A tragedy tailored to the spirit of the times – Romeo and Juliet as interpreted by Franco Ze"relli and Baz Luhrmann

Śliwińska Anna, A tragedy tailored to the spirit of the times – Romeo and Juliet as interpreted by Franco Ze"relli and Baz Luhrmann. „Images” vol. XXVI, no . Poznań . Adam Mickiewicz University Press. Pp. –. ISSN -X. DOI ./i.... ,is article discusses two -lm adaptations of Romeo and Juliet, i.e. one directed by Franco Ze.relli and the other by Baz Luhrmann. It covers the following aspects: the structure of both the drama and its two -lm adaptations, the characters’ creation, the choice of setting and screen time, and the function of tragedy. Shakespeare’s language is characterised by unparalleled wit and powers of observation, and the -nal form of his plays is a clear indication of his ambivalent attitude towards tradition and the rigid structure of the drama. By breaking with convention, favouring an episodic structure, and blending tragedy with comedy, Shakespeare always takes risks, in a similar vain to the two directors who decided to make -lm adaptations based on his plays. Each technical device the adaptors selected could have turned out to be a wonderful novelty or a total disaster. ,e strength of both Ze.relli’s and Luhrman’s adaptations is their emphasis on love and youth, which thanks to their directorial skill is perfectly in tune with the spirit of their respective times.

Alongside Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet remains the most popular and most commonly adapted of Shakespeare's plays. Before there had been already over a dozen lm adaptations of this work. According to Marek Hendrykowski[ ], in alone as many as three lms were made of this play, i.e. an Italian production by Mario Caserini, an American one by Stuart Blackton and a British one produced by the Gaumont-British Picture Corporation. e list of lm adaptations can obviously be much longer and the productions most commonly referred to include: George Cukor's ( ), Renato Castellani's ( ), Franco Ze relli's ( , Romeo and Juliet) and Baz Luhrmann's lm William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet ( ). Despite being made almost thirty years apart, Zerelli's and Luhrmann's lms share a common intention to inteprate Shakespeare's play, i.e. to make a lm about and for a young audience[ ]. According to Patricia Tatspaugh, Ze relli's adaptation targeted the younger generation of Americans protesting against the Vietnam War who, to use Sarah Munson Deats' words, stood in opposition to their parents' ideals of military prestige and the use of force. Tatspaugh emphasises the fact that both Ze relli's and Luhr-mann's adaptations, while so distinctively different, convey the same ironic commentary on the generation gap[ ]. Romeo and Juliet is one of Shakespeare's earliest plays[ ]; it was Ze relli's second encounter with a Shakespeare work and Baz Luhrmann made his William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet straight a er his debut production, 's Strictly Ballroom. What is present in all these titles is a certain aura of freshness and youthfulness, i.e. the rst strokes of the playwright's quill and the lmmaker's freedom to intepret a canonical piece of literature. ese lm adaptations share a comprehensive understanding of Shakespeare's intentions, which does not necessarily mean blindly mimicking the master, but instead re ects an informed intuition in following the amplitude of emotions that accompanied the process of working on this piece. Particular elements of these adaptations, such as their structure, character creation, choice of the setting and the screen time and the function of tragedy, provide evidence of the application of radically distinct means of expression can lead to the same ability to convey a very Shakespearean version of Romeo and Juliet.

Structure
Shakespeare's tragedy opens with a Prologue delivered by the Chorus, which represents the legacy of the ancient Greek theatre tradition. e play is composed of acts. Acts One, ree and Four contain scenes, Act Two six scenes and Act Five is composed of three scenes. Elizabethan drama broke with classical rules, e.g. the unity of time and setting. It rejected the rigid form of traditional composition and aesthetic uniformity. Instead, it o ered a loose and episodic plot structure, which on many occasions gave room for the psychological dimension of the characters. Shakespeare makes deliberate and conscious selections from both traditional theatre and more contemporary trends, following the rule of what best ts in with his needs.
Alongside the Chorus, the legacy of ancient drama in Shakespeare's works also includes what Erich Auerbach emphasises as the choice of tragic characters with a noble background[ ]. Nevertheless, it is worth remembering that Shakespeare's apt and precise language makes it possible for him to describe with equal ease the lives of characters that come from all walks of life. As Samuel Taylor Coleridge asks rhetorically: On the other hand, look at Shakespeare: where can any character be produced that does not speak the language of nature? Where does he not put into the mouths of his dramatis personae, be they high or low, Kings or Constables, precisely what they must have said? Where, from observation, could he learn the language proper to Sovereigns, Queens, Noblemen or Generals? Yet he invariably uses it.[ ] e ancient tradition of prologue and epilogue that encapsulate the world within clear-cut, well-de ned boundaries also found its counterparts in lm adaptations of Shakespeare's works. In Ze relli's production, they were delivered in the form of a voiceover, which made them compatible from the compositional point of view with the rst and the last scene of the lm. In William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet, the words of the Prologue and Epilogue come from a female journalist on a TV news programme. As the Epilogue comes to an end, In Ze relli's lm, these words coincide with an image of the newly reconciled enemies. Luhrmann, on the other hand, added a contemporary context to the Epilogue, which is addressed directly to the audience[ ]. e boldness of the verbal message is enhanced by the image of a disappearing TV screen, which constitutes an ironic commentary on our times. In managing to save their love, Romeo and Juliet were victorious over a world full of hate and confused values. It is the viewer who loses, as they are le with an empty screen, just like on any other day when the news, saturated with human tragedies, is over.
According to Patricia Tatspaugh, Ze relli retained percent of Shakespeare's original text, in order to focus on the main elements of the story and the main characters[ ]. Both his and Luhrmann's adaptation follow the sequence of scenes contained in Shakespeare's original. Only once does Ze relli change Shakespeare's: the lm rst shows Juliet nding out that Romeo has killed Tybald, and only a erwards do we see Mrs Capulet grieving over the body of her nephew, as the Prince reads out the decree sentencing Romeo to exile. anks to this trick of swapping the two scenes over, and despite considerable cuts in the original text, the sense of cohesion is retained.
In Luhrmann's adaptation, many scenes and a signi cant part of the original text are cut. e video-clip style of storytelling allows for a laconic and free approach to Shakespeare's original. ere are two instances in the lm where short shots not integrated in the whole suggest to the viewer how the story is going to develop. e words of Friar Laurence regarding the poison are accompanied with a frame showing Juliet, who has already taken it. e frame, divided into two, blends Friar Laurence's story with the image of the sleeping Juliet, which in turn highlights the couple's determination and the inevitability of their fate. Another example of an unintegrated shot that de es the coherence of the scene is that showing Romeo before setting o for the ball, as he says: His words were accompanied with the image of the young man entering Juliet's tomb (the same image was once again screened at the end of the lm). With this visualisation of Shakespeare's message, the director suggests that the young couple's fate was sealed before they even met.
According to Henryk Zbierski, the structure of Romeo and Juliet can be seen as divided into two parts, with the boundary marked by the rst scene of Act . Up to that point, the reader is only o ered the background to the story, whereas the plot unfolds in earnest only in the second part of the play[ ]. e same design is noticeable in the two lm adaptations discussed here, where in both cases, the scene of Mercutio's death is the pivotal point, albeit lmed quite di erently. Ze relli puts the scene right in the middle of his lm and expands it with long shots of the ght. Described in Shakespeare's original with the briefest of directions " ey ght", in Ze relli's work it is extended to a duel lasting several minutes[ ]. e chaos of this scene is further intensi ed by enormous dust clouds.
Elements of nature frequently re ect the emotional state of Shakespeare's characters (e.g. Macbeth). Although not mentioned in the original text of the play, the wind that accompanies the scene of Mercutio's death in Luhrmann's lm is there to enhance the drama, with him dying in the manner of a stage actor. e impression is further intensi ed by the fact that Luhrmann selects a di erent setting for the scene. He moves it to the Sycamore Grove, which in his interpretation turns out to be the ruins of an old theatre on an empty beach. is way Luhrmann lends the scene of Mercutio's death a visual paraphrase of the famous lines from Macbeth: Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player at struts and frets his hour upon the stage And then is heard no more. It is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.[ ]

Characters
Numerous Shakespeare specialists reiterate a well-known truth about his plays, i.e. the most comprehensive e ect of a theatrical piece of art stems from the juxtaposition of " lled-out" with " at" characters, in other words, those that are more complex with those of a simple design, the exaggerated with the balanced, the comical with the serious, those with rhetorical skill and those using very simple language. e character design in Romeo and Juliet serves as a perfect example of this rule. e lead characters are in fact one-dimensional and less attractive to the reader when compared to the exuberant and witty supporting characters, who sparkle with humour.
It is not justi able to follow the usual path of interpretation, which identi es Romeo as an immature, amorous youth, and Juliet as a romantic "lamb". eir conversations in fact re ect the true nature of their respective characters. While Romeo's language is replete with references to the sky and the stars, and where love is de ned as a glow of light, Juliet's words are far more rooted in reality. She comes across as a down-to-earth girl and she is the one who sets all the rules, including the meeting and the wedding date. e couple is probably best characterised by the famous balcony scene of Act Two, Scene Two. is is the point at which Shakespeare presents Romeo as somebody who believes in the ideal of love. He is led to the Capulet ball to nd the ideal object of his desires, Rosaline. However, later on Romeo declares: [12] It is an obvious trick, yet one that prolongs the scene at the same time. It is used again in Ze relli's lm in Act One, Scene One, where the original " ey ght" becomes a trigger for another scene of ght. is time it is not only between the two feuding families, but those who happen to nd themselves in the Verona street. Luhrmann moves this scene to the petrol station and its structure evokes various intertextual connotations. One of them is the Western convention, or references to Alfred Hitchcock's Birds (S.M. Buhler, Shakespeare in the Cinema, Ocular Proof, New York , p. ). It is clear that the whole lm is abundant in references to various lm genres. Alicja Helman calls it an adaptation "made up as a gangster drama" (A. e new ideal love and object of Romeo's affections turns out to be the daughter of the rival house, but it is her eyes that he now compares to stars and she is now his light. Juliet's replies to the beloved's a ectionate declarations are pragmatic and down-to-earth. is is exactly how the two adaptations discussed here interpret Shakespeare's couple. In Ze relli's adaptation, created in the spirit of Flower Power, Romeo's question: "O wilt thou leave me so unsatis ed?" is followed by Juliet replying with a mischie- stage, in contrast to Mercutio and the Nurse, whose literary lines appeal to the reader immediately. Coleridge compares Mercutio to Shakespeare himself: Mercutio is a man possessing all the elements of a poet. e whole world was, as it were, subject to his law of association. Whenever he wishes to impress anything, all things become his servants for the purpose, all things tell the same tale, and sound in unison[ ].
Mercutio can be seen as a perfect complement to Romeo. He is both intelligent and, at the same time, almost oblivious to his great intellect, obscene and amusing, but most of all, witty. And the Nurse? us, in the Nurse you have all the garrulity of old age, and all its fondness; for the a ection of oldage is one of the greatest consolations of humanity.
[…] You have also in the Nurse the arrogance of ignorance, with the pride of meanness at being connected with a great family. You have the grossness, too, which that situation never removes, though it sometimes suspends it; and, arising from that grossness, the little low vices attendant upon it, which, indeed, in such minds are scarcely vices[ ].
e Nurse is the opposite of Mercutio. She is somewhat dull and her world is limited only to the images connected through her own associations, i.e. hers is a world where it is impossible to nd cause-e ect relations.
Such perfectly designed characters are particularly hard to interpret and incorporate into a lm. is is exactly where the weakest link in Ze relli's adaptation can be identi ed. ere is no reason to criticise the Nurse, played by Pat Heywood. However, Mercutio, as played by John McEnery, justi es a fair share of crit-icism, although this should not be levelled at the acting itself[ ], but rather the design of this lm character. Ze relli presents Mercutio as a jester and cuts his lines to the minimum, as a result of which Mercutio's wit and intellect cannot be fully appreciated. On the other hand, Ze relli enriches his adaptation with a number of slapstick comedy elements, through which Mercutio comes across as the central gure of the farce and clowning around. Heavy-handed joking and obscene gestures are all that remain of one of the best-designed characters in Romeo and Juliet.
In Shakespeare's play Mercutio's death resounds with comic e ect encapsulated in the lines which, paradoxically, enhance the tragedy of the situation: "[…] ask for me tomorrow and you shall nd me a grave man"[ ] [Act III. : p.
]. Unfortunately, Ze relli does not manage to maintain this balance, i.e. the laughter is too loud and it lasts too long. e lm incarnation of Mercutio dies the death of a jester, in line with his role in the lm.
In Luhrmann's adaptation, Mercutio, played by Harold Perrineau, comes across as the very essence of the Shakespeare character, further enhanced with a more contemporary feel. In fact, Mercutio is the most versatile character designed by Luhrmann in his adaptation. He is capable of joking, even in quite a vulgar manner, but at the same time, he maintains his seriousness, for instance, in his monologue on Queen Mab or the words that come as a harbinger of Mercutio's death do not sound as forcefully arti cial as in Ze relli's adaptation.
Both Ze relli and Lurhmann design Mercutio's character in the way that opens up space for the re ection about their respective contemporary times. Ze relli places most emphasis on the relationship between Romeo and Mercutio, which, according to numerous critics, alludes to homosexuality and therefore provides evidence of the breaking of sexual taboo in s' cinema[ ]. In line with postmodern tendencies, Luhrmann eschews a sombre attitude in favour of entertainment and playing with genre conventions. His interpretation of Mercu- is is also the way which determines the viewer's interpetation of how Luhrmann shapes the reality depicted in the whole lm. erefore, the ironic and tacky remains "outside", i.e. it never permeates into the "fabric" of Shakespeare's characters. is is exactly the way Paweł Łopatka interprets Lurman's 'camp approach' as the permanent feature of his work, which in William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet manifests itself only in the set and the props whereas: " e actors play with intensity but in all seriousness, without the pathos typical of camp behaviour, and at the same time, they do not let themselves get carried away in the obvious enchantment of the Shakespearean line. "[ ] Both adaptations discussed here contain numerous shortcuts in terms of the support characters. However, only two of those might confuse the audience. e rst of these is Zerelli's choice to give up altogether on one of the smaller, yet essential parts, i.e. that of the Apothecary. Without him it is unclear where Romeo gets the poison from. Luhrmann, on the other hand, disposes with Friar John and instead introduces a messenger who does not deliver the letter on time. is is because Luhrmann does not fall for Shakespeare's story of the plague. In the same vein, Ze relli simply does not allow Romeo to meet Friar John, as they fail to meet each other on their way.
As a matter of fact, the Friar John thread in the play is not as clear for at least two reasons. Firstly, Romeo is promised by Friar Laurence that his messages will only be passed on by Friar Balthasar, not Friar John. Secondly, the idea of the plague raises considerable doubts of a logical nature. Nevertheless, Henryk Zbierski provides several arguments in defence of Shakespeare's choice. For instance, he argues that the messages have to be delivered in a hurry and Balthasar is simply not around. Somebody has to inform Romeo about what had happened and Friar John is both at hand and also from the same monastic order[ ]. Additionally, the mistake made by Friar Laurence, i.e. sending an inappropriate messenger, serves as con rmation to the audience that it is he who is the protagonist doomed with hamartia. Zbierski highlights this point as a clear indication of Shakespeare's genius in plot design. e fact that a detail like this (the question of Friar Laurence) is frequently not elaborated su ciently in Shakespeare's plays, forces the audience to read di erent meanings into the drama, i.e. opens space for its re-interpretation[ ].

Time and setting
Shakespeare himself never went to Verona, yet he selected this city as the setting for his play. While he leaves the reader with just a few general remarks about the place (a street in Verona, the house of Capulet), Ze relli transforms it into a beautiful, green and romantic setting. e only o -putting element is the wall of the Capulet palace, whose shabbiness stands as a metaphor for the obstacle standing in the way of true love. As described by Shakespeare, it is pretty high and di cult to scale, although Romeo jumps over it "With love's light wings"[ ] [Act II. : p. ].
Luhrmann's Verona becomes Verona Beach, while the Sycamore Grove turns into a deserted beach with the ruins of the theatre at its centre. e place is full of dirt, abuse, prostitution. Kitch has taken over every sphere of life, including religion. Verona Beach is a caricature of the contemporary world, the common denominator of what is stupidest and most laughable within it. In Ze relli's adaptation, the city of Verona serves as the theatre stage on which the drama of the lovers' tragedy plays out. In Luhrmann's lm, however, Verona Beach plays one of the most prominent parts in its own right, i.e. it provides the basis for the most contemporary adaptation in terms of the time and the setting. In this way, Paris, the ideal youth, nds himself on the cover of 'Time' magazine, while Friar Laurence has a big cross tattooed on his back, and a dingy snooker bar goes by the name 'Globe' . Luhrmann's adaptation is crammed with details from contemporary popular culture, although they do not trigger any special metaphorical meanings. ey are merely there to evoke particular associations with contemporary reality, for example, the engagement ring that appears in Shakespeare's play is completely ignored by Ze relli, whereas Luhrmann features the ring in several instances as a hackneyed symbol of love.
As a punishment for killing Tybalt, Romeo is exiled to Mantua. Both cities, i.e. Verona and Mantua, actually come from the Italian piece written by Bandello, which in fact served as Shakespeare's inspiration. Nevertheless, the average contemporary reader associates these places only with Shakespeare's play, which is most probably down to his ingenious talent as a playwright and the renown that his play has acquired. Since Verona and Mantua lie kilometres apart, Romeo can return from his exile quite quickly in order to be able to rest by the side of his beloved Juliet.
In Ze relli's adaptation, Mantua is not in fact a city in the strict sense of the word, i.e. the lm neither presents the image of the place nor even a lm decoration that could symbolise it. Romeo is simply exiled there and then returns. Luhrmann, on the other hand, features Mantua as a dusty desert town, whose su ocating atmosphere is both literal and metaphorical, as Romeo waits with bated breath for news from Verona Beach. Associations with yet another lm are unavoidable here. Luhrmann draws inspiration from Agnieszka Holland's Total Eclipse ( ), mainly in terms of its visuals, but also because of it featuring the same actor. In both Holland's and Luhrmann's productions, the desert becomes the place of exploration, anticipation and quest. Romeo in exile resembles Arthur Rimbaud from Holland's lm through the same image of the character smoking a cigarette and diligently jotting down his thoughts: And all this day an unaccustom' d spirit Li s me above the ground with cheerful thoughts. I dreamt my lady came and found me dead, (Strange dream, that gives a dead man leave to think) And breath' d such life with kisses in my lips at I reviv' d and was an Emperor. Ah me, how sweet is love itself possess' d When but love's shadows are so rich in joy![ ] [Act V.1: p. 123].
In Shakespeare's play, these words signal a premonition about inevitable fate; they herald tragic irony[ ], whereas in Luhrmann's interpretation they turn into poetry and Romeo, the writer, becomes an artist. Paweł Łopatka con rms that the young Montecchi "is a poet who keeps noting everything down in a notebook"[ ]. In this way, Luhrmann includes Romeo in the rank of the artists who seek their artistic inspiration in their own su ering.
Shakespeare set Romeo and Juliet in his times, which can easily be deduced from the Nurse's clumsy lines account of the earthquake. Ze relli sticks to the original time setting of the th century and therefore dresses his characters in ornate Renaissance costumes (designed by Danilo Donati), as they glide around rooms reconstructed in the spirit of the Shakespearean era. Ze relli centres the whole scenery around Verona's main square along with its church. It is here that the most important scenes take place, i.e. the Prologue, Mercutio's death, Romeo and Juliet's wedding and, nally, their funeral processsion[ ].
Luhrmann provides the audience with a completely di erent experience of time, which passes much more quickly due to the video-clip montage. Incidentally, Shakespeare's  Tatspaugh, op.cit., p. . play also covers a markedly brief period of time, i.e. a mere ve days. e lovers meet on Sunday, get married on Monday only to be separated on Wednesday and to die together on ursday. According to Caroline F.E. Spurgeon, "Shakespeare saw the story, in its swi and tragic beauty, as an almost blinding ash of light, suddenly ignitied, and as swi ly quenched"[ ].
e motif of light recurs in the original text of the play and therefore it is also frequently taken up by lm adaptations. e light of dawn wakes the lovers in both lms discussed here, just as torch light accompanies them inside the tomb. An element of light is also woven into the tragic dimension of their love, as summarised by Friar Laurence: ese violent delights have violent ends And in their triumph die, like re and powder, Which, as they kiss, consume[ ] [Act II.6: p. 78] Tragedy e question whether Romeo and Juliet is in fact a tragedy has been raised on numerous occasions. Although Shakespeare himself named his play as such, it has to be remembered that it was written in the 'non-tragedy' period of his early writing career. In Shakespeare was a thirty-year-old novice playwright and his most outstanding works and impressive tragedies were only to emerge seven years later. Romeo and Juliet was written before the onset of the [ th ] century, i.e. before Shakespeare's most proli c period, which brought several tragedies one a er another.
Obviously, the most vital arguments against categorising Romeo and Juliet as a tragedy are contained in the work itself. One of them is the fact that one-third of the dialogues are comedy lines. Moreover, comic characters, i.e. Mercutio and the Nurse, come across as the most skillfully designed. Finally, the actual tragic conict remains external. Andrew Cecil Bradley con rms that Romeo and Juliet are not "torn by an inward struggle"[ ], as opposed to the protagonists from the later tragedies such as Hamlet, Macbeth or Othello. Henryk Zbierski also notes that with Romeo and Juliet, it is hard to identify their hamartia, the fatal aw of the lovers. Romeo and Juliet were to blame for not following their parents' orders, at least in Bandello's Italian prose and its English equivalent in the poem by Arthur Brooke[ ], which both provided Shakespeare with inspiration. In his play, the fatal aw does not take the same form as assumed by Aristotle. In Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, hamartia is scattered into little pieces shared by the support characters, i.e. Friar Laurence or Friar John. When Romeo cries (the famous line): "O I am fortune's fool"[ ] [Act III. : p. ], he does not mean that he carries a heavy burden of the fatal aw, but instead has fallen victim to ironic fate. In contrast to the classic rules of tragedy, he is not faced with the impossible choice between two equally important values. Romeo chooses Juliet and love; his is a happy choice of ful lled love. erefore it has to be concluded that the two lovers (both in Shakespeare's play and the lm adaptations) are not characterised by the fatal aw.
As argued by Auerbach: "Even Romeo's sudden falling in love with Juliet, for example, is almost t for a comedy, and an almost unconscious development takes the characters in this play of love from child-like beginnings to a tragic climax"[ ]. is line of argument leads to the conclusion that up to the scene of Mercutio's death, Romeo and Juliet develops in line with the features of a romantic comedy. Even more interestingly, while remaining a romantic comedy, this play also mocked the idea of romanticism at the same time. Mercutio laughs at Romeo's romantic trials and tribulations, comparing him to a protagonist from a Petrarch sonnet. However, at the same time the play does  Auerbach, op.cit., p. . speak about love in the language of poetry, as a piece of a sonnet appears in Act One, Scene Five. is is the path followed by Ze relli in his adaptation, where up to the point of Mercutio's death, the lm is a faithful reconstruction of Shakespeare's play. In other words, the screenwriters (Franco Brusati, Masolino D' Amico and Ze relli himself) took every e ort to ensure that the dialogues in the adaptation are as witty as the original, but also as poetic and romantic.
Luhrmann, on the other hand, treats Shakespeare's lines daringly; he cuts them up and matches them up again, he adds new meaning through an unexpected juxtaposition with the images. In fact, in his adaptation, it is only Mercutio's and Nurse's comic lines that escape the ruthless scissors of the screenwriters (Baz Luhrmann himself and Craig Pearce). is kind of imbalance in favour of comic pieces again calls into question the tragedy in the original play. In Luhrmann's adaptation, comic e ect is brought about not only through the dialogues themselves, but also because of the contrast with the images of contemporary reality. e world depicted is exaggerated and hence the humour also gains in irony. is comic e ect does not stem merely from the lines, but also from a satirical perspective on kitsch, materialism and the super ciality of the modern era.
Due to fast editing, the beginning of William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet already contains several shots that summarise the whole lm. Every frame is abundant in references to contemporary reality, i.e. billboards, kitsch gures of saints and adverts. Donald McAlpine, the photoprapher, made sure that there would be no single frame in the lm that would lack dynamism, sparkle or blaze of colour. e kitsch reality clashes here with the th -century text, but surprisingly, it works, even at the point where the line: "Give me my long sword ho. "[ ] [Act.I. : p. ] is followed by a pistol being pulled out.
ere is only one untainted treasure in Luhrmann's adaptation, i.e. the love of the two protagonists. Although wearing jeans and Hawaiian shirts, the lovers remain genuinely authentic when they clash with external reality. eir death bears features of pathos in exactly the way that Ze relli presents it. As concluded by Samuel Johnson, Romeo and Juliet is a drama with pathos, whose protagonists face su ering and death, but ultimately, their life proves to be a tragedy[ ]. It has to be borne in mind that were it not for the letter that does not get delivered on time, or if Juliet's did not sleep for so long, the two lovers would be saved.
ere is an alternative for them, they could have lived happily ever a er; it is only the fate that fails them. is is why Edward Chambers lists Romeo and Juliet among other love stories, together with those of Helen and Paris, Abelard and Heloise, Tristan and Isolde.[ ] Although Luhrmann's adaptation is teeming with pop MTV hits of the time, Romeo and Juliet's death is accompanied with the soundtrack that actually highlights their resemblance to their Shakespearean prototypes, as in the grave scene, where Leontyne Price sings Liebestod from Wagner's Tristan and Isolde nale. As a conseqence, despite the fact that the lm draws profusely from contemporary images and music to provide an ironic context, it nevertheless manages to retain the purity of the two lovers, whose dead bodies are untouched by the corrupt world and will remain pure and innocent forever.
In spite of its tragic ending, it cannot be forgotten that Romeo and Juliet also has its bright side. e two protagonists are happy together and their love is ful lled. Andrzej Żurowski puts it this way: "Romeo and Juliet is a bright kind of tragedy. It is a tragedy with optimism and joy at its heart"[ ]. He goes on to say: " e world did kill Juliet and Romeo but did not manage to destroy them. It did not get them, they slipped right in time. ey managed to ful ll the essence of their life. ey succeeded at achieving