Friday, March 29, AD 2024 3:40am

America

 

Something for the weekend.  America from West Side Story.  Hard to believe that it is 60 years since this updating of Romeo and Juliet was first performed on the stage.  Parts of it are still powerful, especially at the end where Maria blames the hate of both the Jets and the Sharks for the death of her Tony, and the gang members join in carrying away his corpse.  Of course some elements now seem absurd.  The gang members now look so clean cut that they are more like young members of a Rotary Club than would be street criminals.

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Dave Griffey
Dave Griffey
Saturday, March 4, AD 2017 7:02am

I find the message of racial tolerance more mature back then. We were watching In the Heat of the Night. My boys picked up on the fact that Mr. Tibbs realized he was every bit as prejudiced in his own way, and that was clouding his ability to solve the case. They said today, such themes usually involve one person or group of people who totally get it, opposing or schooling someone (or some group) who are entirely wrong, hateful, bigoted. That there was a time when we realized you could have two sides wrong in the area of racism or bigotry seemed quite interesting to my boys, given the era in which they’ve grown.

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