Shakespeare on Film: Romeo and Juliet
With Romeo and Juliet, Franco Zeffirelli interprets the language of young love in MM's fifth week of Shakespeare on Film.
by Daniel Rosenthal
URL: http://www.moviemaker.com/acting/article/shakespeare_on_film_romeo_and_juliet_20080626/
With Romeo and Juliet, Franco Zeffirelli interprets the language of young love in MM's fifth week of Shakespeare on Film. Zeffirelli first sowed the seeds of this box-office triumph in 1960, when the Italian director-designer made his Shakespeare stage debut with Romeo and Juliet at London’s Old Vic. In 1967, he set out to replicate that Old Vic passion on film. He was confident of attracting a large international audience and, believing that “the kids in the story are like teenagers today,” took a gamble by casting actors almost as young as their characters: Leonard Whiting was seventeen, Olivia Hussey, chosen ahead of 350 other hopefuls, just fifteen.