![\"\"](\"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/files\/2019\/11\/NexttoNormal1-color-819x1024.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Caity Healy<\/strong> | Managing Editor<\/span><\/p>\n With Western Oregon\u2019s Creative Arts Division as robust and successful as it is, with several programs and departments, students involved in it often choose to get involved in the arts in their community beyond the ways they are offered on campus. One such student is Noah Nieves Driver.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Nieves Driver is a senior at Western, currently in his second year of the ASL\/English Interpreting Program. On top of this, he has been a dancer for nearly as long as he can remember.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI started dance when I was three. And I continued with that all the way until I was 9-ish, then I got back into it when I was 13,\u201d Nieves Driver explained. While he can\u2019t pinpoint the exact reason he stopped at age nine, he can remember exactly what inspired him to start again at 13.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI saw Alvin Ailey perform in my hometown, Tacoma, Washington, and I was like, \u2018I want to get back into this,\u2019\u201d Nieves Driver recalled.<\/span><\/p>\n While his history with dance has been long and extensive, an opportunity for him to do something new came up in the summer of 2019: choreograph a show titled \u201cNext to Normal\u201d \u2014 this was his musical choreography debut.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI choreographed a play in high school \u2026 and I took the choreography sequence here at WOU, so I learned how to choreograph for myself,\u201d Nieves Driver said. \u201cBut show-wise, this is the first actual show I\u2019ve choreographed.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Nieves Driver has been involved in local theater in the neighboring communities to Monmouth for awhile, and when he heard that the Majestic Theatre in Corvallis, Oregon was putting on \u201cNext to Normal\u201d \u2014\u00a0 a show about a suburban household coping with mental illness, delving into the ways a mother navigates her illness and the treatments that go along with it, as well as the impact it has on her family \u2014 he contacted the director, Ruth Mandsager, to see if she\u2019d be interested in him doing the choreography.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI love the show, I love the people who are a part of the production, and I just had this vision for it and I was like, \u2018I want to see this come to life,\u2019\u201d he added. Mandsager gladly accepted his offer, and they got to work. Nieves Driver explained that the songs are very grounded in reality, and therefore wanted to make sure there was a purpose to the choreography that he was planning.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI just listened to the songs a lot \u2026 I tried to understand what the characters were feeling,\u201d Nieves Driver said. \u201cI was working with the music,\u201d he added, asking himself things like, \u201c\u2018okay what is the music doing here? Oh, it\u2019s accenting that. Let me follow that or let me do the opposite to create some contrast with that.\u2019\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n As a choreographer, Nieves Driver felt elated by how this process went, and explained that, ideally, this is just the beginning.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m hopeful that I can get in \u2014 at least in this area \u2014 as a prominent choreographer, and then hopefully become a director so that I can cast more people of color in traditionally white roles,\u201d he explained. \u201cIn this area, there aren\u2019t a lot of opportunities for people like me, like black people, to get cast in stuff \u2026 so with traditionally white roles … why is it traditionally white? Is it connected to the story? Is it about race? If not, then why does that matter? So, there wasn\u2019t a lot of work here for me as a dancer, so that\u2019s kind of why I went into choreography. But I think I\u2019m going to focus more on that, and less on the dance aspect.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cNext to Normal\u201d does have a content warning under the Majestic Theatre\u2019s website, as it includes subject matter and language regarding depression, self-harm, drug abuse and suicide.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n For those interested in seeing the show, there are still a few more opportunities. It runs Nov. 13\u201316 at 7:30 p.m., and Nov. 17 at 2:30 p.m. Tickets are $16 for students, $18 for adults, and only $10 for those that go Thursday, Nov. 14.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/files\/2019\/11\/nexttonormal3-color-731x1024.jpg\"){kind=spacer}
<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/files\/2019\/11\/nexttonormal2-color-1024x819.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/files\/2019\/11\/nexttonormal4-color-1024x1024.jpg\")
<\/p>\n