The Baltimore Lyric Opera House’s
production of West Side Story was
an array of contradictions -- it showcased some magnificent
talents, and some painfully bad casting. It exuded
some vocal genius, and some incoherent skreetching,
and it had some smooth choreography, and some stuff
that resembled my 8th grade production of “Grease”,
where the kid on the end was doing a completely different
dance than the rest of us.
The plot of West Side Story is
based on the play Romeo and Juliet by some guy named
William Shakespeare. (I know, I’ve never heard
of him either) It uses a nearly identical story line
and sets it to the dirty streets of New
York City, amid a rivalry between
newly immigrated Puerto Ricans, “The PR’s” and
the resident hooligans, “The Sharks”.
With a musical wonder like Leonard Bernstein
weaving the notes, West Side Story has
some numbers in it that would be beautiful even if
my dog sang them. It
is a timeless tale of torture, love, disgust and faith.
With an impressive cast of Tony winners
and Broadway performers, many of the lead roles were
magnificently recreated. Jacqueline Hendy played the sweet and
strong Maria, with a pair of pipes that overshadowed
most of the cast.
But not the entire cast was worthy of magnificence
of this play. The
voice of Griff gave me goose
bumps – and not in a good way. Although
his acting wasn’t terrible, his voice was flat
even to the untrained ear.
The choreography in the production was impressive,
with a limited amount of props and setting. Most of the stage was used for extravagant
dance numbers and beautifully constructed fight scenes.
The costume and lighting in the play was
very expressive, and agreed with the plot line. Most
of the color and clothing in the play reflected the
constantly opposing sides of the street. The
PR’s were often depicted in dark reds and purples
and the Sharks were in blues and grays. These
contrasting images made for symmetrically interesting
dance scenes.
While Tony and Maria belonged to opposing
sides, they were depicted in neutral tones. This
symbolized their compromise of the love of their country,
for a larger and arguably more important love.
As the play progresses, it reveals a simple
but convincing plot, which ends in tragedy. The
two sides fight, and both Tony and Maria are forced
to sacrifice others they love, for their love of each
other. When
Tony is killed in the end of the play, it marks the
silence of the ongoing feud between the two “houses”.
Although the message of West Side Story was
technically stolen from Shakespeare’s masterpiece,
it is an important and relative one which should be
stolen over and over again. “Love conquers all” can often
come off cheesy, but in this production, it was simply
moving.
