It’s important to get the full story, to avoid historical revisionism or cleaning up a past that is violent and hateful and complicated,” said Gonzalez-Piloto. “These are stories with problematic characters, but someone has to play the problematic role. For these actors, Gonzalez-Piloto, Liao, and stage director Aviva Ramirez ’22 held more conversations about the importance of playing a difficult role in service of a larger cultural shift in theater. These characters deliver most of the musical’s racist lines, and the actors, many of whom are first-years or first-time Harvard performers, were concerned about how they would be perceived by audiences. Interestingly “West Side Story,” a retelling of Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet,” was praised by critics when it opened in 1957 for its realism and for taking audiences into a world of gang violence and poverty that finds “odd bits of beauty amid the rubbish of the streets,” according to Brooks Atkinson in The New York Times.Īt the same time that the artistic team worked to educate the participants about the painful history they were recreating, they also saw another learning opportunity for the actors cast as the Jets, an all-white gang, and the neighborhood police officers. “We wanted to open up a conversation with the Harvard community and beyond, to show how a story that is dated can resonate with us today,” said technical producer Isabelle Liao ’21, who is concentrating in history and literature. They also tried to be more intentional in wardrobe selection as both groups of combatants emerged from the same lower-income strata. With guidance from actor, director, and OFA guest artist Adriana Colón ’12, the team reimagined the Sharks without the stereotypical accents and mannerisms present in earlier productions of the show, focusing instead on depicting a diversity of Latinx identity and experiences. “Even though ‘West Side Story’ was not written by Latinos, and there are many problematic choices in the text and the movie, including brownface and the stereotyping of Puerto Rican people, there is still a lot of resonance in the text for modern Latinx people around issues like immigration, colorism, belonging, and assimilation,” she said, adding that the musical, with a book by Arthur Laurents, music by Leonard Bernstein, and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, also depicts poverty and police violence in ways that may feel familiar for contemporary audiences. The goal was to critique the language of the script and learn more about the history and culture behind the characters through a distinctly Latinx lens, rather than from the show’s original creators, who were white men. and the development of Latinx and latinidad identity categories. To create a foundation of understanding and knowledge among the cast and crew, she worked with students at La O and Diversity Peer Educators to hold multiple cultural conversations with the cast and staff, on topics including the historic and current poor treatment of Puerto Ricans in the U.S. She said that facing the show’s difficult past was crucial to the production process. Gonzalez-Piloto, a joint concentrator in Theater, Dance & Media and music, is also president of TEATRO!, one of the groups presenting the production, along with La Organización de Puertorriqueños en Harvard (La O). “We’re working within a limited framework, so we have been asking: What can we do to make a more accurate and respectful cultural representation and also acknowledge there are some seeds of truth in this very flawed creative masterpiece?” “‘West Side Story’ has left a big cultural footprint, so there is value in reclaiming the story and depicting it as accurately as possible,” said technical producer Amanda Gonzalez-Piloto ’21, noting that the script for the HRDC production cannot be changed due to copyright restrictions. They also wanted to find a way to reckon with the real and underdeveloped histories of Latinx life in New York in the late 1950s, beyond the show’s stereotypical portrayals. When the artistic team began planning the show, members focused on addressing chronic issues of Latinx representation in casting, a flaw illustrated early on by the Oscar-winning 1961 film adaptation in which the vast majority of Puerto Rican characters were played by white actors, such as Natalie Wood as the female lead, Maria. A new Harvard-Radcliffe Dramatic Club production opening this week at Farkas Hall is confronting the cultural missteps associated with the classic musical, turning an ambitious theatrical project into a complex educational experience for cast and crew. More than 60 years after its Broadway debut, “West Side Story” remains a touchstone of modern American theater.
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