another man, before being replaced with a woman.
  Bateman: Where did you go to school, Paul?
  Pryce: For Christ sake, just suck his dick, will you?
• Aside Comment: Bateman mostly shows his Hair-Trigger Temper at perceived slights to the audience.
• Awful Wedded Life: "If We Get Married" has Evelyn sing about wanting a wedding, and Bateman fantasizing about murdering her.
• Audience Surrogate: Jean sings plot-relevant parts of "Everybody Wants To Rule The World" and "In The Air Tonight".
• Birthday Hater: Bateman has his twenty-seventh birthday, and believes he has nothing to show for it, so has an existential crisis that of course involves murder.
• Borrowed Catchphrase: In part of the work's satire in shaping Bateman as a product of 1980s American culture and values, as molded by its media and most prominent political figures, Patrick appropriates other popular phrases of the era for himself. Most notably, Nancy Reagan's "Just Say No", and, more humorously while speaking on a telephone, George H.W. Bush's "Read My Lips".
• Breaking the Fourth Wall:
  • Inverted. Paul Owen enters the play from the audience, handing out his business card to people on his way down the aisle, before joining the other characters on stage.
  • During "Killing Spree", Patrick will sing the lines "Hey pretty girl/You wanna dance?/You wanna get lucky?/Well this is your chance!" to some random woman in the front row.
  • In "Selling Out", Bateman sings, "Everything I'm telling you is a dream I'm selling you" to the audience.
  • In "This Is Not An Exit", Bateman seems to realize he's a fictional character in a story, singing "look at what's been done here, judge it how you wish", "maybe you've been slaughtered, maybe you've been kissed, either way means nothing, I simply don't exist" and "none of this is real, it's not reality".
• Broken Ace: Patrick outwardly appears wealthy, handsome, and successful, but Beneath the Mask he's a soulless, deeply disturbed man with an empty life.
  Bateman: I may be dealing with a nameless feeling, uh oh, uh oh, oh, but everyone keeps saying that I look amazing, so I dunno, dunno, dunno.

• Cannot Tell Fiction from Reality: In reading off on a litany of headlines and stories in a day's newspaper about murders, communists, nazis, AIDS, etc., Patrick Bateman mentions "Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellers".
• Can't Get in Trouble for Nuthin': No one suspects Patrick of anything, even after he confesses everything.
• Capitalism Is Bad: Patrick's and his associates' entire existences revolve around being shallow consumers of high class commercial products like designer clothes, expensive watches, fancy electronics, and getting reservations in highly fashionable restaurants. For Patrick, this emphasis on commercial consumption not only compels him to murder people out of jealousy for having more or better stuff than he does, like Paul Owen, but also causes him to see other people as products for his personal consumption, first realized through his penchant for prostitutes and escorts and later taken to a metaphorical extreme when he turns to cannibalism.
• Cassandra Truth: There are times when Bateman openly confesses his crimes to people, who either don't believe him, mishear him, or think he's joking.
• Composite Character: Several different side-characters with standalone scenes in the novel and/or film are combined, giving these characters more concise arcs.
  • Detective Kimball is merged with Patrick's lawyer from the book and film, to whom Patrick originally confesses his crimes at the end and does not believe him.
  • Patrick's neighbor who bumps into him while at the dry cleaners later meets the same fate as Patrick's ex-girlfriend Bethany from the novel, whom he murders with a nailgun, after she notices his David Onica painting is hung upside-down.
  • Several of Timothy Price's/Bryce's most outlandish outbursts and actions from the book and film are given to Bateman.
• Dark Reprise: Darker. Christine sings a second version of "In The Air Tonight" where she almost knows she's going to die soon.
• Devil in Plain Sight: Bateman gets even more deranged and manic as time goes on, wanting a chainsaw for Christmas as just one example, and nobody cares or notices.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Several of Bateman's victims, Paul Owen in particular, are killed out of jealousy or vengeance over incredibly petty grievances.
• Due to the Dead: Parodied, as Bateman wants to keep the male corpses and female corpses "apart, out of respect".
• Even Evil Has Standards: Three characters who Bateman does not kill are Evelyn, his fiancee; Jean, his secretary; and Luis, his gay associate, all of whom are in love with him. Notable, as Bateman finds Evelyn incredibly annoying, but never considers murdering her, and he was actually about to kill Luis, until he revealed he was gay and in love with Bateman. Even though Bateman is disgusted by this he still does not kill Luis.
• Evil Is Petty: Patrick kills people for such things as having fancier business cards than he does.
• Extra-Strength Masquerade: Bateman could be caught, but no one cares to catch him.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: Bateman. He complains he's a ghost to these people, they mainly just want him to stop talking about serial killers, and he can't bring an extra guest to his own birthday party. "Cards" is treated like all his 'friends' are in love with Paul, and it's extra ammo for him to want to stab the man in the face.
• Girls Love Stuffed Animals: Courtney has a giant stuffed bear, which also serves as a Scenery Censor for the actors to thrust into each other.
• Haute Cuisine Is Weird: Many of the dishes Patrick and his friends order at fancy restaurants feature strange or exotic ingredients, bizarre combinations, and even outright inedible materials.
• Hookers and Blow: Part of Patrick's exceptionally decadent lifestyle.
• Hypocrite:
  • Early in the narrative, Bateman publicly puts forth to his peers that it is on themselves to work towards solving social crises, such as providing food and shelter for the homeless, opposing racial discrimination, supporting civil rights and equal rights for women, and return to traditional moral values. However, privately, Bateman is an ardent bigot without ethics who only feels disgust for the poor.
  • He makes fun of Evelyn's It's All About Me attitude when her neighbor is murdered and decapitated, but he's just as self-obsessed and probably murdered the neighbor anyway.
• Hypocritical Humor: Patrick incorrectly attributes a quote from serial killer Edmund Kemper to Ed Gein before growing very upset with Craig McDermott for mistakenly calling Leatherface from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre "Featherhead".
• "I Am" Song: "Not a Common Man" ("I'm not a common man"), sung during Bateman's night with call girls Christine and Sabrina, and "I Am Back", after Bateman returns from a tranquil vacation in the Hamptons to continue in his madness.
• Implied Death Threat: Svetlana seems aware of what the stains on Bateman's dress shirts are, and draws a finger across her throat when she repeats his "no bleach".
• Incompatible Orientation: Luis Carruthers is in love with Bateman, who is not only straight but a virulent homophobe as well.
• Inferiority Superiority Complex: Best exemplified in "Common Man", as he starts out bragging that he's a god, but then starts to break down that he's "nobody" and "nowhere".
• Insistent Terminology: Patrick and his peers refer to women who meet their standard of objectified physical beauty as "hardbodies". The terminology is so prevalent in the source material, it directly inspired the tune "Hardbody" in the musical adaptation.
• Ironic Hell: Assuming Patrick really is a murderer, he'll likely never be caught. But that doesn't matter, because his life is already punishment enough. He's surrounded by people he hates but doesn't know how to live away from them; he can't get anyone to stop him because nobody hears what he says; killing people brings him no satisfaction because everyone is so interchangeable that when one of them dies, nobody notices — and what's the point of a murder nobody knows about?
• Jerkass: Every person Patrick surrounds himself with, except Jean, is every bit as shallow, self-centered, and materialistic as he is. His male associates, especially, are frequently sexist, casually racist, or both.
• "Last Supper" Steal: Patrick's birthday party at Evelyn's place gathers all of his closest associates (Jean, Paul Owen, Evelyn, Courtney, Timothy Price, Patrick's mother, and brother Sean) around one side of a table with Patrick in the center. Patrick is presented with a red velvet birthday cake and mashes it with a kitchen knife.
• Karma Houdini: Patrick actually confesses (earnestly) all the horrible things he's done to the detective, and still nothing comes of it. Of course, that's assuming he did do all the things he describes.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Literally conveyed at the beginning and end of Act I with the aid of a clear, plastic curtain dividing the audience from the stage. At the beginning of Act I, as the stage fills with smoke behind the plastic barrier, a woman's figure appears and presses her hands up against it, before Patrick's larger figure appears behind her.
• Love Dodecahedron: Patrick Bateman is engaged to wed Evelyn Williams, who is believed to be having an affair with Patrick's best friend, Timothy Price. Meanwhile, Patrick is having an affair with Evelyn's best friend, Courtney Rawlinson, who is engaged to Patrick's business associate, Luis Carruthers, who is also secretly in love with Patrick.
• Love Redeems: Subverted. Bateman really wants this to happen, Jean's Love Confession inspiring his own, then thinking he's "clean" and wants to look after her with a promotion, but then he realizes he's got away with everything, none of this mattered, he's fictional and meaningless, and Jean fades into the black like everyone else.
• Morality Pet: Jean becomes one for Bateman in this version, as while he's still an abusive boss to her, he imagines himself actually happy with her, gushes over Les Misérables with her, praises her skirts (albeit when she's dressing how he wants), calls her actually good in his confession to the detective, and thanks her for putting up with his bullshit.
• Meaningful Echo: At the start, Patrick says "I am twenty six years old, living in New York City at the end of the century, and this is what being Patrick Bateman means to me." At the end, realizing he's alone and a fictional character, repeats the line.
• Mistaken for Gay: Bateman is about to kill his associate, Luis, by strangling him from behind, but Luis mistakes this as Bateman coming onto him, causing him to reveal that he's gay and in love with Bateman.
• Moonwalk Dance: Bateman dances in his apartment to "Hip to Be Square" with a drunk and drugged Paul Owen prior to killing him.
• The Movie Buff: Bateman is an avid fan of horror films and gory B-movies, which he often rents on VHS. He frequently rents A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) in the musical, and his associates grow tired with him always talking about movie killers like Leatherface from Texas Chainsaw Massacre (which causes Patrick much annoyance when they also mistakenly call the character "Featherhead"). Patrick also makes passing references to C.H.U.D., mentions watching Silent Night, Deadly Night prior to attending Evelyn's Christmas party, and considers Freddy Krueger an "American icon".
• My Card: Early on, there's a scene where several stockbrokers compare business cards.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Some songs are named after quotes in the book or in the movie, for instance, "Mistletoe Alert", "Hardbody", "I Am Back", and "This is Not An Exit".
  • It's revealed to Patrick by the conclusion that his brother Sean could get a reservation at Dorsia at any time because, Sean explains, the restaurant maître d' was his roommate at college—a subtle reference to Bertrand, the French exchange student, in Bret Easton Ellis' The Rules of Attraction where Sean Bateman was originally a principal character.
• One-Hour Work Week: Patrick's job is very high-paying, with a cushy office, but he doesn't seem to do any actual work there and has a lot of free time on his hands. He frequently arrives late to his office, cuts out early, or does both, while he prioritizes shopping errands, lunch meetings, or feeding his more personal obsessions back at his apartment. Most tellingly, when Patrick and all his associates attend a business meeting, the entire time is spent showing off their business cards.
• Only Sane Man: Jean is the only character to show little to no regard for material desires and actually seems to care about the people around her.
• Painting the Fourth Wall: With Paul Owen's blood. Just prior to killing Paul, a clear plastic curtain descends from above the stage. Patrick then hacks Paul to death with an axe, and his blood splatters onto the plastic screen.
• Psycho Knife Nut: Bateman just so happens to have a knife on him to mash the birthday cake, and he uses the same knife to stab Al to death.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: Apart from being a sadistic serial killer, Patrick is also racist, antisemitic, misogynistic, elitist and homophobic (though so are most of his associates, except the serial killer part).
• Pyrrhic Victory: By the end of the story, it's clear that all of Patrick's evil and depravity have afforded him nothing. He's still as lonely and miserable and empty as he was at the beginning, and no one gives a shit about him.
• Raincoat of Horror: Patrick Bateman wears a clear plastic raincoat over his suit, to prevent it from being stained with blood.
• Saw "Star Wars" Twenty-Seven Times: In the musical's opening, this is pointed out by a clerk when Patrick rents A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) at his video store:
  Video Store Clerk: You've rented this movie 37 times.
  Patrick: [slowly leaning in] And I find something new every... single... time.
• Sanity Slippage Song: A common theme of several of the musical's numbers, including some that precede some of Bateman's biggest on-stage outbursts ("Killing Time", "Mistletoe Alert") and "Killing Spree", which is more clearly about Bateman having a mental breakdown.
• Scare Chord: Before the plastic curtain is raised in Act I, when Bateman's figure appears behind a woman pressing up against the curtain, a chord designed to stun the audience is played.
• Serial Killer:
  • Patrick Bateman. Probably.
  • Patrick is obsessed with real serial killers like Ted Bundy or Ed Gein, to the point that his friends complain that he always brings them up in conversations.
• Serious Business: Things that most people would find irrelevant or trivial are blown out of proportion all over; for example, Paul Owen is murdered over a business deal that nobody even knows the details of (as well as for having a better business card than Bateman's and for being able to get a reservation at a popular restaurant). Evelyn and Courtney have a whole song dedicated to the brands they like.
• Sexy Secretary: What Patrick wants Jean to be. In her first appearance, Patrick dislikes her clothes so much that he tells her to never wear them again, insisting that she wear dresses or skirts with high heels.
• "Shaggy Dog" Story: Patrick becomes increasingly insane and homicidal and a lot of people die at his hands, culminating in him confessing to the detective. but in the end, no one believes him, and he ends with a BSoD Song about his fictional, meaningless existence.
• Ship Tease: He's still a sexist and abusive boss to her, but Bateman is a little kinder to Jean, giving her a wave at Les Misérables, for a brief moment imagining himself with her and being happy, being more adamant about not wanting to hurt her, and sharing a Longing Look with her in his BSoD Song before she fades out.
• Shout-Out: All interpretations of the work include references to the Broadway production of Les Misérables. Significantly, Patrick's secretary, Jean, being the most "normal" and moral of all the story's characters, shares her name with Jean Valjean, the redeeming moral protagonist of Les Mis. However, the play itself is repeatedly referenced to establish it as yet another popular commercial product and extension of the consumerist and self-centered lifestyle to which Patrick adheres, irrespective of the work's intended artistic message (which paints a contrast with the wealth, immorality, and emptiness exhibited by Patrick and his peers). Worth noting that the original Broadway run of Les Mis through the late 1980s was so popular and tickets were in such high demand that theatergoers had to pay several hundred—even several thousand—dollars to get in to see it, making the show most accessible to a wealthy clientele who can afford to spend excessive cash (and vie for seats just like other characters in American Psycho itself would try to get a table at Dorsia). In this this musical adaptation, Patrick and Evelyn attend a Broadway performance of the show but spend the time talking to each other and are not are paying attention to the story or its themes; their only interest is that the show is trendy and popular. By contrast, Jean, who is also in attendance at the same performance, is much more engaged and aware of what the show is about.
• Significant Double Casting: The actor who plays Al, the homeless man who Bateman kills, also plays the detective.
• The Social Darwinist: Before killing Owen, Bateman tells him about how one time in Yale, he realized he could disappear and everyone would be happy that he was gone, and that's when he figured out some people deserve to not be here anymore.
• The Sociopath: Patrick Bateman's entire personality is a sham to look good in front of other self-absorbed yuppies, which he achieves by obsessive grooming and droning on about superficial claptrap. On the inside, he's a sadist who hates everybody, especially himself, and brutally murders people for fun. Even with the implication that none of the murders are happening, all it changes is that he has incredibly graphic fantasies instead of outright deeds.
• Summon Backup Dancers: Appearing in Patrick's apartment for two separate numbers, suggested to be a manifestation of Patrick's own psyche. First, during Bateman's opening morning routine, he's flanked by dancers in various states of dress and sporting various bleeding wounds. Second, while entertaining prostitutes Sabrina and Christine, backup dancers appear in assorted fetish gear.
• Suspiciously Apropos Music: The only song that can make Bateman "chill" (and even dance) is "True Faith" by New Order, which includes the plot relevant lines "I don't care because I'm not there, and I don't care if I'm here tomorrow".
• Surrounded by Idiots: Evelyn, seething with jealousy, calls Courtney the smartest of anyone in the room, and Courtney responds that's why she drinks and does lithium.
• Through the Eyes of Madness: Goes beyond the usual tricks of the movie and book with Patrick, at one point, depicted as having a conversation with the talking corpses of "Christie" and other call girls.
• Twisted Christmas: More focus is given to Bateman killing Owen as a "Christmas present to myself", as 'holiday cheer' makes him feel even more insane.
• Uncomfortable Elevator Moment: Bateman gets in an elevator with Tom Cruise and attempting to make small talk with him. The conversation is extremely awkward. This is based on a real event: Ellis lived in the same apartment building as Tom Cruise for some time.
• Unreliable Narrator: It's difficult to take Patrick at his word when he obviously experiences surreal hallucinations, occasionally sees his own actions and behaviors as if they are occurring in a work of fiction he might regularly enjoy, and other characters even dispute his accounts of events. Paul Owen keeps popping up after he's supposedly killed, helping with his own body, singing "Don't You Want Me" when Bateman gets the Fisher account, and is the only other one singing the main words of "This Is Not An Exit".
• Used to Be a Sweet Kid: Kept ambiguous, as Bateman's mother tells Jean he used to be a happy, likable child, but the song title is called "Nice Thought", and both women imply that she just saw what she wanted.
  Bateman: Later, sitting at my desk, I try to remember something, anything from my childhood, but there is nothing.
• Walking Shirtless Scene: Both Matt Smith and Benjamin Walker spend a lot of time either shirtless or in underwear. Also covered in blood.
• Watering Down: Patrick complains about how the cocaine they've been sold is "a fucking milligram of sweetener."
• Wicked Pretentious: Patrick has an incessant habit — in narrative and dialogue — of describing something at length and then haughtily opining on it, even though the things he fixates on are usually deeply banal, and his opinions or conclusions are dull, misinformed, and bigoted. In some ways this is his supreme ego talking, making him think he's above everyone, and thus the ultimate arbiter of taste or judge of human nature; in other ways, it's how he feigns having a human personality — pretending he always knows what the hell he's talking about, just like everyone else around him. The one thing he seems to know well enough to speak genuinely eloquently on is what a monster he is.
• You Bastard!: During "Selling Out", Bateman sings "everything I'm telling you is a dream I'm selling you, you bought it all! You bought it, bought it, even when we were selling out..." while flinging money to the audience.
• Your Favorite: At Patrick's birthday party, we're told that the red velvet cake he is presented is his favorite.

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