West Side Story continues at Theatre du Châtelet, Paris until 31 December 2023.Star rating: four stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ✩How Paris loves this timeless classic, the tragic story of ‘Romeo and Juliet’ star-crossed lovers on Manhattan’s wild Upper West Side in 1950s New York as the centrepiece of the teenage street-gang rivalry between the Jets (white Americans) and Sharks (Puerto Ricans). In 1957 it changed musical theatre forever.
This rock-solid American production which has been touring Europe and Asia since last December is the fifth West Side Story at the majestic 2,500-seater Châtelet since 1981 – I’ve just seen a clip from that and the ‘Dance at the Gym’ scene with each gang daring to challenge the other was just as electric then as it is three decades on.
Even if the names of the young American cast are unfamiliar, the name of the director, Lonny Price, is not. As an actor, he played Charley Kringas in the original short-lived Merrily We Roll Along, he’s directed Emma Thompson in Sweeney Todd at the ENO and in New York, and his Merrily retrospective Best Worst Thing That Ever Could Have Happened was a documentary triumph in 2016. So there’s not much he doesn’t know about Stephen Sondheim. Or Leonard Bernstein, as he directed a TV stream of Candide. In Paris he gives us his vision of West Side Story where the dance element reigns supreme.
And you could tell from the buzz of an excited audience – a big one for midweek in the seventh of a ten-week run in Paris – that the old magic not only survives but now a new generation can see why it was such a game-changer at the time. The combined virtuosity of perfectionist Jerome Robbins’ original choreography (here in the safe hands of his disciple Julio Monge), Bernstein’s dramatic score, Arthur Laurents’ concept and the lyrics of a young Sondheim (some of which, in retrospect, he thought a bit schmaltzy) is as vibrant and vital today as it ever was, even if all four major collaborators are no longer with us.
Who today doesn’t know ‘Tonight’, ‘Maria’, ‘Somewhere’, ‘I Feel Pretty’, ‘America’, ‘One Hand, One Heart’ and the clever comic interlude before the tragic ending ‘Gee, Officer Krupke’? And that’s only seven of them. ‘Something’s Coming’, ‘Cool’, ‘A Boy Like That’ and ‘I Have a Love’ aren’t too shabby either. It’s a wordsmith’s feast, enhancing Bernstein’s sumptuous score, a never-to-be-repeated double act and gloriously interpreted by musical director Grant Sturiale and his 20-strong orchestra.
It’s the mesmerising ensemble dancing that makes this revival really fly with the feisty, fiery, high-kicking Kyra Sorce taking the honours as Anita. This must be the most eye-catching part as Rita Moreno, in the original film that won ten Oscars in 1962, and Ariana DeBose, in Steven Spielberg’s 2021 reworking with a new role written for a by-then 90-year-old Moreno, both won Best Supporting Actress gongs.
Jadon Webster and Melanie Sierra are the young lovers, Tony and Maria, from different backgrounds and allegiances. Their duets touch the heart. At pushing 30, Sierra must be one of the oldest Marias ever – Anita’s unworldly, stubborn, head-over-heels-in-love kid sister can be no more than 18 – but the Natalie Wood-lookalike convinces totally. It is called acting. And a purity of tone and diction shine through.
Antony Sanchez (Bernardo) and Taylor Harley (Riff) play the other two main parts with zest and short-cropped Gigi Hausman makes the perfect tomboy as Anybodys, the do-anything girl who so desperately wants to be ‘one of the boys’.
What didn’t work for me was the ‘Gee, Officer Krupke’ routine. I always look forward to the witty Sondheim puns but this version felt a bit flat. But kudos to Anna Louizos’ atmospheric set and Fabrice Kebour’s lighting, particularly with the dark and foreboding tenement.
For the first time, Paris has a double slice of Sondheim for Christmas. The first Broadway show for which he wrote both music and lyrics, A Funny Thing Happened On the Way To The Forum, is playing at the new, improved Lido2 in the Champs-Élysées. Both shows are in English with French surtitles but next autumn the Châtelet is doing Les Misérables no less – and in its original language. We’d better start brushing up our French!
Jeremy Chapman
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