Romeo And Juliet Adaptation Essay

The Adaptation of Romeo and Juliet by Baz Luhrmann In 1996 an australian film director Baz Luhrman introduces the new adaptation of the ageless love story – “Romeo and Juliet” by William Shakespeare. The action is moved to America and happening in the end of 20th century. In an imaginary city Verona Beach the two powerful clans Montague (Anglo-Saxon) and Capulet (Latinos) brutally rival. The swords are substituted with the guns, the ancient costumes with jeans and shirts. The art director Catherine Martin didn’t have any lack of materials, since the 20th century brought a great variety of heels, lighters, shirts, bikers, rockers, leather, tattoos, piercing, etc. The creators originally approached the small details: the street posters

It is Act I Scene V in the play and Shakespeare starts it with the servant’s talking and welcoming the guests. This part is completely cut out in the adaptation, it is substituted with dances and Mercutio singing. The substitution wasn’t a loss, in fact it brought more action to the film and introduced character’s costumes. This part is also shown from Romeo’s point of view. The characters is one thing that really gives the director a credit. He made them all really interesting. On the costume feast the costumes symbolically represent the inner worlds of the characters. Lord and Lady Capulet thinking of themselves as the supreme dressed up as Caesar and Cleopatra respectively, Benvolio and his friends are shown as barbarians, not seeing anything around himself Paris wearing a space suit and Tybalt is shown as a devil. Romeo dressed as a knight in shining armor, whom each girl waits for. Leonardo Di Caprio played Romeo as no other actor could, he fully represented the image of Shakespeare’s Romeo. Juliet dresses as light angel as she is. Juliet played by Claire Danes and she is symbol of love. Sweet, young Juliet is not a perfect beauty, she is the girl-next-door. Shakespeare’s Juliet is young and not looking for love, and Lhurmann’s Juliet is romantic, dreamy, innocent, not capable of hypocrisy and betrayal. Mercutio dressed up as a diva from cabaret. The director was able to make this character really interesting. Drugs and indifference help him to hide from the outside world very well. The way he dressed up for the party is another symbol of modernism. High heels, make-up, diva’s wig help make him a great example of a showman of the twentieth century. And the thing that he dressed as a woman not just shows how much fun Mercutio is, but also that he hasn’t come to terms with his sexuality