West Side Story ranks among the most influential musicals in American theater history. The show opened on Broadway in 1957 and became a hit, largely through its revolutionary use of dance to tell the story and reveal the personalities of the characters. Arthur Laurents wrote the libretto (dialogue). Jerome Robbins was the director and choreographer (creator of dances). Leonard Bernstein composed the music, and Stephen Sondheim wrote the lyrics.
West Side Story is based on William Shakespeare’s tragedy Romeo and Juliet. The setting has been moved to modern New York City. The show centers on the gang warfare between the American-born Jets and the Puerto Rican-born Sharks over control of part of a neighborhood on the city’s West Side. The tragic lovers are Polish American Tony, a former leader of the Jets, and Maria, the sister of a Shark leader.
West Side Story brought a new realism to musical theater with its portrait of gang violence and racial tensions. The Bernstein-Sondheim score produced such hits as “Maria,” “Tonight,” “Somewhere,” “America,” and “One Hand, One Heart.”
A motion-picture version of West Side Story was released in 1961. It won 11 Academy Awards, including the Oscar for best picture. In the film, Richard Beymer played Tony and Natalie Wood played Maria. In the original Broadway production, Larry Kert played Tony and Carol Lawrence was Maria. A new motion-picture adaptation directed by Steven Spielberg was released in 2021. It starred Ansel Elgort as Tony and Rachel Zegler as Maria.
