Uncommon, rejuvenating
Like some of the conditions ‘Next to Normal’ dramatizes, some of it works wonders
Google “Next to Normal” and “images” and you’ll see a lot of anguished white faces. The celebrated musical about a clinically depressed woman and the family that supports her (or doesn’t) has generally been played as white-suburban, middle-class stereotypes who descend into a maelstrom of mental illness, anger, anxiety and confusion.
This old-fashioned whitebread sitcom scenario is set up in the musical’s ironic opening number “Just Another Day,” which presents — for a few fleeting moments — a seemingly idyllic family happily rushing off to school and work in the morning.
A new production of the show at Westport Country Playhouse challenges that clichéd framework with a racially diverse cast including Black and LatinX actors in the central family. It’s not that non-white actors have never had a chance at these weighty roles, but usually if there’s any diversity in the cast it’s in the minor parts of the boyfriend or the doctors. There are only six actors in the whole musical.
Though other than a couple of brief Spanish expostulations thrown in, there’s no attempt here to deeply reinterpret the show from a different cultural perspective. This is “Next to Normal” with all the same personalities, twists, turns and shocks that the show has always contained, with much the same pacing and rhythms.
The director and choreographer is Marcos Santana, who was so good with a large ensemble for “In the Heights” at the Westport Country Playhouse in 2019. He works just as well with a small cast, spacing them across the stage for maximum impact in the full-family songs and arranging strenuous athletic jumpy workouts for the solo numbers.
The show traditionally has a small pit band that’s styled more like a pop combo than a conventional theater orchestra. Some “Next to Normal” bands rock harder than others. This one, led by keyboardist Emily Croome, is admirably loud and punchy, anchored by the searing guitar leads of Andy Buslovich and some funky bass lines from Wes Bourland. In some musicians’ hands, “Next to Normal” is a chamber opera; here it’s a rock opera.
Most of the actors have a rock-opera attitude too, wailing or growling their songs. That can be highly effective for such a highly charged show — and would be if everyone was adopting the same style.
Yet the star of “Next to Normal” is Dar. Lee. See. Ah., sometimes billed as Darlesia Cearcy, who appeared in the original Broadway productions of the musicals “The Goodbye Girl,” “Book of Mormon,” “Shuffle Along, or the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and
All That Followed” and the 2017 revival of “Once on This Island.”
Dar. Lee. See. Ah. has an astounding voice and brings the house down early in the first act with the musical’s bittersweet anthem “I Miss the Mountains.” All her solo numbers are exceptional. Unfortunately, her musical theater voice is at odds with the rough, wilder tones of Wilson Jermaine Heredia (the original Broadway Angel in “Rent”) who plays her husband; Ashley
LaLonde who plays their daughter Natalie; and Daniel Maldonado who plays their son Gabe. In the duets and trios — and there are quite a few of those — Dar. Lee.
See. Ah. blows everyone else off the stage. She really does give a landmark performance as Diana, one of the toughest roles in contemporary musical theater.
The acting is more evenhanded than the singing. This is an emotionally layered drama that requires the performers to convincingly act out rage, euphoria and extreme passion, yet also at times be withdrawn, awkward and uncommunicative. Maldonado as
Gabe finds a consistent malevolent imp vibe while LaLonde’s Ashley manages to balance her outspokenness with touching vulnerability. Jermaine Heredia finds a passive place where he reacts in useful, generous ways to the emotional outpourings of others. The two non-family players, the wondrously affable Gian Perez as Natalie’s classmate Henry and Katie Thompson as the alternately raucous and severe Drs. Madden and Fine, provide crucial comic relief (or in Perez’s case a muchneeded really chill vibe).
The energy of the band and the actors is somewhat undone by
Adam Koch’s gray, barren scenic design. It suggests a stylish modern home with marble counters, but also looks like a mausoleum. The glum surroundings deaden some of the livelier songs and the sheer size of the set, with staircases on either end, means that the cast needs to take a rather long time to enter or exit the stage.
This show doesn’t want to be a normal “Next to Normal,” and it succeeds. That means some hit-ormiss moments but also some revelations. Songs that might often be under appreciated, like “A Good Step” of “Song of Forgetting,” get noticed here. There’s a slightly different dynamic to the family and strong support from Thompson and Perez. Santana’s direction comes close to bringing back the spark the show had when it first debuted in 2008. Like some of the medical conditions it dramatizes, some of it works wonders, some of it is unsettling and much of it is refreshing, challenging and rejuvenating.
”Next to Normal” runs through April 24 at Westport Country Playhouse, 25 Powers Court, Westport. $50-$70. westportplayhouse.org.