Lord Cherry's Review

Category: Workshop

  • Learning to Truly Live After Tragedy

    Learning to Truly Live After Tragedy

    Tim Tuttle was a Wall Street banker working hard everyday to make a good living. But it wasn’t until tragedy struck that he realised there is more to life than making money. 

    Time Tuttle leans into music to cope with the tragedy of 9/11
    Tim Tuttle is playwright/composer of 44 Lights a new musical theater work for eleven actors and four musicians, in which a man processes his pain and loss over the 9/11 attacks through music and the support of the circle of his friends. Photo by Robin Richardson.

    He was at Ground Zero, working on September 11th, 2001. He survived. He made it out. Not all of his friends did. And ultimately, surviving the attack itself is only part of making it on out alive on that day. 

    The confusion of what is happening around you. The horror in the eyes of the people you see. The hoping and praying that your friends who you hadn’t seen on that one day that they did not make it into work. The slow understanding of the lives lost. The survivors guilt. The anger. All of those things stay with a survivor long after the physical event happens. Surviving the initial attack is only part of it because the emotions and trauma from that day is something every survivor will have to confront and that is when they can start healing.

    Tim Tuttle found that healing in music. For 24 years, he has been writing and performing songs about that day to not only help himself heal and continue to move forward in life, but for the other survivors too.

    Tim Tuttle.
    Photo by Robin Richardson.

    Healing is a long and often painful journey. It can be difficult to express and come to terms with the multitude of emotions created from tragedy. It can be hard to cry in private, let alone with a community of other survivors. Yet, tears and community can be vital to getting through grief. Off-Broadway will be that place that community can come together, not have to say a single word, and allow people to heal. 

    In a time when community is needed more than ever, when politics have broken the bridge of humanity — this is the time for everyone to come together, to cry, to remember, and to just give ourselves the opportunity to heal. 

    Cast in Finale. Photo by Jonathan Slaff.

    Tim Tuttle stopped being a Wall Street banker after 9/11. Instead, he dedicated his life to making art — songs and a show — so that everyone, not just himself, but the community can continue to heal. All of which culminated into a musical called 44 Lights. For Tim, helping people continue to live their lives is how he learned to not just make money, but to truly live. Because honestly, even without terrorist attacks, no one knows how long they have — so let’s live life while we can.

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    The images in this article are curtesy of Robin Richardson and Jonathan Slaff. Used by permission, their respective owner(s) reserve Copyright.

  • 44 Lights

    44 Lights

    Chain Theatre

    9 November 2025

    Matinee

    How long should a person work for the sole purpose of making money when the job they have is not one they enjoy? What would make a person up end their life, end their successful career, and learn to truly live with the goal of happiness and helping others?

    For Tim Tuttle — the writer, creator, and lyricist of the show 44 Lights it was tragedy.

    Tim Tuttle is playwright/composer of 44 Lights .
    Tim Tuttle is playwright/composer of 44 Lights .
    Photo by Robin Richardson.

    44 Lights is the story of the survivors of the 9/11 terrorist attack beginning from before the attack happened and continuing through their healing process. And while this  is very autobiographical — the message of hope and healing is much more universal.

    Creating a show, especially a musical, about real life horrific events will always be a controversial move. It requires the writing, the acting, the staging, even down to the lighting to be done delicately so as not come off as disrespectful or even possibly leave the impression that the entire show was created to profit from tragedy.

    This show walks that line perfectly.

    The staging was simplistic — actors walking in a well rehearsed formation as they try to understand what is happening and why these firefighters are running past them. The lighting was done effectively — leaving the ones who did not make it in a heavenly blue glow which resulted in the characters being perfectly grey scaled. The emotions, however, were very complicated.

    Confusion, wonder, disbelief, horror, realisation, acceptance, grief, anger, depression — all of it is expressed in this show. Whether it was the character not knowing if their coworkers made it into work that day or the realisation that your action put someone else in a part of the building that they cannot escape from or the grief that comes when understanding that you survived but others did not.

    Cast in Finale. Photo by Jonathan Slaff.

    And once everyone has figured out what exactly happened that day, the audience is shown how that knowledge doesn’t fix things. It doesn’t fix the anger or the sadness or the despair and it doesn’t make things okay. Even after knowing the cause, knowing why this attack occurred — well, that’s really just the beginning of being able to heal.

    The characters, and the people who were in the towers that day and survived, had to learn how to live again. And they had to learn to live for someone or else those that perished will simply be forgotten. For some, that means anger. For another, tears. But for the character of Nick — it was music. Specifically music about being at Ground Zero.

    Tim Tuttle was a Wall Street banker who survived the 9/11 attack and the destruction of the Twin Towers. It took losing his friends, literally, to make him see that he wasn’t living — he was merely existing. In order to keep the memory of his lost loved ones alive, he has spent the last 24 years writing and performing music to honour his friends that perished on that day. That is how he was able to heal and keep the memories of his friends alive. And this show is that story. 44 Lights is the story of survival, of guilt, of horror, and ultimately of living life while you still can.

    The images in this article are curtesy of Robin Richardson and Jonathan Slaff. Used by permission, their respective owner(s) reserve Copyright.