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Billy Elliott on Broadway

Billy Elliott, the British musical hit by Elton John and Lee Hall, has arrived on Broadway at a most fortuitous moment. Seldom has America been at such a moment of simultaneous optimism and gloom. Skeptics were worried that a musical about a boy who yearns to be a ballet dancer while growing up under the repressive, union-busting regime of Margaret Thatcher in Northern England, 1984, might not resonate with a New York audience. A year ago, they might have been right. But here we are in a Dickensian best of times/worst of times, with Barack Obama heading to the White House, the nation engaged in distant wars, and the economy teetering on the precipice of collapse. Broadway is totally in the mood to see a working-class English lad triumph over adversity and fulfill his spirit through art.

Yes, this is the age of wisdom and the age of foolishness, and Broadway was sorely in need of a hit. It’s got one. The opening night performance was a decided slam-dunk—so much so that the inevitable moment, when runners start passing out copies of the next day’s newspaper to the guests at the opening night party never even happened. Why bother? Billy Elliott arrived as an assumed hit, featuring the best score Elton John has written for the theater—some might argue the only good score he’s written for the theater, in fact.

We were guests of set designer Ian MacNeil, whose re-creation of a coal town community center through which the other locations in the story glide with deceptive high-tech ease anchors this tale derived from a film by the same title. It was fascinating to watch this triumph unfold in the company of so many Brits. Haydn Gwynne, a London star but Broadway unknown, elicited entrance applause, recreating her London performance as Mrs. Wilkinson, the jaded ballet teacher who discovers Billy’s talent.

Director Stephen Daldry has sharpened contrasts that could be taken for granted in England, such as the specifics of the British political situation in 1984, the conflict between police officers and coal miners and so forth. Such adjustments were noticed. A prolonged sequence, “Merry Christmas, Maggie Thatcher,” probably seems longer to New Yorkers than the show’s creators imagined, despite being reportedly softened.

The British team was also gratified by the abundance of talented children to play the various child roles in the Broadway company. Three boys alternate in the role of Billy. Cuban-Canadian David Alvarez was reviewed by the New York papers, though we saw New York’s Trent Kowalik on the opening night. Kowalik was entirely engaging and—as is required—astoundingly talented as a singer, dancer and actor. Thirteen years old, he had previously played the role in London.

Most gratifying of all, Billy Elliott has made the transition from screen to stage far more successfully than other recent attempts. Indeed, with its soul firmly embedded in a love of dance, Billy Elliott convinces us that it was begging to be a stage creation, unlike the awkward Little Mermaid, or the cloyingly forced Legally Blonde. (Shrek is forthcoming…we’ll see.) Billy Elliott is a story with universal truths to reveal and an immediacy that lends itself to the medium winningly. Expect it to be a long-time resident at Broadway’s Imperial Theatre.