Gotta Dance

When so much of the news is bleak, and so much of what passes as entertainment seems both inane and depressing, it was refreshing to watch Billy Elliot, The Musical walk off with ten Tony awards last night.

The movie on which the Broadway musical was based was a brilliant evocation of the power of dance and of the exuberant hopes of youth, even when those hopes are lonely flowers growing in the desolate coal country of Thatcher's England. The musical was an immediate hit in London, and the American production has been a sold-out hit ever since it opened last fall in Manhattan.

It was a nice evening. The three boys who alternate from night to night in playing the lead role -- a role that requires acting and singing abilities, in addition to their training in ballet -- were funny and touching as they stood before the audience, accepting their awards. Elton John, who failed to win the award for best score, was unusually gracious in praising the winning composer and lyricist (for the show Next to Normal), even while pointing out that Billy Elliot was a team effort and that everyone on the team was a winner.

The show, and the Tonys it received, reveal an increasingly widespread American acceptance of dance as both art form and entertainment, and approval of its mastery as a legitimate aspiration for young people (including, notably, young boys). The publicity resulting from the awards will result, moreover, in increased future interest in dance in general and ballet in particular. (And the staffs of the three regional ballet academies, thanked by their students as they accepted their awards on nationwide TV, must have been justifiably jubilant.)