Steven Spielberg: “‘West Side Story’ needed some corrections”

Hollywood had a pending task with “West Side Story”: The eternal musical about the experience of Puerto Ricans in New York barely had Puerto Rican interpreters in its first film adaptation, something that Steven Spielberg set out to amend in the new version.

“It is the first production of ‘West Side Story’ that has a completely Latin cast to bring the ‘Sharks’ to life. It was something that needed to be corrected”, Says the director.

Since the project was announced in 2014, Spielberg had been aware of the anticipation of bringing one of Broadway’s great musicals back to the big screen.

“I never watch my own movies. It’s weird, but I don’t. I roll them and move on to something else. However, this time during the premiere I sat next to my wife and enjoyed every second“, recognize. “And I think we’ve done things right“, Add.

The first reactions to the film, which opens this weekend in the United States, applaud the veteran filmmaker’s result in the face of a double challenge: it was his first musical and, in addition, a story articulated around racism at a time when the one that sensitivities are on the surface.

Despite the fact that the 1961 film is one of the most awarded in history thanks to its ten Oscars, including the one for best film, over time it has become one of the most illuminating examples of the problems of representation that it dragged Hollywood.

Natalie Wood, of Russian origin, took the role of Maria; George Chakiris, of Greek origin, gave life to Bernardo and most of the Puerto Rican characters were embodied by white actors with brown makeup.

Instead, the only prominent Puerto Rican in the cast, Rita Moreno (who won the Oscar for her role as Anita), was made up much darker than hers to exaggerate her Caribbean condition.

“It is not a correction that is due to this new era ‘woke’ (term that refers to the culture of cancellation in the United States) –relates Spielberg-. We were in debt to the people of Puerto Rico”.

Thus, the director of “ET” and “Jurassic Park” created a specific role for Moreno and counted on her as an executive producer to correct elements of the script that did not accurately represent the experience of Hispanic immigrants in the United States.

“It seemed disrespectful to me”

As a result, and together with screenwriter Tony Kushner (“Lincoln”), the team has enhanced the story’s Latin accent to the point that its original version has several minutes of dialogue that take place in Spanish. Without subtitles.

“Spanish is the second language in the United States so I thought it would have been disrespectful to subtitle it, because it has to live with English and without any support”, Spielberg emphasizes.

In fact, the strong presence of Spanish was one of the details that most attracted attention during the premiere of the film held in New York.

Immediately afterwards, Spielberg explained that his objective is for Spanish-speaking and English-speaking spectators to gather during the screenings, and they “hear laughter from groups that understand certain things in Spanish.”

Despite the changes described on paper, the new film’s plot remains true to the musical written and composed by Leonard Bernstein, Arthur Laurents and the recently deceased Stephen Sondheim.

“I used the original score”

Colombian-born Rachel Zegler makes her film debut with a somewhat more astute portrayal of the candid Maria, while Ansel Elgort delivers a delicate and repentant Tony.

Among the rest of the cast, Ariana DeBose shines as a “black” Anita (Afro-Latin) and David Alvarez as a Bernardo disenchanted with the “American dream”. The two interpreters achieve enormous complicity in “América”, one of the musical numbers that is receiving the most applause among the critics.

“I used the original score from the 1957 Broadway musical. I spent weeks on headphones scripting all the numbers”Recalls Spielberg.

And, as in the first version of this modern “Romeo and Juliet”, the filmmaker has immortalized New York City as another character in the film thanks to timeless numbers such as “María”, “Tonight” or “I Feel Pretty ”.

“Quite simply, we have re-shot the film for a new generation”, Ditch Spielberg.