[NEohioPAL] Berko review: NEXT TO NORMAL @ Lakeland Civic Theatre

[Roy Berko]

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Lakeland’s NEXT TO NORMAL:  compelling script, must see production

Roy Berko

(Member, American Theatre Critics Association, Cleveland Critics Circle)

If you were an investor in Broadway shows and someone came to you proposing
a rock musical about a mother with worsening bipolar disorder, that was
going to be performed as an operetta (all singing, few spoken sentences),
with no show stoppers, no dancing, no chorus numbers, few laughs, and an
unnerving ending, written by an author who has never had a big hit, would
you invest?  Well, a group did, and the result was NEXT TO NORMAL which won
three 2009 Tony Awards and the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and had a
smash 733 performance-run on Broadway, and is now touring to sold out
audiences.

Yes, NEXT TO NORMAL, with book and lyrics by Brian Yorkey and music by Tom
Kitt, is a unique musical which addresses loss, death, suicide, drug usage,
and the ethics of modern psychiatry, which is getting a mind-blowing
production at Lakeland Theatre.

The Pulitzer Board credited the show with “expanding the scope of subject
matter for musicals.”

The story concerns Diana Goodman, a suburban American housewife, who has a
form of bipolar disorder coupled with what might be schizophrenia.  The
question comes as to whether the condition is hereditary or was induced by
a trauma sixteen-years earlier.  Together with her husband, Dan, she fights
to keep her mind and their family on some sort of “normal” path.  Maybe not
normal, but next to normal.  After extensive therapy Diana decides to stop
taking the pills, cuts off all mental health help, including the
electroconvulsive therapy, that caused her short-term amnesia.  This
decision leads to an unsettling conclusion.

As both a mental health professional and a theater reviewer, when I saw the
original staging on Broadway, and again in its presentation as part of the
Key Bank Broadway Series, I was totally caught up in the show.  It is like
no musical I had ever seen.  I left the theatre knowing that I had just
experienced greatness.

The Lakeland production, under the adept direction of Martin Friedman, with
the set and light innovations by Trad Burns, is mesmerizing.

Friedman and Burns remove the Broadway three-level set and substitute
see-through walls constructed of steel wires, which, like the connections
in Diana’s brain, represent her being trapped in a spider web of chaos,
causing her to weave in and out of situations which she doesn’t understand
and disrupt her direct flow of ideas and movements.  In addition, instead
of traditional stage lighting, the duo has substituted nearly a hundred
lamps of various descriptions to illuminate the set and simulate the on and
off flow of ideas in Diana’s mind.  The concept is brilliant and takes the
script to a level not realized in the original staging.

The composite cast is outstanding.  Amiee Collier wraps herself in the role
of Dianna.  She is so real that the character’s pain is Collier’s pain.  She
sings meanings, not words.  She makes us writhe in suffering, her suffering.
This is a performance which rivals Clevelander Alice Ripley’s amazing Tony
winning Broadway presentation.

Rich McGuigan, who, like the rest of the cast, has a strong singing voice,
is spot on as Dan, Diana’s husband.  We experience his frustration in
trying to be an understanding support, but unable to cope with his wife’s
obsession with a past trauma, her reluctance to move on, and his inability
to deal with the chaos around with any action other than emotional
blandness.

Hathaway Brown’s Emma Wahl, who appeared on Broadway in CHITTY, CHITTY BANG
BANG, captures the very essence of Natalie, the daughter caught between the
throes of teenage life and a chaotic home environment.  Pat Miller, as
Natalie’s boyfriend, Henry, creates a pot-headed, yet supportive safe place
for the girl to turn.

Ben Donahoo, as Natalie’s brother Gabe, has the difficult task of creating
a character of dual dimensions.  He does so with clarity and understanding.

Tim Allen, as several mental health professionals, is quite believable.

Though Jordon Cooper’s orchestra sometimes goes overboard and drowns out
the musical speeches of the performers, lyrics that are so important to
hear clearly, the musical sounds are well performed and carry the feelings
and moods of the story.

*Capsule judgement:  Does NEXT TO NORMAL sound like a downer?  The script,
and the music, and this production are so well conceived, that there is no
time during the production that the audience is not compelled to watch with
rapt attention.  Lakeland’s production is an absolutely, positive, MUST SEE!
*

For tickets to the NEXT TO NORMAL which runs through February 17, and is
being staged in Lakeland Community College’s theatre, call 440-525-7134 or
to go http://lakelandcc.edu/academic/arts/theatre/index.asp

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<http://lakelandcc.edu/academic/arts/theatre/index.asp>
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