West Side Story Film Analysis

West Side Story: Education Beyond the Classroom Being at an Ivy League institution, it is easy to think that the best learning experiences for a student comes from the classroom, but I was able to witness that this is not always the case. This semester I had the privilege of participating in Melodramatics production of West Side Story. I was cast as Chino, second hand man of his best friend Bernardo who is the leader of the Puerto Rican gang called the Sharks. I was a bit unfamiliar with West Side Story, so my first step towards developing my onstage persona was simply to watch the 1961 film. After watching the movie, I realized just how dynamic of a character Chino is and I realized that I had to truly develop two completely different characters
on stage. One side is the sweet faced boy that is set to marry Maria, and the other is the vengeance bent, cold-blooded killer that he turns into after the death of his best friend Bernardo and the loss of his love Maria to Tony. Developing both these characters took some time, albeit one more than the other, but with the help of the director, Andrea Fiorentini (Andy), I eventually reached a point where I felt I was accurately portraying Chino, while also being aware of the aspects of my portrayal that could be interpreted negatively. Overall, the whole character development process was both challenging and fun because I was able to bring this character to life while learning a bit more about the real situation my character faced, through the help of the Dramaturgy. This whole experience was amazing, but there definitely came some struggles along the way. The biggest fear that I had coming into this project was one that I know many of the other Sharks shared: the accents.
It is no secret that the 1961 film has received backlash for its brownface characters and the exaggerated accents that the actors put on. I was afraid that I might not do the character justice and just add to the bad reputation of West Side Story productions by putting on an accent that would make a caricature of the Puerto Rican people. Fortunately, I learned that Andy’s vision for this whole production was to fight this exact point. She envisioned a production that would flip the 1961 film on its head: a show that would aim to inform over perform. Now, this is just my interpretation of what Andy was trying to achieve, so do not take it as an absolute truth. Of course, no director wants to put on a bad show, and this was just as true for Andy, but she let it be known to us as a cast that this was going to be more than just an entertaining show for our audience. Andy fought hard for the rights to put this show on, and she did so for good reason. This production would be put on to show that the large gap between the number of white actors and actors of color is an injustice that must be addressed. This is a big issue on Broadway productions, but it is just as present in the Cornell theatre community, as well as the communities on college campuses throughout the entire United States. By casting people of color, many of us belonging to the Latinx community,
Andy was pushing to show that we are just as talented as our fellow white performers. There is no reason to have white actors change themselves substantially to fit into a role when there are just as many people of color who can pick up that same role and perform it just as well, if not better. The beauty of casting people of color to fill roles for characters of color is that both the actor and character may share a cultural experience that no one else can fully portray on stage. Andy knew this from the start and she planned to bring this realization to the Cornell community, while also waving it in the face of Schwartz and the future show directors. Her message was simple, yet strong: neglecting to include diversity in a cast will not only hurt the production directly, but the entire theatre community as well.