More than 50 years after its Broadway premiere, "West Side Story" is back with an old face pushing the show into the 21st century. The old face (pun not intended) is Arthur Laurents, 91, who wrote the book for the original Broadway production in 1957 and returns as the director of the revival. This time around, though, the show will sound distinctively different: Much of the dialogue and some of the lyrics are in Spanish.
The trend of incorporating Spanish in theater began last year with "In the Heights," which tells the story of members of a Hispanic community trying to earn a living in Washington Heights, N.Y. "In the Heights" seamlessly mixed in Spanish phrases and went on to win the Tony for Best Musical. It was a pleasant surprise, then, to see that Lin-Manuel Miranda, who created and wrote music and lyrics for "In the Heights," was brought on to handle the translations for the "West Side Story" revival.
"West Side Story" transports William Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" to the streets of New York City's Upper West Side in the 1950s, where lovers Tony and Maria are caught between two rival street gangs, the white "Jets" and the Puerto Rican "Sharks."
Matt Cavenaugh as Tony and Josefina Scaglione as Maria lead a 37-member cast in the revival. Cavenaugh's previous Broadway credits include "A Catered Affair" and "Grey Gardens," while Scaglione, an opera singer from Argentina, will be making her Broadway debut. Their performances were fine all around, but not impressive. Cavenaugh particularly struggled in the upper register.
The star of the night was Karen Olivo as Anita. Olivo previously played the lead female Vanessa in "In the Heights" and is truly making a name for herself as an actress. Her big numbers were "America" and "A Boy Like That;" the former an upbeat and funny toast to Manhattan, and the latter a cry of grief over a fallen love.
The decision to add Spanish to the show led to both good and bad moments. For scenes between Puerto Ricans characters, the Spanish quickened the pace and certainly made the sequences more natural. The Spanish worked especially well in the "Tonight" quintet, when the "Jets" and "Sharks" sang alternately and then together. The English lines gave context to the Spanish lines, and the sound of Spanish and English in unison was quite the aural experience.
Overall, however, I felt a general Spanish overload. This was especially the case when three songs were sung entirely in Spanish. "I Feel Pretty" became "Siento Hermosa," "A Boy Like That" became "Un Hombre Asi," and "I Have a Love" became "Tengo un Amor."
The result was an audience divided between looking at the subtitles on the sides of the stage and the on-stage action. I devoted most of my attention to the subtitles to understand what the actor was saying and to see what lyricist Stephen Sondheim originally wrote. There's a certain kick to hearing "I feel charming/Oh so charming/It's alarming how charming I feel," and while the Spanish version may be equally fun, I found the song lost its pop as I could no longer draw meaning from the lyrics. Unfortunately, putting a song completely in Spanish forces non-Spanish speaking viewers to choose between seeing the on-stage action and understanding what the actor is saying. If anything, I feel this could be one of the show's weaknesses when it heads to Broadway.
Despite the changes, there are some things that will always be a part of "West Side Story:" great dancing and music. The last thing you expect from a vicious street gang is for its members to spontaneously break out into a complex dance routine, and this dichotomy makes Jerome Robbins' choreography even more impressive.
Then there is Leonard Bernstein's score, which has produced some of Broadway's most popular showtunes, from the romantic strains of "Tonight" and "Maria" to the humorous quips in "America," "Gee, Officer Krupke" and "I Feel Pretty." As today's pit orchestras get smaller and smaller, it is wonderful to hear a 30-member orchestra playing these Bernstein classics.
If you have never seen "West Side Story" performed live, then this show is a must-see. It is darker than the original, as Laurents digs down into the raw emotions of gang life and the struggles of those caught in between.
If you have only seen the 1961 movie version starring Natalie Wood, then you have even more reason to see the show. Laurents brings an authenticity that is lacking in the movie version, which he criticizes for its fake accents and poor acting.
A pre-Broadway engagement runs until Jan. 17 at the National Theater in Washington, D.C., where the original "West Side Story" made its world premiere in 1957. The revival starts previews on Feb. 23 and opens March 19 at the Palace Theater in New York City.
