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Blog Post 13: Three Viewings

THE LAST BLOG. keep in mind that these are out of order. If you want to see the posts on The Drowsy Chaperone, On The Verge, Next to Normal and Fires in the Mirror, keep scrolling

The first thing that I noticed in between the first two monologues was the common character of Nettie, who died at one hundred and three years old.  The first guy’s encounter with her was because he was his undertaker. Mac’s stole from Mrs. Nettie James in order to go see her grandmother.  This lead me to thinking that Mac stole from this innocent woman because she needed to go see someone from her past. She needed something from her family, but came to realize something much bigger that affected her much more (the death of her husband and kids).  Tessie’s funeral made Emil realize how much he loved his wife and how he ever so desperately needed to tell her that. Finally, Virginia realizes how much her husband loved her and how well he knew her. Love and loss are all connected here and unfortunately that means we have to lose in order to realize who loved us and who we love.

When I think of death, I think about crying and sadness. However, something else I notice throughout these monologues is that no one is really upset. They are too busy focused on doing other things or other parts of their lives that they don’t take a step back and really take that time to be upset. Emil focuses on another woman.  Mac is focused on stealing jewelry from other people’s funerals and then has to deal with her family’s death once again after trying to forget. And finally, Virginia is too busy worrying about the financial trouble she is in.  Although we have very different perspectives of funerals, they all sort of deal with it in a similar way: Not being sad.

Show and Tell #3 - Next to Normal

Yes, another musical is my choice for show and tell number three.  I was inspired to re-read this show after talking in class today about musical theater and our favorite moments. I talked about one of my favorite moments from this show, which is a dramaturgical choice that I will discuss later on.

This is a little show called next to normal, music written by Tom Kitt and book and lyrics written by Brian Yorkey. This show first started out about 15 years ago as a workshop called Feeling Electric starring Norbert Leo Butz. It moved to Off-Broadway in 2008 and then a year later moved to Broadway at the Booth Theatre. The orginal production starred Alice Ripley (Diana), Jennifer Damiano (Natalie), Aaron Tveit (Gabe), J Robert Spencer (Dan), Adam Chanler Berat (Henry), and Louis Hobson (Dr. Fine/Dr. Madden).  It won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2010. However, it did not win the Tony in 2009 for best musical (it was beaten out by Billy Elliot). Ripley won Best Actress and Tom Kitt won Best Original Score. The show is now being produced all across the world.

Next to Normal is, in short, about a struggling suburban American family. Diana is a mother with manic depression. She had a son when she was young which is the only reason her and Dan got married. Eighteen months later, her son was killed. They had Natalie some time after and she is currently sixteen years old.  Throughout the play we see Diana interacting with her son although he is not actually there, however we don’t learn that until halfway through act one.  After a suicide attempt, Diana goes through electric shock therapy and forgets everything about her life. In act two, the family tries to bring back some of her memories and leaves out everything about her son.  However, Gabe keeps poking back at her trying to get her to remember.

Meanwhile, Natalie is feeling a bit ignored.  She’s your typical stressed out high schooler, up until four in the morning studying “three more chapters of calculus, a physics problem set, a history quiz and two pages on floral imagery in Flowers for Algernon which is like duh” (9).  She is an avid pianist, and as she rehearses for her big recital she meets Henry. Henry is a loser stoner type who tries to win Natalie over, and eventually does. However, Natalie becomes a stoner and steals her mother’s medication.  Eventually she goes into a downward spiral and Henry brings her back.

My absolute favorite dramaturgical choice in this show is a choice that Brian Yorkey makes.  Diana and Dan’s son’s name is not mentioned until the end of act two.   At one point, in the “It’s Gonna Be Good (Reprise)” Diana screams, “What was his name?” We see him on stage throughout the show but the one moment that literally assaults all of your emotions is when Dan finally accepts that he is there. In “I Am the One (Reprise)” Dan looks up and says “Gabe, Gabriel” as Gabe replies “Hi, dad.”  This is one of the most effective and powerful moments I’ve ever read/listened to and I cannot imagine what it would do for me when I see it live.

Another choice is the delayed point of attack with Gabe.  We see him throughout the first act and think that he is just a normal part of the family.  He interacts with Diana but we don’t realize that he isn’t real until the right before the song “He’s Not Here.”  Natalie and Henry are at dinner with the family and Diana walks in with a birthday cake for Gabe.  Henry says something along the lines of “I didn’t know you had a brother” and Natalie responds with “I don’t. He died before I was born.” We grow attached to Gabe because we think he’s real and it’s just such a shift and you get so confused that it’s so just “wow.”

This is one of the trippiest and inspiring shows I have ever read. It makes you think and I cannot even begin to express my love for it.  I highly recommend it to anyone with a fascination in psychology or how the mind works in the slightest. 

Post 12 - On the Verge

Yes, really this is my post 13, I think. Keep in mind that everything is sort of out of order at this point.

A poster for this play avoiding the main characteristics of the girls and what they have.... That’s difficult.  My first thought was sort of the stereotypical evolution poster. You know, the one that has the monkeys turning into the caveman who then turns into present day man? I would do a spin-off of that. I like the idea of showing the evolution of time, but I don’t exactly know how to do that. I think the tag line I would chose would be my favorite quote from the play. This quote is , “Prisoner in a Kaleidoscope” (29).   I think this is a good tagline for the show because they really are trapped, if you think about it. Yes they are moving throughout time and certainly are not stuck. However, they are trapped because they cannot go back to their home. They are trapped in Terra Incognita and will never be able to go back to Terra Haute. 

The Kaleidoscope is this strange new place. Going from the middle of the nineteenth century to a bright new place in the 1950’s is insane and such a culture shock. The 1950s are bright and fun and full of life and lights. It’s the time of poodle skirts and sock hops. So I think that might be more what my poster would look like. Maybe the evolution of pants that the girls wear? They start off in their traditional skirt from the 1800s and move to trousers and the poodle skirt. It shows the shift in time. Or maybe one girl would wear one of the three items of clothing.