Next to Normal, Donmar Warehouse, review: Nostalgic musical still feels relevant
Brian Yorkey’s Pulitzerwinning Next to Normal (it sits alongside Hamilton and A Strange Loop as the only musicals to be awarded the accolade in the 21st century) returns to the stage 14 years after its Broadway debut – but its message about the weight of coping with mental illness has barely aged a day.
It follows Diana Goodman, a middle aged woman trying to hold her family life together while dealing with bipolar disorder. The book is as sharp as the Pulitzer would suggest, with lines such as I’m no sociopath, “I’m no Sylvia Plath” peppered throughout.
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One catchy number focuses on Diana’s pill regime, while another is entitled “My Psychopharmacologist and I”. But there’s also a steeliness to the production, which deals unflinchingly with attempted suicide and its aftermath.
It asks big questions such as whether it’s better to live in pain or to suffer through the medically induced amnesia of electro-shock therapy. While the themes may feel brand new, the music has taken on a pleasantly nostalgic quality, with the frequent rocky numbers – think Green Day – taking you back to the days when American punk rock dominated the charts.
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It’s all set in a wonderfully realised family home, with tunes delivered by a band located in the attic, not dissimilar to the band in the recent Richard Hawley musical Standing at the Sky’s Edge. There’s a reason this musical has stood the test of time and the Donmar more than does it justice.
Next to Normal plays at the Donmar Warehouse until 7 October