Tom Williams

Theatre ReviewsTom Williams

Billy Elliot The Musical

The winner of 10 Tony’s including Best Musical, Billy Elliot arrives for an extended sit-down run at Chicago’s Oriental Theatre. There has been much hype about this show and, as is the case so often, it doesn’t quite live up to my expectations. I must say, that Billy Elliot has so much going for it that it is “critic-proof.”

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Theatre ReviewsTom Williams

The Hiding Place

Corrie ten Boom (Lia Mortensen), her sister, the saintly Betsie ten Boom (Cynthia Judge) and their father, Casper ten Boom (Dennis Kelly) have a large house/watch repair show. The ten Boom’s are devote Christians from the Dutch Reform Church. They are also fierce Dutch patriots who quickly became members of the Dutch Resistance.

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Theatre ReviewsTom Williams

The Lost Boys Of Sudan

I believe that using irritating rhymes and hip-hop speech patterns not only makes the words hard to understand but comes off as trivializing the horrors of surviving the slaughter in the Sudan. Combine the strong African accents with the gibberish, sports-orientated, hip-hop tirades and The Lost Boys of Sudan reduces the struggles of survival by the three teens as a provocative adventure. Too much whimsy and artsy disjointed scenes lowered the impact of the Sudan’s tragedy.

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Theatre ReviewsTom Williams

Resurrection Blues

Miller’s 2002 penultimate play brilliantly satirizes modern politics and faith in a media-obsessed society. This is whacked-out satire that contains both Miller’s wonderful dialogue and apt speeches and, a rarely used farcical satirical style each used to hone in to make Miller’s duality– “hope and disgust, high amusement and despair. It’s all packed into one play.”

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