Tom Lynch

A pink-haired Columbia College freshman, complete with a Camel cigarette and a matching backpack littered with Black Flag patches, winces as she witnesses a child swallowed by a river of thick brown ooze. She holds her comments as she notices a family of four next to her giggling at the scene. "That's Charlie," the father says to his young son. The son sticks his fingers into his mouth. The pink-haired student exhales her smoke.

"Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory" is this year's holiday theme for Marshall Field's Christmas windows. Eleven different scenes grace State Street this winter, each of them a bit more unsettling than the last. Veruca Salt, Mike Teevee, Augustus Gloop and gang make their cameos and meet their doom one by one, by sea of chocolate, by chemical-laced gum, or by another odd-yet-efficient way of taking out a small tyke.

"Our windows have become a tradition," says Amy Meadows, Marshall Field's decorator and self-described "holiday display guru." "People say, `We must begin the holiday season with a visit to Marshall Field's' windows.' For some people, the Christmas season absolutely does not begin until that has occurred."

Families gather around the black italicized captions that narrate every scene. Random letters and punctuation marks have fallen or have been peeled off the windows. The wind howls. "I'm not carrying you!" shouts a leather-clad dad at his small daughter as they reach window eight. She cries immediately. Family fun is in jeopardy.

(2003-11-26)

Also by Tom Lynch

Tip of the Week
Geoffrey Bent discloses all of the dirty details in "Silent Partners," his satiric ode to necrophilia
(2003-11-19)

From Russia, With Love
Katherine Shonk's ticket into the book world comes in the form of "The Red Passport," a collection of eight short stories set in post-Communist Russia
(2003-11-19)

Tip of the Week
Poster artist Robbie Conal likes to jab a pitchfork into sacred cows and incinerate subjects already ripe for parody
(2003-11-13)

Debbie does Dogme
Usually XXX flicks are vanquished to the back of the store, but Earwax Café's new adults-only collection is up in front of the indie-rock music shelves
(2003-11-13)

Tip of the Week
(2003-11-05)

Still biting
(2003-11-05)

Ollie oop
(2003-11-05)

Tip of the Week
(2003-10-29)

Psycho Killers
(2003-10-23)

The narrator stands alone
(2003-10-23)

Tip of the Week
(2003-10-16)

Mr. Postman
(2003-10-08)

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