[title]
Broadway review by Raven Snook
Rating: ★★★★ (four stars)
Ticketing: Buy tickets to Paranormal Activity
Levi Holloway's Paranormal Activity is a cleverly executed variation on the popular horror franchise: an original feary tale that replaces the found-footage approach of the films with the immediacy of live theater. The play centers on an attractive but troubled married couple, Lou (Cher Álvarez) and James (Travis A. Knight), who have moved from Chicago to London to make a fresh start. She's on meds but seems plagued by more than just depression; he's an atheist and skeptic—despite a deeply religious upbringing—who believes that having a baby might cure their problems. Holloway's slow-burn story ramps up the suspense by allowing us to spend time with Lou and Cher in their coziest and most intimate moments (even in the bathroom!) before plunging them into a supernatural hellscape. You don't need to be familiar with any of the seven Paranormal Activity movies to predict their final destination, but it's the journey that proves haunting.
If you’re in it strictly for jolts, be warned: This show is all about the vibe. From the moment you walk in, the production aims to get in your head. The gothed-out ushers have red flashlights; the pointed preshow playlist, loaded with Radiohead, Nine Inch Nails and Soundgarden, is cranked up to 13. Throughout, Holloway and director Felix Barrett are more interested in the psychology of fear than in delivering jump scares, though illusion specialist Chris Fisher—in an impressive collaboration with scenic designer Fly Davis, lighting designer Anna Watson, sound designer Gareth Fry and projection designer Luke Halls—achieves some very unsettling effects.
Horror plays are hard to pull off on Broadway, as Holloway's own somewhat creaky Grey House demonstrated in 2023. But Paranormal Activity is a much more successful fright night. Barrett, who codirected Sleep No More, leans into voyeurism and elicits excellent performances from Álvarez and Knight. The true shocks come in watching Lou and James lose their grips on their lives—and each other—and the liveness of theater heightens the tension by creating a kind of mass hysteria where even innocuous bumps elicit shrieks that evolve into the relief of communal laughter. The whole show is a scream.
Paranormal Activity. August Wilson Theatre (Broadway). By Levi Holloway. Directed by Felix Barrett. With Cher Álvarez, Travis A. Knight, Shannon Cochran, Eva Kaminsky. Running time: 2hrs 10mins. One intermission.
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