‘Fear is contagious’: why horror shows are taking over the New York stage

As we escaped the restrictions of the pandemic, with many also trying to escape the smartphone addiction that was exacerbated by it, there was widespread desire for the in-person communal experience. It was a slow crawl back with casualties along the way but as the Hollywood and Broadway box office return to pre-pandemic levels this year, our craving for IRL thrills appears to be stronger than ever.

It’s why Imax and 4DX formats are breaking records, concert attendance is at a new high according to a mid-year report and the most recently tracked season of New York theatre grossed more than the previous. It also helps to explain why the hottest tickets of the fall are for plays in the most communal genre of all: horror.

The giddy sensation of watching, gasping and shrieking at something scary is why horror has remained so reliable on the big screen (that and its low stakes, low-budget nature) and why a film such as May’s breakout shocker Obsession was something audiences simply had to see in a sold-out cinema. Last year horror films made a record $1.4bn at the US box office with this year’s figures suggesting another historic rise.

As A-list names, established musicals and retooled IP continue to score the highest grosses on Broadway, three spine-tingling transfers are hoping to lure horror nuts away from the screen and into the theatre.

The shows all started out in London, apt given that the West End was home to The Woman in Black, a jumpy bumps-in-the-night ghost story that became the second longest-running play in the city’s history and one that has become something of a blueprint for how to invite in a wider audience to a genre often viewed as “for fans only”.

“I’ve got a really sort of seminal kind of trace memory of watching Woman in Black in a theatre and just feeling totally exhilarated the moment that the entire audience screamed together,” British writer Danny Robins tells me over Zoom. He’s here in New York as his hit Olivier-nominated play 2:22 opens at the Lucille Lortel theatre in the village. It’s a four-person supernatural chiller that’s become known for its unusual viral casting, launching the acting career of Lily Allen when it started back in 2021 and since welcoming in everyone from ex pop group members (Girls Aloud’s Cheryl, The Saturdays’ Frankie Bridge, Busted’s Matt Willis) to TV hosts (Love Island’s Laura Whitmore and Stacey Dooley) to Inbetweeners (James Buckley).

It has gone everywhere from London to Los Angeles to Melbourne to Wolverhampton and its New York debut arrives at the same time as a transfer of headphone horror A Ghost in Your Ear also opens just blocks away while a screen-to-stage adaptation of Paranormal Activity has become a Broadway blockbuster further uptown.

“Fear is contagious,” A Ghost in Your Ear writer Jamie Armitage says. “At a time when theatre’s like: ‘Ooh, how do we stand out? How do we do something specific?; I think giving that collective emotional experience is so theatrical and it’s also just so much fun. And I think that’s why these horror shows are doing well and finding an audience.” (He too sees The Woman in Black as the “gold standard”).

His play combines the classic – we’re being told a literary ghost story taking place in a mysterious old house – with the contemporary – it’s via an audiobook recording and each audience member has to wear headphones throughout. The Guardian’s Arifa Akbar called it “a good, old-fashioned ghost-train of a story” when it opened in London at the end of last year.

Similarly, 2:22 uses some flashy light design and a supporting role for an Alexa device to update the framework of an old-fashioned thriller with a sting in its tail. The unconventional casting also helps (in New York, Pitch Perfect’s Anna Camp stars alongside Iron Fist’s Finn Jones) as does a healthy amount of savvy self-awareness from the team behind it. They’ve seen the memes that have cropped up, jokes online that either Peppa Pig or Liz Truss would be joining the cast, and they know who their audience is. “I remember sitting outside a restaurant next to the theatre where we opened on the first night and there were gangs of young women who were coming to see Lily Allen,” says the show’s longtime director Matthew Dunster. “They had party hats on and they were singing: ‘We’re going to see a play!’” He told me he wants the Duchess of Sussex next.

At the Noël Coward theatre in London, the show didn’t just break the box office record but the bar one as well. “I loved that,” Robins says. “I thought that was people having a fun night out, that you were having a great time, you were having one or two drinks to kind of steady your nerves.”

Dunster adds that “[theatre] can be very po-faced, very issue-based”. He remembers a “snobbiness” prior to 2:22 about putting on a horror show and he recalls chatting to figures within the theatre world before it opened with the “audible sharpening of knives” in the background.

When I went to see Paranormal Activity, the ornate lobby of the August Wilson theatre was soundtracked by Soundgarden and My Chemical Romance with neon cocktails and pretzel bites on sale. It felt less like a crowd waiting for a Broadway play and more like one lining up for a rollercoaster.

Armitage noticed a difference in the type of audience too for both the London and New York productions of A Ghost in Your Ear, something that “excites” him. “I always think that is essential for theatre particularly at the moment to find what are ways of drawing in these audiences whether that be from who’s in the show or what the show is itself,” he says. For a US audience, he also cast Lucas Iverson, an actor from the phenomenally popular medical drama The Pitt, in the lead (vocal young women near me had bought tickets purely because of him).

For Robins, keeping ticket prices for 2:22 low was also something of an “ethical mission” for him, saying that a ticket should be closer to “the cost of a meal not the cost of a holiday”.

Party hats, pretzel bites and booze might not be what many expect from a night out at the theatre – and the success of these shows comes at a time of tension. Stars such as Rosamund Pike, Cynthia Erivo and Lesley Manville have spoken out about phone usage from audience members while the availability of alcohol at shows such as the most recent Broadway restaging of Cabaret has led to a backlash over how inebriated they might also be.

“I think often that rowdiness comes from not knowing how to behave and being put in a situation where you feel a bit uncomfortable,” Robins says. “I think theatre can be really bad, really clinically effective at making people feel uncomfortable.” He believes that 2:22 does the opposite and gives a “sense of belonging” to those in the audience. “I think if you create an environment where people feel comfortable and where it feels accessible and if you are exciting and stimulating people, you’re not going to be rowdy and disruptive because you’re really enjoying what you’re watching,” he adds. “I like a little bit of noise!”

Robins also says that it’s “weird” that within a “middle-class theatre community”, a vocal response is seen as inappropriate whereas in other communities it would be “absolutely welcomed and championed”. He also shares that when the show was in LA, with Constance Wu as Jenny naturally, audiences clapped for everything. “If theatre wants to survive, it’s got to feel fun,” he says. Armitage too noticed a difference in the US where he found audiences more “vocal” than they had been in the UK. “If they want to, like, scream and sort of hoot and do whatever they like during the show, I kind of love that because it means they’re having a good time,” he says.

It’s too early to tell how well 2:22 and A Ghost in Your Ear will do in New York (although both performances I attended were close to being sold out), yet Paranormal Activity has become an unqualified smash, extending its run by eight weeks after already making more than $8m. For Halloween, the August Wilson theatre will celebrate by screening the original movie with the franchise heading for an inevitable big screen reboot next year.

Horror remains frighteningly popular business and what better than watching it in a theatre where everyone else can hear you scream?

“Audiences are hungry for experiences which feel truly live,” Armitage says. “I think it’s a beautiful fluke of timing that three shows which all seemed to catch a wave in London and find an audience are all arriving in New York at the same time. Hopefully they can recreate that attraction for audiences to come and be scared together, to come and see something which is truly live. I kind of feel that’s what’s behind it: it’s matching the audience’s hunger.”