NPX Weekly Round-Up: 5 by JuCoby Johnson

The end of the world comes to a small neighborhood slowly being gentrified-- plus three other plays I'm interested in this week.

Aug 19, 2024

I’m writing a horror play.

Yep, after years of writing things on the edge of the genre— containing body horror, ghosts, violence, and more— I’m finally writing something I would actually consider to be within the horror genre. And as I write more, I find myself wanting to read more of it. I have analyzed one or two horror plays here before, but all have been shorter pieces. I have been searching high and low on NPX for a full length horror (someone PLEASE tell NPX to implement a ‘search by genre’ function) and 5 by JuCoby Johnson does fit into the genre. Not in the way you’d perhaps picture, especially if your main exposure to horror in theater is something like The Woman in Black adapted by Stephen Mallatratt, but horror nevertheless.

Wikipedia defines the horror genre as, “speculative fiction that is intended to disturb, frighten, or scare…perhaps induces a feeling of repulsion or loathing” with an “eerie and frightening atmosphere”. I find this definition to be true in its vagueness, because the more horror media I have consumed over the past three or so years, the more I see that there are so many ways that a story can fit within this framework. From cosmic horror to psychological horror, monster to slasher, there are so many ways to “disturb, frighten, or scare” just as there are many ways to make someone laugh or cry. I used to dislike horror, or think that I did, because I never found the sensation of being scared pleasant. What I didn’t yet know was how the heightened stakes, gruesome frankness, and straight up terror of the genre could illuminate particular messages and themes in such an effective way.

5 is not a horror in the way that one may classically think of it— there are no ghosts, no jump scares, no possessions, people being eaten alive, or even much violence. It is a horror that doesn’t necessarily “frighten or scare”, but one that “disturbs” and “repulses”, complete with “eerie” atmosphere.

Before I go too far, here is the summary of 5 from NPX:

Best friends Jay and Evan run a convenience store in a rapidly changing neighborhood. When a real estate developer stops by with an offer to buy the place, their deep-rooted connection is tested. As the choice to sell weighs on Evan’s shoulders, their community is ripped apart and the very foundation of the world around them begins to rumble and quake. An intimate play that races towards apocalyptic ends, 5 examines a friendship tested by money, race, and family secrets come to light.

Content warnings: discussion of religious dogma (Christian), racism, death, and gentrification; body horror; natural disasters; apocalypse

The “eerie atmosphere” that Wikipedia mandates a horror story has is apparent from the very beginning of this play. We open on a dark stage, a flickering red light, and a man who quotes Revelation. The cacophony of what sounds like an earthquake, or perhaps something more sinister, begins— only to be ended by the entrance of Jay, calling the man (Walter) into the convenience store.

I find this sudden change in atmosphere to be effective in continuing that uncanny feeling, despite the very every-day events that begin to unfold in the first scene. We meet almost all of our characters— Jay and Evan, the owners of this failing store; Walter, a local man who seems to be the store’s only regular; and June, Jay’s on-again-off-again girlfriend. The contrast between the opening and scene one serves to make said opening only more disturbing.

Various technological failings, mainly the store’s stereo malfunctioning, lend to the sense of unease that permeates the play, as it becomes clear that Evan and Jay face a bigger dilemma than the store not breaking even: the neighborhood is “changing”, as is evidenced by the selling and paving over of June’s family’s store and the arrival of Stacy, a real estate developer. Here is where the allegory is unveiled— the gentrification of the neighborhood, the end of this piece of the world as it has been known, in parallel with the Christian myth of The End of Days.

Johnson takes the details of this myth— the earthquakes, the hailstorms, the plagues— and puts them in the background of a heart-wrenching story about community, friendship, and systemic racism. These events create such a deep sense of impending doom, only serving to highlight the same in the story of Evan and Jay’s store being completely overtaken and discarded by Stacy (and therefore, the city at large). As Evan and Jay’s world seems to come to an end, so does the entirety of existence.

And that’s the thing that fascinates me so much about horror, and has done ever since I discovered that I, in fact, like the genre: that these terrifying, unsettling, or just plain destructive circumstances illuminate the experience and theme of more “mundane” violences. In this case, it’s gentrification and the systemic racism that has allowed for it. But I’ve seen it used effectively to discuss the horrors of sexual assault, misogyny, abuse, and more, in a way that sometimes cannot be reached by telling the excruciating truth of it all. Sometimes, the only way an audience is truly going to understand something is by making it larger than life, by making it into something that they cannot and will not look away from.

I liked the subtlety that Johnson uses in this piece, gradually meting out the horrors until they overwhelm the piece with their destruction. At first we only hear the strange whispers and static on the stereo…then the newscasts of disturbing natural disasters…Evan vomiting out a frog…and then all at once, the oceans are blood, Stacy is Satan, and Walter is Michael the Archangel. Hell is literally about to break loose— but that is where our story ends. Because there is no satisfaction in this annihilation; everything that needed to be said has been said. This delicate pacing and dispensing of eerie and disturbing events is truly what kept me on the edge of my seat, and I think is a key aspect of effective horror. If we release everything all at once, we not only lose the mystery, we lose the allegory in the depths of fear.

This metered releasing of horror elements is something I will be monitoring further reads for, in order to get the feeling for the exact rhythm of it for my own use. If you have horror play recommendations, please message me!

In the meantime, here is my official recommendation of 5 by JuCoby Johnson:

An effective and delightful horror that uses the eerie prophecies of Christian myth to its advantage to discuss the quiet violence of gentrification and the systemic racism that allows it. Evan and Jay's friendship was so incredibly moving, and Walter had my heart from the first page (yes, even when he was spouting off scripture). I felt so deeply for Stacy as well, which made her villainy all the more heartbreaking. Truly loved this play, and hope to see it staged!

Did you read this play? Do you want to? Let me know your thoughts down in the comments below!

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