The director, who has brought Bret Easton Ellis’s novel to Broadway, explains why he’s drawn to the dark stories of Patrick Bateman, Faustus and Macbeth

“I am drawn to theatre as an art form of surprise and of provocation,” says the Almeida’s artistic director Rupert Goold, while backstage at rehearsals for American Psycho, the stage adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis’s novel about late 80s excess and violence in New York. “Every show we’ve done at the Almeida is trying to challenge aesthetic and sometimes social assumptions.”

Goold’s been challenging assumptions his entire career. He’s set King Lear in Liverpool and Merchant of Venice in Las Vegas, while the first of his two ventures on to Broadway this season, King Charles III – which opens in Sydney, Australia in April – stripped away the nobility of royalty with its minimalistic set.

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You’d forgive Goold for succumbing to delusions of grandeur himself after his rapid rise. He became artistic director of Headlong Theatre at 33 and four years later he was also serving as associate director at the Royal Shakespeare Company, until he took over the Almeida Theatre two years ago. He won two Olivier awards for best director before he turned 40.

Goold, who is now 44, initially staged both King Charles III (for which he earned another Olivier nomination) and American Psycho at the Almeida. On the surface they are starkly different, yet Goold sees what unites them: they each speak to their country’s sensibility.

“In America, the relationship between the individual and the state has an uneasiness about it and in Europe we tend to accept institutions a bit more,” he says.

More significantly, while King Charles III “required something spare and Shakespearean, as close to nothing but the performances and text” and American Pscyho “is incredibly visual and flamboyant”, what drew him to both plays is the risks they take. Both play with form and style in unique ways while telling a compelling story that makes an argument to support the writer’s vision.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Tim Pigott-Smith in King Charles lll at the Almeida Theatre Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The Guardian

King Charles III used blank verse and iambic pentameter to tell a thoroughly modern story in a classical style, while one of Broadway’s go-to composers Duncan Sheik, who wrote the music and lyrics for American Psycho, is giving Broadway its first EDM, or electronica, musical. “This music has been pretty dominant in the culture but has not found its way much on to theater stages,” Goold says. (Sheik acknowledges the 80s pop musical obsessions of the book, with covers of songs by Phil Collins and Tears for Fears; additionally some Huey Lewis is heard onstage.)

Additionally, he points to Patrick Bateman, the American Psycho protagonist who is both Wall Street banker and serial killer, as an example of what intrigues him about “non-normative dramatic art”. Bateman is an execrable human being, “a rightwing materialist and an exceptionally violent figure”, he says. Yet Goold sees him as symbolizing “a certain kind of social loneliness we all feel and the show asks you to think about this character and your own sense of self but in a slightly provocative way”.

On one level this is an existential satire about materialism and on another it’s sort of a horror-comedy Rupert Goold

Goold believes American Psycho should fare even better here than it did in London where it debuted in late 2013 with Doctor Who star Matt Smith in the lead role. For starters, he worked with Robert Aguirre-Sacasa and Sheik on some tweaks “to fix some holes we felt we had from the last production”.

Then there’s the subject matter and location. “On one level this is an existential satire about materialism and on another it’s sort of a horror-comedy,” he says. “That marriage of genre, character and wit is something the Americans embrace more than the British.”

Finally, there’s a bit of fortuitous timing. Patrick Bateman idolizes a man who symbolized the greed is good ethos of the 80s. No, not Gordon Gekko. A real life figure, one who is frighteningly even more relevant today: Donald Trump.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Matt Smith as Patrick Bateman at the Almeida Theatre Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The Guardian

“Trump was a major figure in the novel of American Psycho, which is looking at a period and people, not just Trump, who dictate power in this country and set a cultural agenda for better or worse,” Goold says, adding that the book and the musical look at the legacy of the United States at its peak in terms of power but also a time when people were defining their self by the brands they consumed. “What Bret was satirizing back then is absolutely as pertinent now. Many things he wrote about have come true.”

Bateman and King Charles III also share a trait with many other protagonists in shows Goold has directed – from Doctor Faustus to Macbeth – and even in his first feature film, True Story, which was released last year: all have vaulting ambition but when they reach for their dreams they find they have lost sight of themselves or reality or pitfalls and consequences. All are undone, and often doomed by their efforts.

“I am drawn to these figures, these paradigm shifters,” Goold says. “Perhaps it is because I am so unlike that, I am interested in the other.”

Indeed, Goold is known for being relatively unflappable and for being a team player even as the boss. “He is a true collaborator and no idea is a bad idea ... until you try it and find out it really is bad,” says Benjamin Walker, who will play Bateman on Broadway and who says the opportunity to work with Goold was one of his reasons for signing on. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen him lose his cool. It’s a dark work but he runs a very peaceful and efficient and enjoyable rehearsal room.”

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But Goold is more than just a nice guy, Walker adds: “A lot of directors flounder in the darkness to find what works but Rupert has a visually creative mind so intricate and beautiful that when you step into the play you step into the visual vocabulary of Rupert’s imagination.”

Robert Powell, who is playing King Charles III in the touring company, adds that he didn’t get to work directly with Goold before their first leg and requested some time with him during a rare week off. “He completely revitalized the show and lifted the cast in a very brief period,” Powell says, explaining that Goold zeroed on the emotional and theatrical side of the show instead of the intellectual side.

Goold has no complaint about juggling his myriad responsibilities: producing and directing at the Almeida and elsewhere while developing a movie career and planning to write books in whatever downtime he has. (He also has two children with wife Kate Fleetwood, whom he met while directing her in Romeo and Juliet in 1998 on a UK tour.)

“You have to stave off complacency and keep yourself challenged,” he says, adding that he is “viciously self-critical.” He acknowledges that being a late bloomer – his ascent was sharp but started late – motivates him but he keeps working so much because he, “feels fortunate to be doing this. I like doing other things, but I really like directing and producing”.