NEXT TO NORMAL Exit interview

[nexttotheheights]

Posted: 12/28/10 at 7:03pm

This is a great article with thoughts from Adam Chanler- Berat and Tom Kitt about the closing of the show.
"Approaching the end of NORMAL"

[HummingAlong]

Posted: 12/28/10 at 10:48pm

beautiful...but i can't stand it! don't close, n2n...don't close...

[nexttotheheights]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 7:11am

^I know, when I found out it was closing I went through the 5 stages of closing show syndrome

1. Denial
2. Anger
3. Bargaining
4. Depression
5. Acceptance


I'm never going to get past 1.

[showchoirguy]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 8:38am

This is truly sad. Although I have never seen the show I am very familiar with it and Im in love with the soundtrack. This is going to be a sad loss :/

[nexttotheheights]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 10:17am

^Careful people on this board are really anal about Soundtrack vs. Cast Recording. (hint: use cast recording)

[Idiot]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 12:51pm

Okay folks -- really. What is the passion for this show based on? I saw it in L.A. last week and it's deeply mediocre.

I mean it -- why do people love this show? Real answers please.

[KA2007]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 2:00pm

Idiot-

REALLY????

ENOUGH SAID!
Updated On: 12/29/10 at 02:00 PM

[Idiot]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 2:03pm

KA -- Such an informative an well considered response to my question. Really. Now I completely understand what people love about this show.

[HummingAlong]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 7:04pm

IDIOT -

I'll try. I think you're asking a great question. My love for the show comes from a deep connection with the material. I lost a mother who was much like Diana, and watching the show is like watching life unwind with a different ending. It's escapism at its best.

I can't speak for others, only what I feel during the show. But outside of a little escapism, I love the relationships. I find each character intriguing in his or her own way.

Why do Dan and Henry keep pursuing these ridiculous relationships?
Why does Natalie get so frustrated with everything but still stay to hear everyone out?
Watching Marin play Diana, I wonder how she's falling apart but still manages to head up the family.
The doctors are so personally removed yet so invested, and I can remember feeling that way.
Gabe - haunting, playful, and unknown - raises lots of questions for me about the one's we've lost...are they still present somehow? Do they know how we feel? Can they help us through grieving their loss?

I think these different relationships mirror the relationships we all have in real life, but the characters feel different from stock characters. There are so many questions and so many facets of each character that I feel like I'm constantly learning about them, which keeps me interested. Also, they seem to be tackling very real things, which is appealing and takes us in different directions than more traditional musicals would, perhaps, explore. As a result, it's not as easy in this show to figure out what's going to come next. It's not "eye candy" - like watching some fun, mindless sitcom with a predictable structure. It feels thoughtful to me.

The show also challenges beliefs about life that I once held very dear. And at my somewhat young age, I think it's important to have my beliefs challenged or even uprooted.

When I watch the show, I feel an electricity, and a very real passion for trying to understand life, which I don't feel many other places. And I like that there doesn't have to be a happy ending. I think we, as a society, spend a lot of time trying to convince everyone that everything's always going to be okay and that there's good in - or at least a reason for - everything that happens. But I think that we should really just acknowledge that some stuff in life is just FFed-up, and then try to figure out how to move forward anyhow. Maybe that's a bit dark, but I consider it pragmatic. It just seems like a no-BS-show, and in a world full of a lot of BS, I can really appreciate that.

So that's what I see in it...this isn't intended to sway your opinion, just trying to provide an answer to your question. Would love to hear your thoughts!

[Idiot]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 7:19pm

Humming -- thanks for the thoughtful response.

I am fascinated (being a screenwriter / director myself) by how differently people can receive the same piece of work. If an artist attempts anything that's not 'by the numbers', it will be experienced in ways that cannot be predicted or controlled. I suppose that's a good thing, but it's still unnerving from a creative's point of view.

I enjoyed the first act very much, and I loved the twist with the son. I didn't see that coming and nobody (thankfully) had spoiled it for me. I'm a big fan of theatricality in the theater, whether it's quiet and naturalistic (The Goat) or over the top (Kiss of the Spider Woman). I experienced this show as being unskillfully in between. Neither theatrical nor naturalistic -- kind of an identity crisis in the direction. I don't think that was intentional -- I think it is a failing.

I love untidy endings to distraction. Hamlet and Sweeney are two of my favorite stories of all time. Perhaps it's because I experienced the husband character as a device rather than a person, I didn't mourn the break up of the family at the end at all. And the idea that the 'son' was now attached to the father was just... well... not connected to anything in the story for me.

Now, I hadn't dealt with this kind of mental illness in my family. A friend who saw N2N in NYC has a mentally ill mother, and she said, "It's okay. It's good. But I never need to see it again." I think it hit her kind of hard.

I really appreciate your thoughtful response.

[HummingAlong]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 8:02pm

Totally - I'm all for lively, intelligent conversation. Thanks for throwing some back!

And I'll give it to you...from someone who supports the show whole-heartedly...I never do understand Gabe's attachment to Dan at the end. Or, in fact (no matter how lovely I consider the actor) much of Gabe's agenda at all. Ever. He smiles when Natalie FFs up her piano recital, then he seemingly orchestrates Henry and Nat's interactions in Hey #2...Gabe confuses me. I guess the ambiguity works for me in the sense that the dead are mysterious to us. Where they've gone after they've gone, what (if anything) they're doing...I guess that's beautiful to me in a sad way. The lyric "I'm old as time and forever young, I am every song that will stay unsung" cuts me every time.

One more lingering question I have from the show is Henry and Natalie's dialogue while getting to know each other (in Psychopharmacologist) - and I'm hoping someone can shed some light. Natalie is trying to prove to Henry that jazz is kind of worthless in that it lacks structure. Henry is trying to prove to Natalie that many Jazz performers have classical (and thus worthwhile, in her eyes) training. Henry starts making his points, and Natalie immediately, without any other sign of surrender, starts listing points that validate Henry's argument.

H: (forget jazz musician's name) was classically trained
N: Beethoven did cocaine
H: Miles Davis went to Juilliard
N: Mozart wrote poems about farts

It bugs me every time...anyone??

[CockeyedOptimist2]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 12:03am

Humming, I think that Natalie is trying to prove that classical music, or at least classical musicians, are not as straight-laced as they might seem.

[HummingAlong]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 12:58am

i know, but it just always seems counterproductive to her original point in the conversation to me.