Next to Normal Tour Understudies

#1

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/3/10 at 7:04pm

They have finally posted the cast of the Next to Normal tour on the website. http://nexttonormal.com/tour_cast

And as I scroll down to the understudies I am surprised to see the the Diana understudy is Asian! Now I am Asian myself, but she doesn't work since both the kids are white.

Comments? Concerns?

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For those who thought NEXT TO NORMAL wouldn't have a life outside Broadway, well it's now playing in 4 cities, 9 different countries and has been translated into 6 languages.

#2

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/3/10 at 7:13pm

I would LOVE, LOVE, LOVE to see an Asian Diana within a white family. I don't know why, it just seems awesome.

I have no problem suspending disbelief. That said the Natalie looks asian*ish* and Gabe.....how about overanalysis that PearlSun!Diana is imaging her son to look like his father :P.

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Give me claws and a hunch, just away from this bunch.

Updated On: 11/3/10 at 07:13 PM

#3

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/3/10 at 7:50pm

This entire cast looks phenomenal!

#4

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/3/10 at 7:53pm

^The thing is that I knew this would happen. Eventually a minority would have to play Diana, but I hoped that they would do it correctly by having the kids actually being half Asian, not necessarily changing the ethnicity of Dan. This is all for the sake of the plot.

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For those who thought NEXT TO NORMAL wouldn't have a life outside Broadway, well it's now playing in 4 cities, 9 different countries and has been translated into 6 languages.

#5

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/3/10 at 7:55pm

As long as the actress (Pearl Sun) can sing and act the role of Diana, I don't think that her ethnicity will be a major concern. Too bad the tour isn't coming anywhere near NY...

#6

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/3/10 at 8:20pm

nexttotheheights, let's just be happy that more of us Asians are making our way to the stage. :)

#7

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/3/10 at 8:27pm

Too bad the tour isn't coming anywhere near NY...

Hartford is 90 minutes away, and Philadelphia is 2 hours away.

#8

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/3/10 at 8:43pm

Pearl Sun, who's covering Diana, is incredibly talented, but she also reads unbelievably young on stage.

I would have guessed she was in her late twenties, having seen her in HAPPINESS and tick, tick... BOOM! previously.

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Tonya Pinkins: Then we had a "Lot's Wife" last June that was my personal favorite. I'm still trying to get them to let me sing it at some performance where we get to sing an excerpt that's gone.
Tony Kushner: You can sing it at my funeral.

Updated On: 11/3/10 at 08:43 PM

#9

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/3/10 at 8:48pm

rmusic11322, Amen to that!

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For those who thought NEXT TO NORMAL wouldn't have a life outside Broadway, well it's now playing in 4 cities, 9 different countries and has been translated into 6 languages.

#10

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/3/10 at 9:37pm

"Hartford is 90 minutes away,"

It's actually 2 hours and 15 on a good day, however there's usually a bit of a delay just south of Hartford, and sometimes around the Cheshire area on 84 making the trip almost three hours.

#11

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/3/10 at 9:40pm

Race in this day and age shouldn't matter.

#12

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/3/10 at 10:52pm

From the city its about 2 hours, from upstate (in college and its not during a break) the drive would be far worse.

#13

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/4/10 at 3:01am

I would still think that it's close enough not to immediately reject any possibility of catching the tour :P.

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Give me claws and a hunch, just away from this bunch.

#14

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/4/10 at 12:28pm

I am so proud of Pearl! This makes me very excited to see the tour. I really hope she gets a chance to go on :)

#15

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/4/10 at 12:40pm

i think it's awesome. i don't mind if other races are in the roles, it wouldn't throw me out of the story. as long as they have the talent for the role i don't care what race they are. i found this clip on youtube of her which made me like her. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UO_4j0xSQXw

#16

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 11/4/10 at 2:05pm

She also sounds great here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VA4lAVIC2FE&feature=related

#17

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 12/1/10 at 6:53pm

If there were ever a mixed-family cast, here are your Gabe and Natalie. Real life siblings!

Adam Jacobs - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHy1JcKruHI
Arielle Jacobs - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZK3yYlqV7k

Imagine both of them belting it out in Superboy And The Invisible Girl... *sighs*

#18

Next to Normal Tour Understudies

Posted: 12/1/10 at 7:09pm

Pearl Sun could barely handle the score of tick, tick, BOOM, in which she only had one major solo ("Come to Your Senses"). I can't imagine how she'd fare in a voice-shredder like Diana. Good thing Ripley is usually reliable.

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"You travel alone because other people are only there to remind you how much that hook hurts that we all bit down on. Wait for that one day we can bite free and get back out there in space where we belong, sail back over water, over skies, into space, the hook finally out of our mouths and we wander back out there in space spawning to other planets never to return hurrah to earth and we'll look back and can't even see these lives here anymore. Only the taste of blood to remind us we ever existed. The earth is small. We're gone. We're dead. We're safe." -John Guare, Landscape of the Body