THPD block party returns for its third year
TERRE HAUTE, Ind. (WTWO/WAWV) — A fun night in the community is right around the corner.
On May 31, the Terre Haute Police Department will be holding its third annual block party. The event will include food, rides, games, face painting, and more for the community to enjoy free of charge.
Lieutenant Justin Sears said this event is a great way for the department to build relationships in the community.
THPD recognizes local business for their support
'We are developing relationships with the kids, and we are developing relationships I may never see by the time I retire, cause we are starting at these ages. We want the Terre Haute Police Department to be a fun place. We want the kids to drive by with mom and dad and be like 'hey that's where we went and saw Foam Hommies, or we talked to the police, or we saw the K9 demo, that SWAT truck was there and they let us get in it. We want it to be a place they feel comfortable,' said Sears.
The event will be held at the Terre Haute Police Department
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Had the young British writer Jack Godfrey made up the plot of '42 Balloons,' his new musical with Broadway aspirations now in its North American premiere at Chicago Shakespeare Theater, he'd have been obliged to justify its eccentricity. But a California man who came to be known as 'Lawnchair Larry' Walters really did attach 42 helium-filled weather balloons to a Sears lawn chair, take a seat and leave terra firma in 1982, reaching a whopping height of 16,000 feet during his 45-minute flight before popping some balloons with a pellet gun and floating back down to Earth. The introverted Walter was not some TikTok influencer (he took no pictures and did not inhabit any such gestalt), but an eccentric man who simply wanted to fulfill his lifelong dream of being a pilot. For those who have not seen other material influenced by Walters' flight (the movie 'Up' being just one example), the veracity of the story gets pointed out at the top of '42 Balloons' by an eight-person ensemble, a self-aware Greek chorus that knows it is in a musical. 'This actually happened, you can look it up after the show,' they sing. 'And you can tell your friends about it and they can say, 'That's pretty crazy, why did you go and see a musical about balloons and what makes a man try to fly in a lawn chair?'' That's a good question on many levels, especially since Walters (played by Charlie McCullagh) persuaded his wife, Carol (Evelyn Hoskins, in a dominant performance), and his best pal, Ron (Akron Watson), to fund and back his quixotic quest, despite its obvious risks to life and limb. But it's also a clever bit of self-protection from the exceedingly smart Godfrey, a newcomer who has written an enjoyable and engaging new musical that strives to see Walters as an everyman with a weird dream — not so different, of course, from the dreams people describe in Tony Award acceptance speeches. His fast-moving, sung-through show (Godfrey penned the whole shooting match) is a quizzical, chirpy, mid-sized musical written for a cast of 12, with an undeniably charming and very British insouciance. American eccentrics like Walters long have provided material for satirists across the pond. But the difference between '42 Balloons' and, say, 'Jerry Springer — The Opera' is that this one has an emotional openness at its core. Godfrey walks a careful line between making musical hay with the strangeness of Walters' 'Candide'-like quest and admiring the guy's chutzpah and his determination to find his grail, as they say in 'Spamalot.' 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And a fifth catchy hook, penned for Carol and beautifully sung by the fabulous Hoskins, kept me awake half the night trying to remember in which show I had heard that particular musical phrase before. You can hear the strong influence of Tim Minchin, who wrote the score for 'Matilda,' as well as other English composers from John Barry to Andrew Lloyd Webber to Willy Russell to Elton John to the Australian songwriter John Farrar, who wrote 'Xanadu,' another show you keep hearing. There's a 'Hamilton'-like rap and, unsurprisingly, some harmonics not so different from 'Six.' At other moments in the orchestrations, you feel like you are listening to ABBA or Electric Light Orchestra or 10cc or the show 'Rock of Ages.' I recount all that not necessarily as pejorative or to say that '42 Balloons' is like a musical Wikipedia (although, come to think of it …). 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Review: '42 Balloons' (3 stars) When: Through June 29 Where: The Yard at Chicago Shakespeare Theater on Navy Pier, 800 E. Grand Ave. Running time: 2 hours, 20 minutes Tickets: $71-$132 at 312-595-5600 and
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