West Side Story Dance Analysis

The book West Side Story written by Arthur Laurents is set in the mid 1950’s, created as modern version of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. West Side Story is a romantic tragedy about two characters that are supposedly completely different and aren’t accepted when they fall in love. The “difference’s” between these characters is centered on the prejudice’s they had against each other. Prejudice is a harsh opinion or feeling formed previously without any knowledge or reason. The Jets and the Sharks used many prejudices against other races, sex, and age. What they didn’t realize is that they have more similarities than differences.

Based on Romeo and Juliet, West Side Story’s emotional connection with the audience hinges on the relationship between Tony and Maria. Arguably the most important scene to develop this relationship is the adaptation of the balcony scene between the two, represented by the song Tonight. The lighting and cinematography utilized in this scene connects the two, visually bringing Shakespeare’s prose to life.

In Romeo & Juliet the setting is in the time of the 16th century. West Side Story was filmed in the 20th century. There are a lot of differences between the two. In Romeo & Juliet the settings was during the era of the realm, big ball gowns, and sword fighting. But in West Side Story there are guns, dancing and singing, and rumbles. Romeo & Juliet has a monologue of old English language. As for West Side Story is written in modern English language. In West Side Story, doc says to the boys “Why do you kids live like there's a war on?". The times are different in Romeo and Juliet they didn't worry about wars they only cared about the royal families and the fights between the two families, but for West Side Story they worry about

In the book A Time to Dance by Padma Venkatraman, Veda is in a car crash and suffers a below-the-knee amputation of her right leg. She is a dancer who lives in India and is not going to stop just because of this roadblock. After she gets a new fake leg, Veda goes to a new dance school and doesn’t agree with the teaching approach. Worst of all, Veda’s mom doesn’t like Veda dancing from the start. With the support of her grandmother, Veda conquers challenges and realizes she is a stronger person than she originally thought.

Side Story is a modern day Romeo and Juliet, there are two gangs, The Jets and The Sharks that’s

West Side Story is the iconic American musical that is a 1957 Broadway production choreographed by Jerome Robbins. Arthur Laurents is the author of the original book with the setting taking place in the upper west side New York city in a blue-collar neighborhood during the mid-1950s. (The Broadway) Because West Side Story is a movie musical, it will be a lot of narrative conveyed through the song. The movie West Side Story and Romeo and Juliet have many similarities and differences consider their plot, their character and their setting. The major plot of the musical is about a rivalry between two different ethnic group gangs, the Sharks and Jets. The Sharks are Puerto Rican and the Jets are white. Leonard Bernstein composed the dynamic and influential music. In the mix of the conflict between the two gangs, a former member of the Jets, Tony, falls in love with the leader of the Sharks sister, Maria. Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet clearly influenced this movie, and there are parallel characteristics. For instance, Romeo and Tony, Juliet and Maria, Mercutio and Riff, Tybalt and Bernardo all have similar characteristics. As for the specific film, I decided to watch the 1961 version.

What style of dance did you see or do? What specific movements did you see or do that would indicate that it was this specific style or genre?

In Athol Fugard’s play “Master Harold”… and the Boys dance becomes a metaphor for how society can work harmoniously together, yet there are conflicts that prevent it from happening. Specifically, ballroom dance becomes a metaphor to show the conflict between a cooperative society and the disappointment associated with life and our inability to force change. This is expressed by Sam teaching Willie the mastery of dance and also educating Hally on the significance of the championships, and ultimately through the final dance performance.

Death love and something you better buckle your seatbelt because we are going on a ride full of plot twist and a lot of death. There is a lot of different things about romeo and juliet and west side story. Love eventually overcomes hate, this relates the stories majorly in both of them because it is the most important thing to the book

figure out who they are. Romeo and Juliet is like West Side Story. The West Side Story is very much like Romeo and Juliet in the sense that Maria and Tony are from two different feuding gangs in New York. Just like Romeo and Juliet,

The York Dance Ensemble Presented: Space/Time/Line, and a piece in the show that was captivating was Avium Redux choreographed by Susan Lee. The dance was a fourteen-minute number consisting of eighteen dancers. The simplicity of the dancer’s white costumes made the movements clearly visible and captivating. This dance evidently presents all aspects of body, effort, space, shape and time through the dancer’s movement.

This genre of dance created mixed feelings among conservative members of society and although MSNBC’s Mike Brzeznski calls it “disgusting” and “pathetic” (USA Today, 2013) there is a time and a place when the dance should not take place because of it provocative style. Women are using the dance to get in shape and stay in shape, including it in their exercise regime. Regardless of the negative critiques it receives, it is a different way to express sexual feelings for one of the opposite gender when performing, which is no different than lovemaking choreographed into a piece of a contemporary dance scene and a dance that is protected in the USA through freedom of expression the “very heart of our democracy”

My favorite dance was the contemporary routine with Derek, Jaja, and Alexia. The choreographer, Stacey Tookey, explained that the piece was about bravery in different forms: Derek played a veteran, Jaja was portraying a woman leaving an abusive relationship, and Alexia took on the role of a single mother. I really enjoyed the dance because of the story it was trying to convey; each dancer dove into character and brought out complex emotions through their movements. The dancers connected deeply with each of their stories, even though they were completely different people. They were portraying things that they had never personally experienced in their lives before. They showed the strengths of the characters along with their weaknesses, they

It walks down the road which separates the once untouched forest harshly with asphalt hands, the border between new and old, nature and development. When it speaks, it whispers softly elegantly, and under the influences of punk screaming and classical concertos somehow it seeks harmony in-between. When my life speaks, it lets the words dance, as it has learned from a WWII Veteran who formulates poems in each sentence between crisp bites of fig. Like the changing seasons, it seeks variation, the gentleness of a warm hot chocolate but the panic of impending snow storms. It changed many times subtly in the midst of other lives, within an Italian family, with always enough food for a feast. They are the kind of people who yell often, who raise

AMSTERDAM — Obviously I know, but what fascinates me is how this human dance could be a response to almost any event - good or bad - the camera phones, the monopods and selfie sticks, press photographing the press. And about how watching the event through our device screens we miss things like the boats lying across the water, or the two people in the middle, maybe individuals, maybe friends caught up in