‘Next to Normal’ is the show about mental health all Asian-Americans need to see
Last Saturday, I had the honor of watching Next to Normal at the East West Players theatre in Little Tokyo, Los Angeles. As the nation’s longest-running theatre for People of Color, the East West Players devotes itself to Asian representation in both casting and production selection. This season’s Next to Normal beautifully reimagines the original Tony and Pulitzer-winning Broadway musical with a star-studded, all-Asian cast that generates a much-needed conversation about mental health, especially in context of the Asian-American community.
Next to Normal tells the story of Diana Goodman (played by Broadway Miss Saigon and Wicked star DeeDee Magno Hall), a wife and mother who struggles with bipolar disorder along with symptoms of other mental illnesses. It’s never clearly divulged which illnesses she has, because as with all things mental health, it is not an exact science. Diana’s husband Dan (played by Broadway Miss Saigon star Cliffton Hall who, incidentally, is Magno Hall’s real-life husband) desperately grapples with medical solutions to treat Diana, at the cost of his patience and sanity. Strung along for the dynamic dance with death are Diana’s daughter Natalie (played by N2N veteran Isa Briones) and her son Gabe (played by Justin W. Yu).
What makes this particular performance so poignant is not just the prowess of the cast and production team but the relevance that this iteration bears to an Asian-American audience. Mental illness is very stigmatized in many Asian cultures, and when added to a slew of other Asian-American struggles such as inter-generational cultural conflict, acculturation, and discrimination, it poses an intricate, intersectional issue.
According to the American Psychological Association, suicide is the “8th leading cause of death for Asian-Americans, whereas it was the 11th leading cause of death for all racial groups combined”, yet many mental health cases remain underreported in Asian-American communities (Heron, M. 2011). Staging Next to Normal with an all-Asian cast implicitly presents this phenomenon as a problem, and facilitates a much-needed social discussion on how we can better empathize with and support those who experience mental illness in our community.
As an Asian-American who struggles with mental illness, the production hit very close to home for me. There was almost always an experience to which I could identify in each scene depicted of Diana’s life. And while it was deeply emotional for me to witness the show, I am grateful that I did. Magno Hall’s refreshingly holistic approach to portraying Diana makes the character rich, subtle, and deeply human. After all, the mentally ill are not inhuman creatures who exact chaos — they are multi-faceted people not unlike yourself, who must choose (and sometimes lose their agency of choice) between duty and compulsion every day.
The anguish and struggle of living with a psychological condition can be profoundly isolating. This is what makes N2N’s hallmark song “I am the One” so powerful — it repeats the through-line “You don’t know” from both the perspective of Diana and her husband Dan, highlighting the fact that one can never know what it’s like unless they experience it for themselves. Even then, one experience can vary from another in even the same diagnostic category, which is why treatment requires constantly “figuring out” what the patient is experiencing before being able to offer help. For Asian-Americans, even entering into this process is a challenge that requires a certain admission of defeat which the cultural concept of “saving face” diametrically opposes. But as we see with Diana, help is best received when the patient is informed and actively chooses to proceed with it on their own terms. Because among all things, agency over their own life is something that people who struggle with mental illness value the most.
The show also sheds light on the painful diagnostic process that patients undergo when trying new medications. While there is a medical tendency to over-pathologize emotions as problems in need of treatment, there also exists a need for medicine to balance what therapy cannot. The song “My Psychopharmacologist and I” dramatizes this process by framing it as a metaphorical dance with psychiatry, a tango where Diana is guided into a world of side effects, multi-colored pills, and diagnostic misfires. After considerable attempts and failures, many people may wonder: Is this worth it? The truth is, no one knows for sure. From my own experience, experimenting with medication is risky and humiliating, but necessary. It is certainly one of many resources we have to help people achieve something, well, next to normal.
The topic of mental illness deserves as much focus in the Asian-American community as issues of racism and representation, especially since the health of our psyche ties directly to our relationship with identity, upbringing, and culture. What the East West Players has accomplished by putting up Next to Normal is a production that deserves every standing ovation it gets (from what I’ve heard, it’s been getting one every showing) and some extra applause after that, for the issues it brings to light.
Next to Normal shows at the East West Players from May 12 — June 11, 2017 at the David Henry Hwang Theatre. Tickets may be purchased at http://www.eastwestplayers.org/news/next-to-normal/