Louis Hobson Gives Psychiatry a Good Name in Normal

Age: 32

Hometown: Puyallup, Washington

Currently: Making his Broadway debut as a pair of psychiatrists (including one who morphs into a rock star!) in the Broadway musical Next to Normal.

Can’t Stop the Music: Growing up in the Seattle suburbs, Hobson became serious about singing in high school, when he placed second among baritones in a statewide competition. “I’m the kind of person who gets really focused on something and then I have to keep practicing to be the best at it,” he says with an intensity befitting his Next to Normal characters. “I joined the jazz ensemble and taught myself to sing jazz by listening to vocalists like Harry Connick Jr.” Winning a scholarship to nearby Pacific Lutheran University, he majored in music education—but after his father survived brain surgery, he switched to theater. “I was walking through campus thinking, ‘I don’t want to be a music teacher, I want to be a performer,’” he recalls. “Life’s too short not to do the thing you love.”

Let’s Get Hitched: Just after graduation, Hobson married his college sweetheart, Noreen, who owns a Seattle-based talent agency that she continues to run from New York. “It’s somewhat of an anomaly in this business to have gotten married as young as we did, and to be married as long as we have,” he says of his 10-year union. “She’s always been my biggest cheerleader and my strongest critic.” The couple had originally planned to move east from Tacoma two years ago, but when Noreen became pregnant, they delayed their departure so that baby Gwyneth, now two and a half, could bond with other family members. “Things happen for a reason,” Hobson says of the timing of his arrival in the Big Apple. “If I had come earlier, I might not be doing this show now.”

Seattle Star: He’s a Fresh Face in New York, but back in Seattle, Hobson was the go-to leading man in musicals ranging from West Side Story (as Tony) and Miss Saigon (as Chris) to Evita (as Che) and Hair (as Claude, opposite Cheyenne Jackson as Berger). So why start over in the toughest theater market in the country? “I wanted to be challenged,” he says. “I think being the ‘biggest fish’ anywhere makes you soft. Toward the end of my time in Seattle, I wasn’t even auditioning—I just got offered things, and I didn’t like that. What I wanted in New York was to work with great actors and great directors. I remember telling my wife before we moved that I’d rather have the smallest part in the best show than a big role in a so-so show. And I got exactly what I wanted.”

Normal Journey: Way back in 2002, Hobson played Dan, the father, in a Seattle reading of Next to Normal. “I was doing The Sound of Music at the Village Theater, where [Next to Normal librettist] Brian Yorkey was associate artistic director, and he said, ‘My friend Tom [Kitt] and I are working on a new musical. Would you be interested in doing a reading?” Although the show was substantially different then, Hobson recalls that the score “was unlike anything I had sung before, and the response was really strong.” Fast-forward six years, and the actor, newly arrived in NYC, was summoned to read for the younger roles in the show’s Arena Stage production. “I told my agent, ‘I’m too old,’ but who would turn down an audition for [director] Michael Greif?” Four callbacks (and a newly grown beard) later, Hobson won the small but pivotal parts of Dr. Madden and Dr. Fine.

Feeling Electric: Hobson’s charismatic performance as a psychiatrist won raves not only from Times critic Ben Brantley, who declared it “suavely played,” but from audience members and real-life shrinks. “At the stage door, a lot of people say they wish their therapist was more like me,” Hobson says with amusement, “and therapists have told me that I represent the profession well. The head of psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medical College came the other night and loved the show.” Now happily settled in New York with his family, Hobson looks forward to watching his career unfold anew. “You have to have fire and desire to be successful in this business,” he reflects. “I’m hoping what I did in Seattle will translate to what’s happening here, and that I can play bigger roles.”