Do Film adaptations of Romeo and Juliet enhance Shakespeare in contemporary society or undermine his cultural status?

Film adaptations have long been considered as involving a lowering of the status of the original venerated book or play. The assumption is that they not only simplify the source, but that they also undermine it and its place in the classical canon.  As Linda Hutcheon asserts in A Theory of Adaptation (2006), ‘if an adaptation is perceived as “lowering” a story (according to some imagined hierarchy of medium or genre) response is likely to be negative.’[1] This leads people to assume that authors and texts such as Shakespeare are on a classical pedestal and cannot be touched or reproduced, unless it is by a higher art form.  Hutcheon continues that ‘it seems more or less acceptable to adapt Romeo and Juliet into a respected high art form, like an opera or a ballet, but not to make it into a movie.’[2] However it has been suggested that rather than undermining classical works, media adaptations can enhance them, pulling them down from reverential pedestals and making them palatable to the masses.  Courtney Lehmann argues that adaptations can reverse the attitude of looking down on anything ‘non Shakespearian’[3] and ‘safeguard […] the bards sacred place in the pantheon of dramatic literature.’[4] Zeffirelli said of his adaptation of Romeo and Juliet that, ‘“I have always felt sure I could break the myth that Shakespeare on stage and screen is only an exercise for the intellectual. I want his plays to be enjoyed by ordinary people.’[5] During his own time, Shakespeare was for the masses and for entertainment, as Lynda Boose remarks; ‘in a sense Shakespeare himself was not only a popular artist but also a populariser. For a largely illiterate audience he transferred from page to stage and from narrative to drama some of the central writings of his time.’[6] 

This essay will discuss the impacts of film adaptation on Shakespeare in the literary canon, in particular the adaptations of Romeo and Juliet by Franco Zeffirelli in 1968 and Romeo + Juliet by Baz Luhrmann in 1996. These two films have been selected due to their status as appealing to a youthful audience and therefore selected by schools as the way in which we introduce Shakespeare to a new generation.  Lehmann believes that ‘it (Zeffirelli) has stood the test of time as a film that is shown, often in comparison with Baz Luhrmann’s adaptation, in classrooms around the world.’[7] In order to study in detail the use of the original Shakespearean text this essay will also study two scenes from Romeo and Juliet; Act one Scene five; the ball and Act three Scene one; Mercutio’s death.

Both Baz Luhrmann and Franco Zeffirelli have been a popular choice for use in schools, due to their apparent appeal to a younger audience. Russell Jackson explains that both ‘Franco Zeffirelli (1968) and Baz Luhrmann (1996) – appealed to a youthful audience by casting young Actors as Romeo and Juliet and presenting the conflict between generations within a contemporary context.’[8] In casting youthful actors, the directors made them more appealing to a teenage audience. This can be seen especially in Act one Scene five, in which Romeo and Juliet meet for the first time. Both directors use dance and song for the first meeting; Zeffirelli uses a traditional Italian dance, the moresca, which fits with his period style drama and would have been similar to the dances used on stage in the 1590s, when Romeo and Juliet was originally performed. This dance is fast paced and less formal than the previous dance, ‘involv[ing] a dizzying interweaving of hands, gazes and bodies’,[9] gradually building up to mirror the heightening feelings of Romeo and Juliet. The youth of the actors is particularly noticeable here, due to the close ups Zeffirelli uses of their faces which appear young and ingenuous. Luhrmann uses a similar motif technique, blurring everything else whilst the couple fall in love.  As Lehmann notes ‘in Luhrmann’s film, this motif is revisited in the form of Romeo’s ecstasy trip which mimics the frenzied whirl and hum of love-at-first-sight.’[10]

These references to drugs are a part of what Luhrmann uses to grasp teenagers interest, by using popular culture as context; during the 1990s drug use by teenagers was increasing.  Luhrmann uses this explicitly, cleverly using the line from later in the play ‘thy drugs are quick’[11] when Romeo dies, giving it an alternative meaning as well as ‘foreshadowing’[12] Romeo’s use of drugs to commit suicide later in the play.  Through this, Lehmann explains that ‘we glimpse the postmodern confrontation between Shakespeare, Zeffirelli and Luhrmann’s sex, drugs and rock-an-roll rendition of star-crossed love through the magnifying glass of a rabid intertextuality.’[13]

To contrast the fast paced excitement of the dances, both directors use a slow song for the actual meeting of Romeo and Juliet; in both films this song then becomes the theme for Romeo and Juliet’s love.  The song ‘kissing you, which comes to function in the film as Romeo and Juliet’s personal love theme, much in the same way that Nino Rota’s arrangement does in Zeffirelli’s adaptation.’[14] In Zeffirelli’s adaptation, this scene is a kind of hide and seek between Romeo and Juliet, each searching for the other in a childlike game, their young faces contrasted with the disapproving looks of the older folk around them. The use of song is particularly important to the sequence of Romeo and Juliet’s meeting in Luhrmann’s adaptation, which plays as their eyes meet through an aquarium.  Lehmann explains that ‘Luhrmann’s camera produces a series of floating eye-line matches that follow Romeo and Juliet’s gaze as they dart about in search of each other through the strobe-like glint of water, fish and wonder that characterises this surreal love-at-first-sight sequence.’[15] This striking imagery, coupled with the Des’ree song, creates ‘a kind of aural scenography which is as important as the costumes […] [it is] a sound which creeps into you.’[16] This use of a popular sound track, coupled with Luhrmann’s use of ‘glossy atmospherics, and breakneck speed’[17] is what many use to criticise Luhrmann’s adaptation as a ‘parody or even burlesque, a hip […] retelling aimed at an irredeemably lowbrow audience of clueless teenagers living in an intellectually bankrupt culture.’[18] However, critic Marco Calavita suggests that the MTV label is a ‘film criticism fallacy.’[19] Anderegg goes further to say that,

The MTV style has become a kind of shorthand through which scholars and critics establish – and in fact seek to perpetuate – ‘us’ / ‘them’ oppositions, which typically fracture along the predictable lines of ‘art versus commerce, adult culture versus youth culture[20]

Zeffirelli focused his film largely around the struggles young people were going through at the time of its creation.  Critic Sarah Munson Deats points out that Zeffirelli, ‘particularly intended to attract the counter culture youth, a generation of young people, like Romeo and Juliet, estranged from their parents, torn by the conflict between their youthful cult of passion and the military traditions of their elders.’[21] This conflicted youth can be seen in the ferocity of the gang fighting shown in Zeffirelli’s opening scene, between the Montagues and the Capulets. The men fighting are extremely young, continuing a feud commenced before they were born and whose origins are never explained, much like the youths who were fighting the Vietnam War, which began in 1968. 1968 is described by Lehmann as a ‘miraculously impetuous year, marked not only by the infamous May riots […] the rising tide of anti-Vietnam war sentiment […] A ripple effect in the world of film ensued.’[22] This integration of conflict in Romeo and Juliet is not a recent addition, as the play is described as having ‘implicit cultural violence.’[23] This is perhaps because whilst Shakespeare was writing England was filled with discontent and conflict, as Lehmann points out:  ‘In June of 1595 – a time when Romeo and Juliet was likely being performed in London – the heat and madness reached a fevered pitch, as twelve of the thirteen riots recorded that year occurred between June 6 and June 29.’[24] The integration of historical events is not then a new innovation of film adaptations and not therefore a justification for criticism.

To further appeal to his younger target audience, Zeffirelli only included, ‘35 per cent (approximately 1,044.5 lines) of Shakespeare’s script.’[25] He intentionally reduced the text, in order to concentrate further on the central characters and make them less complicated, as well as to ‘minimize the disadvantages of casting inexperienced actors’,[26] therefore making them more attractive to his audience. In developing Shakespeare for a younger audience, Zeffirelli enhanced Shakespeare’s reputation as not just for the scholarly and intellectual, but also for the entertainment of the young.

Luhrmann directed his adaptation to what Patricia Tatspaugh describes as the ‘MTV generation or teenagers roughly the age of Romeo and Juliet.’[27] Many critics saw this as a downfall of Luhrmann’s adaptation, dismissing it as, ‘postmodern tom-foolery.’[28] It did however encourage teenagers to see his film. One of the ways he did this was through his setting; Luhrmann used the setting of Mexico City.  Lehmann describes this as ‘interpreting ‘fair’ as ‘foul’, shooting on location in the polluted and politically corrupt corporate centre of Mexico City.’[29] This setting allowed Luhrmann to set the stage for a corrupt and gang-ridden city that was his vision of Verona. Although this may strike some as a radical change from Shakespeare’s ‘fair Verona’,[30] the image of Mexico City that many teenagers have - as exciting, dangerous and corrupt - is similar to the Elizabethan view of Italy when Shakespeare was alive. :Lehmann remarks that ‘Luhrmann’s depiction of Verona beach and its inhabitants attitudes to Latinity bears striking parallels with Shakespeare’s Verona and Elizabethan assumptions about Spain and Italy.’[31] Further, Lehmann describes Italy as being ‘England’s, hot-blooded neighbour to the south [which] was ‘marvellous dangerous’ to English youth.’[32] In this changing of the setting, Luhrmann has created the Verona of 1996.

In creating Romeo + Juliet, Luhrmann aimed to bring Shakespeare up to date and attempt to remove the stigma attached to Shakespearean films as being old fashioned, long and slow.  He remarked that ‘we’re trying to make this movie rambunctious, sexy, violent, and entertaining the way Shakespeare might have if he had been a filmmaker.’[33] To do this, he not only had to update the setting and the weapons, but the characters; to make them believable and to fit into a modern society. As Julie Sanders contests, ‘[t]he adaptation of Shakespeare invariably makes him ‘fit’ for new cultural contexts and different political ideologies to those to those of his own age.’[34] Two characters Luhrmann changes dramatically are Friar Lawrence and Mercutio. In Zeffirelli’s adaptation, the Friar is old, balding and chubby, wearing brown monk’s robes, and has been described as, ‘affectionate but dotty.’[35]  Luhrmann portrays him dressing in bright Hawaiian style shirts with a large tattoo of a crucifix on his back; this religious imagery is reminiscent of Vegas style churches, and reflected in Friar Lawrence’s church in Luhrmann’s film, which is abundant with neon glowing crucifixes.  Lehmann believes that this ‘heavy handed use of religious symbolism has affected the films critical reception’ in a negative way.’[36] In trying to make his films accessible and understandable to teenagers, Luhrmann drew the criticism of many who argued against the simplifying of Shakespeare. However in terms of characterisation, Luhrmann does this in order to make Friar Lawrence into a figure whom modern teenagers might understand Romeo seeking help and advice from, thereby maintaining his accepted status as the trusted confidant and helper of Romeo and Juliet.

The sexually ambiguous portrayal of Mercutio has also sparked critical controversies. Luhrmann depicts him as a ‘buff, drag queen’[37] during the costume ball scene, which can be argued is not just a costume, but a way in which he ‘expresses gender confusion and anxiety.’[38] It can also be argued that Luhrmann is not simply creating ethical and sexuality diversity in his film to replicate today’s society, but is continuing what other directors before him have begun. Zeffirelli’s Mercutio suggests ‘Mercutio’s homoerotic attachment to Romeo’, as Zeffirelli presents Mercutio as, ‘desperate […] to retain Romeo’s (attention) by keeping him loyal to the values of the male pack.’[39] To signpost this relationship between Mercutio and Romeo, Zeffirelli uses Mercutio’s Queen Mab speech, after which ‘Romeo clasps Mercutio’s face to his in an effort to console him.’[40] Some critics see this as a romantic gesture; ‘[f[ilmed in tight profile, this two-shot shows Romeo and Mercutio’s foreheads resting softly against one another [...] their impassioned and deeply private exchange is as romantic – in its own subtle way – as the Scenes between Romeo and Juliet.’[41] This appears to be a narrow minded view, due to Zeffirelli’s open homosexuality, that he cannot show the love between two men who are like brothers, without him being accused of putting homosexuality into the film, with Lehmann remarking that ‘others have more crudely described Zeffirelli’s camera – at its best – as one-sidedly ‘homosexual’ or – at its worst – even ‘sodomizing’.’[42]

Whilst Shakespeare was writing, ‘England was being threatened from both within and outside of its geographical borders.’[43] This latent violence underlines much of the play, which ‘depicts Verona as ripe for rebellion, opening with images of ‘mutiny’ and ‘civil blood (shed),’ wrought by the ‘ancient grudge’ between the Capulets and the Montagues.’[44] Zeffirelli and Luhrmann use similar techniques to include historical context in their adaptations of Romeo and Juliet. Zeffirelli even described his film as ‘a documentary for the period’[45] This is particularly evident in their depiction of Act three Scene one – Mercutio’s death revealing the brutal truth of Verona and its instability, which appears when Mercutio and Tybalt have both died and everything in the lovers world falls apart.  Lehmann asserts that ‘this precarious equilibrium proves unsustainable in the wake of Tybalt’s murder of Mercutio.’[46] It is the point in the play at which there is no turning back for Romeo and Juliet, the ‘tragic turning point’[47] (p197,SA). Zeffirelli and Luhrmann interpret this in different ways. Zeffirelli’s fight scene takes place in the dusty and mostly deserted streets of Verona, which have tall walks and not much in the way of colour, showing Verona as a prison like containment for Romeo and Juliet’s love. The fight itself begins quite jovially between Tybalt and Mercutio; Mercutio ‘playfully engages Tybalt in an epic sword fight – one that is filled with laughter, jests and even a handshake between the opponents.’[48] They appear to be trying to impress the crowd of Capulet’s and Montague’s around them, much like a gang of boys would in any time or society.

Zeffirelli includes much physical humour, as if they are playing childishly with the swords.  There appears to be no malicious intent behind their banter and joking; they play with the hay and do no more than tap each other with swords. In chopping off a piece of Mercutio’s hair, Tybalt shows himself to be more interested in humiliating Mercutio than killing him, until ‘Tybalt’s unintended fatal blow.’[49] In doing this, Zeffirelli adds a new dimension to the character of Tybalt, who can be depicted as a murderous killer and indeed appears to be so in many versions.[50]  However, in making it seem like a gang of boys whose messing around has gone too far, ‘Zeffirelli makes it clear that when the fun and games turn deadly, Michael York’s Tybalt is utterly horrified at the sight of Mercutio’s blood on his sword.’[51] Tybalt is looked at as less of a cold blooded killer, and more of a spoilt child showing off who does not like jokes being made at his expense. Luhrmann takes an alternative perspective, ignoring the empty bravado of Tybalt and turning him into a brute, not allowing him any added dimensions; we see in him no softness or remorse. 

 It is difficult to tell how Shakespeare intended Tybalt to be portrayed; as there are very few stage directions, everything rests in the tone of voice undertaken – is it the hot headed bluster of a naïve young man or cold blooded desire, ‘Now, by the stock an hour of my kin/ to strike him dead I hold it not a sin.’[52] Capulet calls him a ‘Saucy boy’[53] and a ‘princox’;[54] not the imagery of a cold-blooded killer, but a tempestuous youngster to be reined in. The dramatic change between the two styles of fighting is significant. Tybalt and Mercutio fight to a large crowd cheering and laughing at their mock fight, Tybalt and Romeo ‘s fight is darkened by Mercutio’s death; the crowd is serious, trying to help and the banter like jeering disappears. The fighting also descends from civilised swordplay to hand to hand brawling in the dust. This physical closeness between the characters creates a more animalistic fight and death of one of them seems inevitable.

Luhrmann also seeks to bring Shakespeare’s scene of Mercutio’s death up to date as a believable act in modern society. To do this he uses a darker approach.  From the beginning there is a sense of trespass when the Capulets arrive at Verona Beach. Both Mercutio and Tybalt are quicker to anger than Zeffirelli’s counterparts and appear to revel in the violence using physical rather than verbal banter, thereby allowing the Scene to move at a quicker pace, creating a greater sense of impending danger, or ‘unmistakeable urgency.’[55] This is an example of Lurhmann seizing ‘every opportunity to convert the potentially ‘dead language’ of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet into a distinctly cinematic visual language.’[56] Luhrmann uses the form of a cowboy standoff between the characters sign posting a High Noon style denouement. The sense of immediate danger is also clear from the characters serious demeanours and the foreboding music. The film is liberal with its use of violence and Luhrmann is not afraid to show blood, showing the violence of the scene through the camera work, using many different angles and constantly cutting between shots to create a mad, disjointed scene.  Critics have dubbed this as ‘bravura camerawork’[57] and criticised its over use and privileging over Shakespearean language. The emotions portrayed in this scene are amplified by Luhrmann placing it in a melodramatic tempest-like storm, which heavily contrasts to the stark setting of Zeffirelli’s fight scenes. The beach and the storm backdrop emphasise the wide-ranging danger of the situation, and yet concentrate ones view of the intimacy of death. The storm also symbolises the storm which awaits Romeo and Juliet, as after this scene their world is ripped apart, as is the beach after the storm.  Luhrmann includes shots of buildings falling apart and being blown away as well as locals blocking up their homes and hiding from the onslaught of death. Film media allows such wild and dramatic allusions, which would be impossible to stage in a theatre, in a way this bring the images and thereby the story to life for the audience, who could arguably engage more in what they are watching. It also creates a more dynamic and exciting scene, which would appeal to modern viewers, who are used to action packed sequences. It could be argued that Shakespeare as a populariser in his own time, if born now, would have been at the forefront of such blockbusters.

Both Zeffirelli and Luhrmann exclude two main points that Shakespeare includes in his play. Firstly Mercutio’s death in the play is off stage.[58] Shakespeare may have done this to place less emphasis on Mercutio and more on Romeo and his reaction to Mercutio’s death, perhaps to draw the audience’s attention away from Mercutio, who could otherwise dominate the scene. Both directors felt it necessary to have Mercutio die on screen.  A death scene does give added drama to the films; to take Mercutio off screen at that point could have caused the tension and the scene to fall flat, removing the sense of pace. Seeing Romeo grieve over Mercutio’s dead body spells out to the modern audience Romeo’s line of thought; it makes it obvious why he would turn to fighting when previously he refused, showing that Romeo is not a cold blooded killer but someone the audience can feel sympathy for. Secondly, in the play, Tybalt returns to Romeo rather than Romeo running after him as he does in both films. This again is more dramatic, giving the directors the opportunity of having a chase scene, which allows the audience to see the build-up of Romeo’s hate and fury for Tybalt.  It also emphasises the stark difference between the two fights.  Romeo and Mercutio’s is wild, brutal and dangerous. Shakespeare obviously didn’t have the option of a chase Scene, having written his play to be performed on a stage with limited space.  Instead Tybalt returns,[59] riling Romeo into the frenzy which drives him to kill.

Shakespeare is possibly the best-known playwright of our time.  Most of his plays have been adapted for the big screen.  However, critics have long been dismissive of the new media approach, arguing that it undermines his cultural status as high art that should not be discredited by adaptations. The critic Calavita disagrees, arguing that many literary theorists have created their own filmic canon in which they ‘want to set themselves and their preferred films apart from the juvenile, taste challenged masses […] according to the rules of good cinema from an imagined, Edenic-past.’[60] Even though Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet was, ‘the first Shakespeare film ever to lead all films in box office receipts during its open weekend’ it was ‘widely trashed by most critics upon its release’[61] for its use of  ‘popular songs, glossy atmospherics and breakneck speed.’[62] Because of its popularity with the masses, the academic community shunned it. Similarly, Zeffirelli works to ‘revitalise the qualities that originally made the plays popular.’[63] The film industry is fast growing and in order to maintain the popularity of Shakespeare’s works and keep him, ‘not of an age but for all time’,[64] the film adaptations of Shakespeare, and particularly Romeo and Juliet, must be embraced, thus allowing motion picture to ‘for the first time in history render Shakespeare immortal.’[65] In Shakespeare’s words, ‘All the worlds a stage.’[66] His plays can be performed anywhere in any form and they will still be recognised as Shakespeare.

Word Count- 3,515

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Hutcheon, Linda, A Theory of Adaptation (Abingdon: Routledge, 2006)

Jackson, Russell., ed., The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare on Film (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007)

Sanders, Julie, Adaptation and Appropriation (Abingdon, Routledge, 2006)

Shakespeare, William, As You Like It (London: Penguin Books, 1996)

Shakespeare, William, Romeo and Juliet (London: Penguin Books, 2005)

Wain, John., ed., The Oxford Library of English Poetry (Oxford: Oxford University Press,1986)