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Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

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#1

Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/24/09 at 12:56pm

Trying to come up with a comprehensive list of musicals featuring characters dealing with mental illnesses.

Clearly, there's 'Next to Normal' and the revival of 'Sweeney Todd' but are there any others? (Of course you could make a case that many musicals featuring mentally ill characters, but I'm looking for ones where it's more or less clearly defined.)

ESP doesn't count, right? "On A Clear Day, You Can See Forever" comes to mind.

Any help (within the next couple hours) would be greatly appreciated!
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#2

re: Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/24/09 at 12:58pm

maybe Leo Blum's condition in "The Producers?"

and Stacee Jaxx's sex addiction in "Rock Of Ages."
#5

re: Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/24/09 at 1:05pm

"The Light in the Piazza has a character with mental issues"

Umm, that wasn't "mental illness." If I remember correctly, she had developmental problems due to a pony accident.
#7

re: Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/24/09 at 6:01pm

According to the definition on wikipedia, developmental disorders such as "Mental retardation" are included as a "Mental Disorder".
Give me claws and a hunch, just away from this bunch.
#9

re: Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/24/09 at 6:15pm

If Clara had a learning disability, such as ADD, I dont think her mother would be so concerned about her being romantically involved. Clara had some serious emotional issues that were just touched on.

I think most musicals deal with some level of mental distress or transition. The DSM has a an adjustment disorder category which refers to someone dealing to a change or transition with either depressive traits or anxiety. I think many musicals deal with that.

Norma Desmond had some level of detachment and regression, so I guess "Sunset Boulevard" counts. I don't think there are many musicals that the mental health issues are the focus, like N2N, but most musicals have shades of mental health concerns, often that are never addressed.
"The sexual energy between the mother and son really concerns me!"-random woman behind me at Next to Normal "I want to meet him after and bang him!"-random woman who exposed her breasts at Rock of Ages, referring to James Carpinello
#10

re: Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/24/09 at 6:24pm

Billy Elliot's grandma is senile.
If we're not having fun, then why are we doing it? These are DISCUSSION boards, not mutual admiration boards. Discussion only occurs when we are willing to hear what others are thinking, regardless of whether it is alignment to our own thoughts.
#11

re: Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/24/09 at 7:12pm

This might not count, but Sally Bowles has the mentality of a little girl. I guess you could call her pathologically immature. There was something very wrong there. So I'm gonna say Cabaret.
I know you. I know you. I know you.
#15

re: Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/25/09 at 10:45am

I'd add DEAR WORLD. It's the lovable kind of crazy, but it's still crazy.

I remember some poster here recently making the case that Mama Rose is a sociopath, but I don't remember who. Pretty convincing, though.
Nothing matters but knowing nothing matters. ~ Wicked
Everything in life is only for now. ~ Avenue Q
There is no future, there is no past. I live this moment as my last. ~ Rent

"He's a tramp, but I love him."
#16

re: Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/25/09 at 12:19pm

I always thought that Mama Rose had some kind of mental illness, and she wasn't just pushy and determined.
"Art, in itself, is an attempt to bring order out of chaos."-Stephen Sondheim
#18

re: Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/27/09 at 2:29am

In The Phantom of the Opera, in my opinion and analysis of the role of the Phantom, he suffers from some sort of mental disability. However, being that its my own analysis, I'll leave it to you to make you own discoveries of that theory, rather than spill out my whole analysis.
#19

re: Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/27/09 at 9:31am

I'm disappointed in you all .... nobody remembers MAN OF LA MANCHA?
2016 These Paper Bullets (1/02) Our Mother's Brief Affair (1/06), Dragon Boat Racing (1/08), Howard - reading (1/28), Shear Madness (2/10), Fun Home (2/17), Women Without Men (2/18), Trip Of Love (2/21), The First Gentleman -reading (2/22), Southern Comfort (2/23), The Robber Bridegroom (2/24), She Loves Me (3/11), Shuffle Along (4/12), Shear Madness (4/14), Dear Evan Hansen (4/16), American Psycho (4/23), Tuck Everlasting (5/10), Indian Summer (5/15), Peer Gynt (5/18), Broadway's Rising Stars (7/11), Trip of Love (7/27), CATS (7/31), The Layover (8/17), An Act Of God (8/31), The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (8/24), Heisenberg (10/12), Fiddler On The Roof (11/02), Othello (11/23), Dear Evan Hansen (11/26), Les Liaisons Dangereuses (12/21) 2017 In Transit (2/01), Groundhog Day (4/04), Ring Twice For Miranda (4/07), Church And State (4/10), The Lucky One (4/19), Ernest Shackleton Loves Me (5/16), Building The Wall (5/19), Indecent (6/01), Six Degrees of Separation (6/09), Marvin's Room (6/28), A Doll's House Pt 2 (7/25) Curvy Widow (8/01)
#20

re: Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/27/09 at 10:42am

Developmental disorders are Axis II, the same as personality disorders.

I don't really think any musical is actually focused on incredibly severe pathology, which is probably why people are making such a big deal out of Next to Normal. Obviously there are people in musicals who display some sort of pathology, but you can't just slap a diagnosis on everyone. The biggest argument I think you could make is that Sweeney Todd has anti-social personality disorder, though I remember someone here arguing with me back in the day that he had an adjustment disorder instead.

I think that Erik may also have anti-social personality disorder, or at least lean towards it. I would also possibly suggest that Javert from Les Mis has Obsessive-Compulsive personality disorder.
Jimmy, what are you doing here in the middle of the night? It's almost 9 PM!
#22

re: Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/27/09 at 12:15pm

Is addiction a mental illness? Been a while since I've taken a psych class....
if so-


In the Heights: Addiction to gambling! I've never seen so many lottery junkies!

Also- since addiction is a mental illness- there are endless possibilities there. (RENT, Hair, etc.)
"Are you sorry for civilization? I am sorry for it too." ~Coast of Utopia: Shipwreck
#23

re: Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/27/09 at 12:20pm

Assassins. Several of the characters obviously have mental problems. Unfortunately it may not count because the way that the show is written makes them less crazy.
If anyone ever tells you that you put too much Parmesan cheese on your pasta, stop talking to them. You don't need that kind of negativity in your life.
#24

re: Help! Musicals featuring mental illness?

Posted: 8/27/09 at 12:26pm

Yes, AODA is viewed as a mental illness.

Oh, I forgot about Assassins! John Hinckley, Jr. supposedly had paranoid schizophrenia.
Jimmy, what are you doing here in the middle of the night? It's almost 9 PM!

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