Those star-crossed lovers are dying to make a comeback — again
IWAS browsing through the US entertainment channels, checking out the lists of the next big movie releases, when my tired heart skipped a beat. There is a new film version of Romeo and Juliet, one of the greatest love stories of all time, that is likely to captivate audiences young and old.
The film will only be released in September but expectations are already high. On many movie-based websites, film buffs are secondguessing the film’s potential.
I have no doubt that our country’s more up-scale schools will herd their teen pupils into the cinema to see, possibly for the first time, the heartbreaking tale of love’s young dream, shattered by adult arrogance.
Over the centuries, Romeo and Juliet has maintained its fascination. It was first performed in 1594 when Shakespeare was still a young man infatuated with love, passion and wit. His later plays, such as Othello, Macbeth and King Lear, became darker and more complex, but Romeo and Juliet has never lost its magic.
The first film version was made in 1908. It was a silent film that ran for 20 minutes and one can only imagine what audiences of that time made of this Shakespearean classic.
The actors were voiceless mimes, accompanied by snippets of Shakespeare’s words as subtitles. Less than a quarter of Shakespeare’s words were used in that film, but audiences flocked to see it.
When “talking” movies began, with The Jazz Singer in 1927, Hollywood was quick to get in on the craze and MGM was the first studio to make a “talkie” based on a Shakespearean classic.
It was released in 1936, in blackand-white with a cast of hugely popular stars — Leslie Howard as Romeo, Norma Shearer as Juliet. It was an astonishing success.
Looking back at that film, you cannot but giggle about the actors. Howard was 43 years old when he was supposed to be a love-struck teenager. The flashy Mercutio was played by John Barrymore, a 56-year-old alcoholic. Shearer was 32 when she played the girlish Juliet.
Since then, there have been several versions of the film. One of the best
I wonder how many students have read
those words … and what they think
of love
was made by director Franco Zeffirelli in 1968, with a cast of young actors: Leonard Whiting as Romeo, Olivia Hussey as Juliet and a very young Michael York as Tybalt. Zeffirelli also hauled in Sir Laurence Olivier, who was an unseen voice quoting the words that Shakespeare wrote.
Then, in 1996, Australian director Baz Luhrmann gave the tale a modern twist, with Leonardo diCaprio as Romeo and Claire Danes as Juliet.
The tale has been copied in so many ways. In 1960, Peter Ustinov’s cold-war parody, Romanoff and Juliet, was a romantic play about an American Juliet and a Russian Romeo.
In 1961, West Side Story, about rival gangs on the rough streets of New York, turned Juliet into Maria and Romeo into Tony, lovers who are pulled apart by crime and race.
In 1998, Shakespeare in Love starred Joseph Fiennes as the playwright himself, who bases his work on a young woman, played by Gwyneth Paltrow, who is unable to reveal her love for a man she cannot marry. Both Paltrow and Judi Dench won Oscars for that film.
Now, this new version features a cast of young actors headed by Hailee Steinfeld as Juliet — she rose to fame for her portrayal of Mattie Ross in the 2010 film True Grit.
English actor Douglas Booth plays Romeo and Ed Westwick (a star of Gossip Girl) plays Tybalt.
Once again, audiences will hear those wonderful words spoken by Romeo as he stands under that famous balcony: But, soft! What light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun…
I wonder how many students in schools and universities around the world have read those words … and I wonder what they think of love and romance in 2013.
So much of old-fashioned romance has been set aside for tougher, more edgy styles. I cannot wait to see how audiences will take to yet another Romeo and Juliet.