Decades later, unfulfilled promises of 'levelling up' keep the musical's themes relevant.
The musical is set during the 1984-1985 UK miners' strike in Everington, a fictional County Durham village. The government of the day argued that many pits were no longer viable, while unions and their supporters saw it as a battle against an attack on their power and the survival of entire communities. Decades later, unfulfilled promises of 'levelling up' keep the musical's themes relevant.
The sharpest conflict, though, is fought at home. Billy grows up in a hyper-masculine environment, where proud working-class men are expected to show distress through anger or violence. Billy's father, a striking miner and widower, is not simply closed-minded: in a world already falling apart, he fears what he cannot understand and clings to the only rules he knows, including the belief that ballet is for girls. At his audition, Billy answers through the song Electricity, where he struggles to say what dancing feels like and, in doing so, claims the right to be himself in a community defined by rigid tradition.
...Billy's success introduces another painful reality: the heartbreak of having to abandon your roots to thrive.
Yet, Billy's success introduces another painful reality: the heartbreak of having to abandon your roots to thrive. To train at the Royal Ballet School, Billy must leave the North East behind, highlighting the region's long-standing dilemma with brain drain. As a Spaniard living far from home, I recognise the bittersweet feeling shared by many students: leaving home in pursuit of a better future.
That is why Billy Elliot works: it never dilutes itself. The more it delves into the grief of one mining village, the closer it gets to something universal. A student who has just arrived in Newcastle and knows little of the region's past can sit in the Sunderland Empire and still recognise their own fears, sense of melancholy and search for true identity.