Music by: Leonard Bernstein Book by: Arthur Laurents

Lyrics by: Stephen Sondheim Original production directed by: Jerome Robbins

West Side Story adapts Romeo and Juliet to New York City in 1957, placing the two lovers, Tony and Maria, at the center of turf warfare between the Jets, an immigrant gang, and the Sharks, a Puerto Rican gang. Just from that, you know it's not going to end well. :-) Read the complete synopsis. To get a better idea of how it all unfolds, take a look through the lyrics.

This show is just one of the innumerable adaptations of a play that is widely considered one of the greatest love stories of all time, Romeo & Juliet. You can read more about the play from the Roméo & Juliette pages. As for this show, you can find out more about the history of the musical, or take a look at some of my thoughts on the movie version.

There are a lot of different recordings of this show, but I could certainly think of a dream cast if anyone want to make one more. :-) Take a look at my reviews of the CDs that I have, or listen to a clip from one of my favourite songs.

I haven't seen this show on stage yet, believe it or not! I really wanted to see the production in Bregenz over the past couple of summers, but it just didn't work out that I was able to go. Still, I will try to see it sometime soon, and add my thoughts here when I do.

Since I haven't seen the show for myself, most of my favourite performers come from the recordings, or are just those that I'm sure would have been great - take a look at my thoughts on some of them! Once you're done looking around here, check out some of the other West Side Story websites that are out there.