When discussing classic love stories, William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet is often included in the conversation. The tragic story of the “star-crossed lovers” (Shakespeare 6) is taught in high schools and studied in colleges. Its poetry has graced many stages and silver screens. Romeo and Juliet is also often reimagined for a modern audience. One such interpretation is West Side Story. Written by Stephen Sondheim, it made its Hollywood debut in 1961 under directors Jerome Robbins and Robert Wise. Instead of feuding families in Verona, West Side Story touts rival gangs in New York City. Although the plots of West Side Story and Romeo and Juliet themselves seem interchangeable, key differences exist that make West Side Story a …show more content…
West Side Story and Romeo and Juliet both delve into battle rather quickly, making haste to display the deadly feuds between characters. This fight happens before any dialogue occurs, but it still directly mirrors how the initial fight in Romeo and Juliet occurs. Instead of exchanging banter, battles between the Jets and Sharks “are mild at first: a boy being tripped up, or being sandbagged with a flour sack or even spit on” (Sondheim 1.1). The early fighters of Romeo and Juliet, on the other hand, are not immediately physical with each other, aside from Sampson rudely biting his thumb toward Abram (Shakespeare 1.1.44). Moving on from the fight, Romeo and Mercutio plot to sneak into the Capulet’s ball, while Tony is convinced to go to the dance in the gymnasium. Romeo and Tony, however, have similar premonitions of “some consequence yet hanging in the stars” (1.4.114), “a miracle due” (Sondheim 1.2), ultimately predicting that fate will have a hand in the night. As balconies turn into fire escapes, female love interests are thought to be dead, and feuds end, West Side Story continues to emulate Romeo and Juliet almost seamlessly, but not quite flawlessly. A few instances seen in West Side Story ensure its independence from the Shakespearean love-story. These differences, however, strengthen West Side Story as a modern adaptation of Romeo and Juliet. Romeo and Juliet marry each other, but Tony
Although Juliet seems more serious and mature at the beginning, Maria grows up during the course of the movie. Tony and Romeo are just the opposite. Tony knows whom he loves, and that's Maria, while Romeo had a very idealistic view of love in the beginning of the play, maturing as the end neared and he had to deal with Juliet's death. Tony and Maria are also less preoccupied with the bonds of marriage and love in their society, while it's almost like a sin for Romeo and Juliet to be together before being married. This is further emphasized by the fact that religion plays a substantially lesser role in West Side Story than it does in Romeo and Juliet.
The film and play Romeo and Juliet has a similar story line to West Side Story. However this story is based in Verona, Italy and the rivals are not gangs but families, the Capilates
Romeo and Juliet and West Side Story share many similar themes. Romeo and Juliet both chronicle a story of overcoming prejudice and hatred, forbidden love, and defying stereotypes that nobody thought could be broken. The two stories are similar in a multitude of ways, even though their settings are centuries apart- Romeo and Juliet set in the 1500’s, and West Side Story set in the 1950’s. Romeo and Juliet and West Side Story both teach a lesson of how prejudice can teach you how to hate, and how one of your rivals may be the one who helps you remember how to love.
Love is a universal truth that is portrayed similarly in both Romeo and Juliet and West Side Story. Two members of warring groups fall in love. Love is something that we can all relate to in one way or another and it will never change over time. In Romeo and Juliet both Romeo and Juliet have such a strong love for each other that they both commit suicide when the other dies. In West Side Story, Tony and Maria talk of running away and they have such a strong love that they believe that they can end the hatred with their love.
William Shakespeare’s play, Romeo and Juliet, tells the story of the tragic love between Romeo Montague and Juliet Capulet. The play has been reinterpreted throughout time and Baz Luhrmann’s film version, William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet, uses a modern setting to tell the tale. Luhrmann’s cinematic understanding reinforces the key themes of love, fate and hate as he explores Shakespeare’s famous play.
Romeo and Juliet is a timeless, classic love story written by the incomparable William Shakespeare. Many of Shakespeare’s works are considered literary classics, but none are more loved than Romeo and Juliet. This play masterfully tells the love story of two teenagers in Elizabethan England. The title characters Romeo and Juliet are members of two feuding families, Romeo is a Montague and Juliet is a Capulet. There are different stylistic ways of portraying Romeo and Juliet, and the two most popular film versions portray two very different styles of this one play. Zeferelli's Romeo and Juliet was made in the 1970s, and is the film version most commonly shown in high school classrooms. The newest film version of this play is Baz Luhrmanns
Romeo and Juliet and West Side Story are both iconic, enjoyable stories that most people have heard of. Romeo and Juliet was written much earlier than West Side Story was, however it was still based on older Italian stories. These stories can teach us a lot about our daily lives and how we live them. In order to do this though, we have to make other comparisons throughout the story first. So, let’s dive in and analyze the differences between the stories, their origins, and their authors.
Romeo and Juliet and The West Side Story , both romantic sagas that unfold into
Since the beginning of time people have been intrigued by the story of “two star-crossed lovers”, those who long to be together but never can. Such is the case of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet and the collaboration work, West Side Story. The purpose of this paper is to show the similarities and differences between these two tragic love stories.
West Side Story came out in 1961 as a melodramatic musical that took place in New York. It takes the same theme as Shakespeare's, Romeo and Juliet, in that it is about two lovers whose relationship is not accepted by others because of conflicting backgrounds.
Three Hundred Fifty Years of Blind Love: A Contraposition of Shakespeare and Robbins’ Romeo and Juliet Andy Warhol once said, "They say that time changes things, but actually you have to change them yourself." Two hundred fifty years passed between the original Romeo and Juliet and the premiere of West Side Story on Broadway in 1957. However, time did not change the message of the story, simply the creators’ unique visions evolved. Shakespeare’s delivery of the timeless tale of desperate love in his classic Romeo and Juliet proves to only intensify through retelling and modern interpretation. Audiences cherish Romeo and Juliet as one of the most beloved plays of all time from the Elizabethan Age to the present.
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.
Although the discrepancies between Romeo and Juliet and West Side Story are too frequent to categorize in such limited space, it is impossible for anyone familiar with both texts to not notice the obvious similarities between the two works ("Theme"). From the opening scenes in both, up through the rumble in West Side Story/death of Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet, the plays mirror each other (Poelstra). It isn't until the last part of West Side Story, where Tony (our modern-day Romeo) dies and Maria (Tony's Juliet) doesn't (unlike the two star-crossed lovers of Shakespeare's work, both of whom perish), that the major difference between the two works becomes apparent.
Throughout the years there have been stories related to love and loyalty. West side story and Romeo and Juliet are perfect examples of this. Their themes are very similar but at the same time they are very different since they don't really relate. This could be as how they have different time periods and they had different time periods and they had some similar scenes. The way that their feuds were set up was very different with family feuds and then there was gang feuds and nationality problems as well.
Romeo and Juliet and West Side story are two classic love stories. West Side Story is a modern version of Romeo and Juliet so there are many similarities. The way Detective Schrank threatens both gangs I similar to the way Price Escaulus threatens both the Capulets and the Montagues. West Side Story uses gangs which is the same way Romeo and Juliet uses families. The fight between Riff and Bernardo is similar to the fight between Mercutio and Tybalt in Romeo and Juliet.