Ghost stories are a tough ask in the theatre. While all forms of storytelling require a suspension of disbelief, there is something about the medium of theatre that makes this task both more difficult and less rewarding. Perhaps it’s the communal nature of the art form. A cinema audience is able to submerge into private hells, whereas theatre audiences face their fears together. And fears faced are fears halved.
English playwright Danny Robins’ 2:22 – A Ghost Story follows slavishly the template of the horror film, especially its recent tendency to turn its monsters into metaphors for psychological states. Where The Babadook stands in for maternal anxiety, and the evil in It Follows represents sexual awakening, the ghost of 2.22 acts as a metaphor for marital strife. The rift here is less between the living and the dead as between husband and wife.
