Next To Normal
9 / 10
It is not easy to pull off a musical about psychotropic drugs and electroconvulsive therapy—or for that matter, about duty, freedom and loss. In its trial mounting at Second Stage last year, Next to Normal sometimes suffered from acute self-consciousness and mood swings. Happily, authors Brian Yorkey and Tom Kitt have successfully stabilized the show since then, and their songs make up the best new Broadway score of the season, merging show-tune influences (William Finn neurosis in “My Psychopharmacologist and I”) with more radio-ready styles (John Denver wistfulness in “I Miss the Mountains,” Seventies pop-rock thrust in the instantly memorable “I’m Alive”).