Pulitzer Report: Next to Normal’s Unlikely Win

Next to Normal debuted at Broadway’s Booth Theatre in April 2009. Photograph by Flickr user libookperson

On the bus back to Newark last month after opening the latest smash hit to go from Issaquah’s Village Theatre to Broadway – the Elvis Presley/Johnny Cash/Carl Perkins/Jerry Lee Lewis musical Million Dollar Quartet – executive producer Robb Hunt got an unexpected phone call. The other Issaquah-spawned Broadway smash, Next to Normal, with lyrics by Brian Yorkey and music by Tom Kitt, had won the Pulitzer Prize for drama. “To have two shows running on Broadway is pretty phenomenal,” says Hunt. “The Pulitzer was highly deserving and quite a surprise. It was a shock to Brian and Tom. It wasn’t on the list under consideration.”

In fact, Next to Normal’s out-of-nowhere win was even a shock to the jury for the Pulitzer Prize. Though he’s sworn to secrecy and can’t reveal the play the drama jury recommended, juror Charles McNulty published an angry rant in the Los Angeles Times bewailing the choice of Next to Normal. The Pulitzer board “ignored the advice of its drama jury in favor of its own sentiments,” wrote McNulty. Not that he’s an N2N hater: he also wrote that it should have won the Tony Award for Best Musical. N2N lost that prize to Billy Elliot, though it did win three Tonys, including Best Score.

Ironically, McNulty also bashed the Pulitzer board for its “blinkered New York mentality” and perceived bias against non-New York drama. “Does anyone really believe that Next to Normal would have been chosen had it been submitted when it was at Arena Stage in Washington, DC?” In fact, the play is originally from way out of New York: Issaquah. “That bit doesn’t get reported much,” says Hunt. As the play’s developed, it traveled from Issaquah to New York’s Second Stage Theatre to DC’s Arena Stage to Broadway. “At each step it got better,” Hunt says. “There are all these moving parts.” Over a hundred songs were written along the way, most of them scrapped.

“There are wonderful songs not in the show,” says Hunt. Might they resurface sometime at the Village Theatre? Funny you should ask, he replies. “I’m actually thinking about a cabaret with some of the songs, with Brian Yorkey, Tom Kitt and a couple of actors.”

When Hunt was rehearsing the 2009 Village Theatre musical Stunt Girl, in which Pulitzer Prize founder Joseph Pulitzer is a character, he mused about how on earth Next to Normal might catch the attention of the Pulitzer board, whose procedures are utterly secretive and mysterious. He still doesn’t know how it happened. “But it was a good week for the Village Theatre.” •