Theatre review: Next to Normal

Fifteen years after its Broadway debut Next to Normal gets its London premiere at the Donald and Margot Warehouse, and in many ways you can see why UK producers might have been wary of bringing it here for so long - and not just because it won the Pulitzer for drama, and should therefore automatically be treated with suspicion. It treads a fine line between the emotionally raw and the emotionally manipulative, and I'm still not sure which dominates overall; there's definitely moments that fall on one or other side of that line. Tom Kitt (music) and Brian Yorkey’s (book and lyrics) musical is certainly a bold take on mental health issues, as it introduces Diana (Caissie Levy,) her husband Dan (Jamie Parker,) and teenage children Gabe (Jack Wolfe) and Natalie (Eleanor Worthington-Cox) as an almost exaggeratedly average family.

Theatre review: Bring It On

Currently in residence at Southwark Playhouse, I’m quite surprised that youth company British Theatre Academy managed to get the rights to Bring It On - given Hamilton fever is still high I would have thought there’d be lots of competition to cash in on Lin-Manuel Miranda’s name. Miranda contributes songs alongside Tom Kitt and Amanda Green, with Avenue Q’s Jeff Whitty providing the book, based loosely on the 2000 teen comedy. Very loosely – I’m pretty sure in the film Eliza Dushku transferred to Kirsten Dunst’s school rather than the other way round and Phill, who seems to have a worryingly encyclopaedic knowledge of its many straight-to-video sequels, thought some of the plot points might have come from them. Campbell (Robyn McIntyre) has just been made captain of Truman High’s award-winning cheerleading squad, when a rezoning of the school district means she and unpopular student Bridget (Kristine Kruse) have to spend their senior year at the rough Jackson High, which doesn’t even have a cheerleading squad.