Latest Posts by abottlvr - Page 2
I know the family not interacting with/seeing Gabe is for the best because he’s a manifestation of unresolved grief and they’re healing. Even Gabe seems to recognize this. There’s a line he sings in “I’m Alive” that goes “And I’ll tell you the truth if you let me try” which makes me think that he’s limited by Diana’s perception and what she wants to hear, but he’s also aware of himself on some level. He’s telling his parents - though not in the nicest way - that they need to grieve him. Yet, at the same time, he’s so desperate to be seen, so scared of being alone, that I can’t help feeling bad for him.
Dan hugs Natalie in “Light”, as he should, and Diana doesn’t acknowledge Gabe, showing that she’s healing, but I wish Gabe could be happy, too. It was the grief that twisted him into something terrible. That wasn’t his fault. And I see him sitting alone in the kitchen, in the dark, while his family moves on without him, and all I see is a boy.
“A girl who felt caught and thought no one could see” (says the woman who have famously not seen the girl)
"you've got to let him go" (says the man who, famously, has NOT let him go)
on gabe: ghosts, grief, and wants.
before i get started: this is all my opinion! i've been into n2n since 2010 so i've had a lot of time to think about this (thank you dunmar warehouse thank you) the thing that those who are pro-poltergeist/demon/ghost/etc gabe don't consider, i think, is that i'm alive tells us everything that we need to know.
he is not just want diana wants him to be. he's what natalie wants him to be, he's what dan wants him to be, he's even what dr. madden wants him to be.
one of the reasons why he takes the melody in superboy and the invisible girl is (aside from the absolute juiciness narratively of her brother that she's singing about overshadowing her in her own song about him overshadows her) because natalie in that moment wants to feel validated, like she's correct in assuming that gabe Is More Acknowledged Than Her and in fact Is An Asshole, which is why he's smiling and bragging so much. (in my opinion!!!)
he isn't able to be seen by dan for most of the show, because that's exactly what he wants him to be: invisible. not there. the reason why he sees him at the end (other than the acknowledgement of grief as a larger symbol and made into a tangible form) is because some part deep inside of him wants someone at that moment; diana is gone, natalie is too. he wants to feel held, so he gets held. (in my opinion!!!)
dr. madden knows him as a baby who died, which is why in make up your mind / catch me i'm falling he's cradling himself in his mother's lap, why his voice becomes more childlike. (in my opinion!!!)
the problem is we are trying to define an abstract concept in simple terms, which is just not possible. not only is gabe a symbol of grief, he very much is a hallucination of diana's, and tends to side with her for that reason. (in just another day, diana is talking about how beautiful the day is, and the only one who agrees with her is gabe- "birds are singing, things are growing", etc.)
and then, of course:
guys, that's the point.
poltergeist? ghost? hallucination? symbol of grief? abstract? that's the point. we aren't supposed to know what gabe is. it's paradoxical. "what you want me to be / your worst fear", "i'll hurt you / i'll heal you", "your wish, your dream come true / your darkest nightmare too". that's how grief is. you don't know exactly what it is. is it love without a place to go? is it anger for losing them? anger at yourself for letting them be lost? gabe can be more than one thing.
especially with theatre! every gabe is going to be different! aaron's gabe is different than jack's gabe is different than kyle dean massey's gabe is different than a community theatre somewhere's gabe! that's the point! some gabes may play him as the all american football throwing jock, some may play him as an evil poltergeist, some may play him as a whiny child who needs his mom. that's the point! the interpretation means what it means to you and how you see it! he means what he means to you! we can discuss all day long about what is the objectively correct opinion on who or what gabe is (i am guilty of this. look at the previous paragraphs), but at the end of the day…
he is what YOU want him to be.
"because the tallest mountain cannot stop the smallest stream winter can't hold back the spring no matter how dark it may seem come what may nothing stops another day" –Nothing Stops Another Day, Ghost: The Musical
CAISSIE LEVY as Diana Goodman in Next to Normal Wyndham's Theatre (2025)
i promise i’ll stop my n2n spamming at some point but. i just can’t stop thinking of the genius of having diana’s (and dan’s) grief take the form of a neglected child when it is that grief and hallucination that is causing them to neglect their actual real child. LIKE.
There’s something about the focus on Gabe (in both productions) in the fandom to the point it overshadows everyone else + the focus on Gabe in the story overshadowing everyone in Diana’s life. I love Gabe too but you have to admit it’s ironic 😭
unpopular interpretation? regarding bway vs west end gabe goodman.
okay, im seeing a lot of posts comparing aaron tveit and jack wolfe as gabe, and the differences in their portrayals. a lot of people are chalking it up to jacks being more of a sad ghost, and aaron’s more of a malicious manifestation, which i don’t disagree with! however, i have always regarded gabe in both lenses since i first heard the show, so it was suprising to me that this was the interpretation. instead, i thought it had to do more with how times have changed since 2008 regarding male main characters. more under cut.
because next to normal takes place in the “modern day” i don’t think most of us think of it as a dated show, but visually, it most certainly is. in the original production, gabe spends most of the show in those y2k cross shirts, diana is almost entirely in skirts and tights, natalie is DEFINITELY a by-product of the “not like other girls” era (i can make a post on this, too)
but we know the relationship between diana and gabe is played some what as oedipal, because he’s an extension of herself. gabe is like the first victim of the draco malfoy affect. he’s evil? …but he’s hot! that’s why he pole dances!
in 2008, every love interest in a rom com was six feet tall, absolutely jacked, and possessive? this is the era of chad michael murray and singing at girls. this is the era of rom coms where every couple should’ve been in therapy. because we’ll never know what gave really would have looked like, he gets to be perfect! and possesive! and on the football team! because this was what was considered hot in 2008. it’s why aaron is in his boxers.
in 2025, the family dynamic is much more relaxed. diana wears jeans, because she’s a millennial and a mom and that makes sense. natalie gets to have fun outfits, because her wearing tights has nothing to do with how smart she is. but gabe? we don’t find men pushing you around hot anymore, thank god. so what is? the white boy of the month!! gabe isn’t possesive because that would scare the audience. there’s a world, for one, would become so much scarier. instead, he’s the white boy with the curly hair and the grandpa sweaters, perfectly engineered for the fangirls to make uwu edits about him, as they already are!
in order to understand diana’s grief and depression, one has to understand why gabe is compelling. why would we want to feel sympathy, want to root for him? and the quickest subconscious way to do that is visually. in 2008, it’s aaron with no clothes on. in 2025, it’s jack and the close ups on his eyes. and yet, they both manage to do the opposite as well. jack is genuinely scary to dan in im alive and i am the one. aaron is soft to diana in i dreamed a dance/there’s a world. it’s both at the same time, and two amazing performances!!
in this house, we love gabe goodman, for all the weird and fucked up that he is.
btw jack wolfe had a garland with ‘gabe bab’ written on outside his dressing room during next to normal, if you even care
EDIT: i’ve been informed it said ‘gabe bar’ (which is fucking brilliant) so my whole life’s a lie, sorrryyy
and now the donmar graphic as well lol
next to normal letterboxd posters
they've changed it 3 times already this week 😭 what's your fave
currently working on a deep dive into the goodman's perception of gabe and how the antagonist role is pushed onto him and his lack of agency
I cannot stop thinking about the undertones of guilt in Diana’s last interaction with Gabe, and even slightly in Dan’s. It’s a bit noticeable in the proshot, was VERY noticeable in the last show I saw. Like this is their SON, he was just a baby who wanted to be loved and remembered and in different ways they both equally failed his memory and turned him into this destructive force which he should never have been. I always saw the London staging of The Break as Diana in part realising what she helped turn Gabe into, as well as acknowledging her own pain.
And don’t even get me STARTED on how they’ve warped Gabe’s memory for Natalie and twisted their relationship which could’ve been affectionate (her brother as her guardian angel or something). And this on top of the MULTITUDE of ways they failed Natalie…and yet it’s Gabe she blames for most of the show. Something about Gabe taking the antagonist role when he’s actually the only innocent in the family because he’s not real and the only thing he did “wrong” was die.
Anyway never not thinking about all the ways this family failed each other it KILLS me.
I think it is so important to remember this scene, especially when trying to understand Shauna’s dramatic shift in Season 3. Shauna saw all of these people eat her baby right in front of her. And while it was only a dream, it was incredibly vivid and there’s no doubt in my mind that Shauna can still see each of her teammates’ faces covered in her baby’s blood every time she looks at them. Reality is warped in the wilderness, and we have already seen many other characters struggle to determine what’s real and what’s delusion out there. For Shauna, that image of her friends eating her son holds some form of truth. She consciously knows it wasn’t real, but a deeper, more primal part of her psyche clings to the betrayal, rage, and profound resentment toward her teammates as though it had truly happened.
And now she has to live alongside these people and hear them talk about the death of her child as a “sacrifice” that brought “miracles” for the group. With every conversation, every moment spent with them, that resentment grows deeper. She begins to view her teammates as the embodiment of her pain, her grief, her guilt, and her deep sense of loss. Shauna’s desperate need to make sense of her overwhelming emotions leads her to project her own internal turmoil onto them. She can’t bear the weight of believing that her baby’s death is her fault, so she externalizes that guilt, shifting the blame to those around her. And her postpartum nightmare is the catalyst for this projection, turning her grief into rage, and leading to her violent reign as the Antler Queen.
Having galaxy brain thoughts about bisexual Natalie Goodman today
👀 did someone say next to normal west end cast recording 👀
because this certainly isn't a link to the unofficial one that i just spent two days putting together from the proshot complete with album art and track details 👀
(it is)
Could you please gif Natalie in all her outfits?
All of Natalie’s outfits in N2N West End!
Feel free to use with credits to my tumblr! I hope the order wasn’t messed up… oops..
Send any requests to my ask box!
being able to open the next to normal tag every hour or so and see a new post is the best feeling ever
the dark of hes not here into the bright white light of you dont know immediately ughhh also natalie and henry watching you dont know/i am the one from the staircase landing makes the number(s) so despicableeeee. like in the obc i rlly sympathize with diana while shes talking abt how fucked her sitch is + i sympathize with dan for having his feelings get swept under the rug... it is Their Moment. but in the revival w natalie watching them it makes them both just feel like shitty parents likee.... girl put the chair down ur daughter is havinng a panic attack. AND this makes superboy feel like a Direct Response to watching the you dont know/i am the one fight
the revival reaaalllyy lets dan and diana feel like shit parents, where i think the obc gives them a little more leeway, and it is super interesting. it makes maybe/ntn feel like a whole other song
top ten heart wrenching moments in next to normal
(in no specific order because they are all equally devastating in their own ways)
1. the reveal that gabe is dead
diana's look of hope as she walks up the stairs coupled with dan and natalie's wounded expressions makes the whole reveal even more shocking
2. natalie's breakdown during her piano performance
as a perfectionist with crippling anxiety who wants to be acknowledged for her talents, i feel for her
3. natalie trying to block out her parents' argument
i think this one speaks for itself. just look at her
4. diana's blood on the floor
absolutely chilling scene with gabe's toy car and bin surrounded by diana's blood
5. gabe's expressions during "i've been"
his scared expression at diana's blood being on the floor and his look of hurt when dan says there's no one around makes my heart break for him
6. gabe touching natalie's hand
him softly touching her hand before he leaves forever and her feeling it was genuinely soul crushing for me
7. dan throwing gabe's music box
dan's yell at natalie, natalie getting scared and running away, and diana tears and attempts to fix the box shook me to my core
8. dan breaking down in front of natalie
from the whole production, this scene made me tear up the most. dan's gut wrenching sobs still echo in my head
9. gabe's pleading look after "i am the one reprise"
jack wolfe just really knows how to pull on my heartstrings because god i feel so bad for gabe that my heart hurts
10. diana crying when she's going through gabe's baby stuff
hearing people break down makes me so emotional. and diana whispering "my baby" while clutching gabe's baby clothes just made sure that i would want to bawl my eyes out
How Dance Symbolises Relationships In Next To Normal
Was going through my drafts and found this post and I feel as though with the pro-shot being released yesterday it's a nice time to post it.
Dancing is used throughout N2N to facilitate a deeper understanding of how characters view each other. Its first mention is in "My
Psychopharmacologist and I" when Diana is describing Dr. Fine and says "It's like an odd romance // Intense and very intimate // We do our dance." Here it's implied that her 'dance' with Dr. Fine is well-established, she has made little long-term progress with her issues over the course of seeing him. It is habit more than help.
After that there's "I Dreamed A Dance".
Here dancing is a platform that Diana can use to dreams of a life with Gabe. Dancing is a physical act, often one where partners will hold onto each other in some way, and this is exactly what she lacks with Gabe - physical presence to engage with. Dreaming of not just a life with him, but a dance, shows how she has idealised their relationship. Since he exists entirely in her head, she knows the ins and outs of him in a way that no parents ever truly knows their teenage child. In order to dance with someone you need to know what move they will make before they make it. It adds weight to her omniscient relationship with Gabe, which is starkly juxtaposed against her distant relationship with Natalie
The most compelling lyric in the song, and the one I'll come back to later is the only lyric which Gabe also sings, which is "The dancers may disappear // Still the dance goes on."
The dancers, the physical beings that can be touched and held and can take part in the act of dancing, fade away, but the act of dancing can remain. It doesn't require the same presence as a dancer. It's a tidy, heart wrenching summary of their entire relationship. Gabe isn't there, but Diana will take part in their life together anyway.
Dancing is brought up again when Henry invites Natalie to a dance after they don't speak for a while. She rejects him twice throughout the second act until she finally goes and meets him there after reconciling with Diana. The dance is the "prop" around which Natalie can engage or disengage herself from Henry. When she chooses to go to the dance with him she chooses that relationship, to be with him. To know and learn about each other.
The final time dancing is mentioned is in "So Anyway". 'And true, it's quite a trick to tell the dancers from the dance'
This is a callback to the "I Dreamed A Dance" lyric. Diana recognises how she's been swept up in the 'dance', these visions of a life with Gabe, and that has detached her from the physical dancers, the people in her reality.
What this does mean, is by the end of the musical, Dan is the only character who never 'enters into dance' or rather a life with somebody. Diana and Dr. Fine do, Diana and Gabe do, and Henry and Natalie do. This speaks to how he is generally detached. To enter a dance implies an agency which he lacks throughout the musical as he gives up on his life time and time again to try and get the 'girl he knew' back. Diana leaves him, Natalie finds a 'dance' outside their family, and Gabe haunts him despite his begging.
Next to Normal (Broadway 2009, Donmar Warehouse 2023, Wyndham Theatre 2024) and Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022)
gifs from @where-our-stories-start & @offarawaysnfuturedays-inmydreams
wowwww
piano in its gonna be good reprise.... pianist needs his dick sucked for that idk
gabe in this like infantile fetal position once he enters the first catch me im calling falsetto in dianas lap wowwww .... also thruought the show his crawling, standing on his knees like he is literally his body being put in this like infan/child space but he is grown and so its like it just feels weird and Wrong.... YES!!!!!
and then in maybe diana trying to force natalie in that gabe fetal position in her lap.... JESUS CHRIST!!!!! i love how unforgiving to diana maybe/ntn was dude
dan moving to embrace natalie in song of forgetting and then immediately just going back to diana and literally brushing her off.... augh
loved how much quieter and softer eleanors natalie is to jennifer damianos, made the take feel so much more different and made natalie feel so much more At Risk andlike concerning . there is no fronting or posturing she looks like she is going to die 2 days from now max ans NO ONE IS HELPING HER!!!
dans hyperventilating hiding behind the island during the break...YESSSS!!!!!
tab mentioned gabe behind the pexiglass in aftershocks looked like hes looking in through the windows dude ugh
made minis versions of gabe’s birthday cake for the proshot airing
niche aesthetic: the era of next to normal where the rips of jack wolfes jeans would increase every show
i love Zachary Stewart’s description of Jamie Parker’s portrayal of Dan
Read on WOS here
jamie they could never make me hate you, idc if you sound like kermit. your desperation, need to fix everything, and attempt at emotionally detaching yourself, but being incapable of it means everything to me
Here's the audio of the 1st preview of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry from 5.5.2025 for anyone interested! (I know I was, the FOMO was insane) Did not disappoint 🥹✨
