Alex Castro Cruz 3-26-19
English Period 5
Romeo and Juliet was a tragedy written by William Shakespeare around the years 1594-1597. First performed at the Global Theater in 1595, it became an overnight sensation around London and then across the entirety of England, showing enough drama, action, and comedy for everyone to enjoy. Soon, it boomed across the entire world as a must see tragedy to make your week, establishing itself as one of the greatest pieces of literature for future generations to come. Now, more than 400 years after its initial debut, there have been several attempts to try and modernize this classic to grab the attention of a short-attention span millennial. Despite some mediocre success by using such stars like Leonardo DiCaprio and Kevin Hart, classic literature shouldn’t be modernize. First, let’s take a look at Romeo and Juliet’s success over the years. While it may have fallen out of popularity after Shakespeare’s death, it was sooner revived in 1679 by a man called Thomas Otway, revising the play to take place in Rome with a new set of characters, but using much of the original script. Soon, the classic literature was introduced in the public school systems, where it has and still is being used to teach children not only the different style of culture and language the 1600’s had, but also stir up debates on topics such as true love vs. a crush. In 1968, the first adaptation of Romeo and Juliet finally took place on the big screen, preserving all of Shakespeare’s ideas as though we were watching the original play. However, a 1996 version of Romeo and Juliet would soon tarnish the reputation of this great English classic. While the film wasn’t the worst thing in the world, it took away the emotion and drama of what made Romeo and Juliet so great in the first place. But it wasn’t until the 2013 Romeo and Juliet was released that made us cherish the original literature so much. The setting looks too futuristic, some of the characters like Mercutio were completely ruined, and overall, there was a definite lack of emotion due to the rewording of a script that didn’t need to be edited. Imagine Shakespeare watching this abomination and seeing all of his time and effort into creating this masterpiece completely ruined by a couple of greedy, inconsiderate writers who probably tried to change the script by changing each word with another one found in a Thesaurus. Romeo and Juliet is still on a successful road, but had to be halted due to a couple of modernize adaptation roadblocks. Next, let’s take a look at other classics who have been ruined thanks to modernization. One example would be A Wrinkle in Time, a classic science fantasy novel written by Madeleine L’Engle. When first released, this book rose to the top of the charts, or in this case shelves, and quickly became a fan favorite. Then suddenly, a TV movie about it was released in 2003 which went very poorly. It only received an average of 40% across all critic reviews and ws dubbed an insult to the novel and an insult to L’Engle. Despite this, Disney thought it would be a great idea to reboot the novel as their own movie, but despite the popularity of Disney, the movie barely made back anything after it was also declared a failure with an average rating of 40%. A second example to look at is Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak. This was a classic childhood story for everyone to read, which taught an important life lesson of obeying your parents, but also that first impressions aren’t what they appear to be. Then, in 2009, it was released onto the entertainment world to create a visual for families to enjoy. But that entertainment sooned turn to disaster as the movie was a complete flop, partially due to the appearances of the characters, but also the lack of emotion that the movie had, making it as much fun as watching paint dry. The movie couldn’t even make back its initial budget of $115,000,000 due to poor ratings, making a net loss of 15 million dollars. Classics don’t deserve to be modernize because as even shown in their title, classics are pieces of literature that enjoyable for everyone and have very little flaws.