WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE’S ROMEO & JULIET

The classic Shakespearean romantic tragedy is updated by director Baz Luhrmann to a post-modern Verona Beach where swords are merely a brand of gun and bored youths are easily spurred toward violence. Longtime rivals in religion and business, the Montagues and the Capulets share a page from the Jets and Sharks of West Side Story when they form rival gangs. Romeo is aloof toward the goings-on of his Montague cousins, but after he realises that Juliet is a Capulet at the end of one very wild party, the enmity between the two clans becomes the root of his angst. He relies heavily — and with serious consequences — on his rebel gender-bender of a friend, Mercutio and Father Lawrence for protection and support. Romeo is, of course, exiled, and it looks like Juliet will be forced into an arranged marriage with the bland Paris. It ends, as Romeo and Juliet must, when Romeo hears a tragic piece of misinformation and brings his suicide wish to what was meant to be Juliet ‘s temporary tomb. This time, though, the turf and the weapon of choice have taken a turn toward the surreal.