Why have different versions of Shakespeare and plays?

Answer 1

There are at least five movie versions and it may be argued some modern plays and films such as the (West Side Story) are loosely based on the tale. all of them (WSS discounted, as only the male character, Tony, is killed in a gun fight) retain the double tragedy nature of the play which is Situation Tragedy. Not aware of any with felicitous or jolly-style outcomes, though it is possible by changing the story around.

There is a black and white version released in 1936 starring Leslie Howard and Norma Shearer who were much older than Shakespeare intended. Howard was 43 and Shearer was 33. Nevertheless, Shearer received an Oscar nomination. The screenplay is relatively faithful to the original text although lines are omitted and liberties taken.

The most lavish version is Franco Zefferelli's 1968 release starring Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey. Both 17 when the movie was shot, they remain the youngest actors filmed for a major release of Romeo and Juliet. Beautifully shot, the film remains the gold standard for movie versions. However, lines were omitted and Juliet's entire soliloquy where she drinks the potion, was left out.

The third and last of the big-budget versions is Baz Luhrman's Romeo + Juliet starring Leonardo di Caprio and Clare Danes. Although the actors speak using Shakespeare's lines, the setting is current. Instead of Verona, the story unfolds in Verona Beach and the characters fight with guns and not swords. Still, the production is very faithful to the original play although shot with Luhrman's bombastic style. It is a visual feast as one would expect from Luhrman who also shot Moulon Rouge. Di Caprio and Danes, and indeed the entire cast, deliver their lines wonderfully. Although it certainly helps to have studied the play, this movie is very accessible and easily understood. As with the other major releases, liberties are taken, and some scenes are diced up and interspersed with one another.

There are least three British productions available on CD that were filmed on sets and with a minimum of pomp and glitz. On the plus side, they are line-for-line accurate to the original. They vary in quality.

One production is performed by the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts and stars Clive Francis and Angela Scoular. It is black and white and the lighting is very poor. The sound isn't very good either, a hollow echo around the set. During the first part of the balcony scene, Romeo has his back to Juliet as he "thinks" his lines which were overdubbed, his lips not moving and his eyes 180 degrees from the balcony.

Another set production stars Christopher Neame and Ann Hasson and is from the Thames Shakespeare Collection. It is faithful to the original and decently acted.

A third set production (from the BBC's mammoth project to film all of Shakespeare's plays, circa 1978) stars a very young Alan Rickman as Tybalt.

A Canadian film by CBC of a performance at the Stratford Festival with Megan Porter Follows and Antoni Cimolino is also available. Colm Feore makes a very good Mercutio.

All in all the IMdb lists 36 films and TV shows with the title Romeo and Juliet, although some of these are ballets. There are 34 others which use the two names in the title, suggesting that they are likely in some way based on the story Shakespeare told.

Answer 2

Yes, there always will be little variations especially when talking about such an old story. It has been made into a movie, many times as a matter of fact! The main theme will stay the same with all of the different versions but minor things are expected to be changed.

Answer 3

Uh, what original Romeo and Juliet? There might have been a real-life situation similar to what Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet experienced, but to my knowledge, he created Romeo and Juliet. (Well, actually he didn't, but none of his sources did either. It's sort of like a folk tale whose origins are lost in the mists of time.)

Answer 4

The two versions of the play Romeo and Juliet are the one called the First Quarto, dated 1597, and the one called the Second Quarto, dated 1599, which forms the basis of all later editions of the play. How is the First Quarto different? It is much shorter and some of the lines are different. Here, for example, is the Prologue:

Two household friends alike in dignity

(In fair Verona, where we lay our scene)

From civil broils broke into enmity

Whose civil war makes civil hands unclean,

From forth the fatal loins of these two foes,

A pair of star-crossed lovers took their life:

Whose misadventures, piteous overthrows,

(Through the continuing of their Fathers' strife,

And death-marked passage of their Parents' rage)

Is now the two hours traffic of our Stage.

The which if you with patient ears attend,

What here we want we'll study to amend.

It's very similar but not quite the same. The reason why there are two versions of the play, scholars believe, is that the First Quarto was a pirate copy, written out by an actor or stagehand with a good memory. It is sometimes called a "bad" quarto, not because pirating plays is wrong, but because it is thought defective when compared to the more full version that came out two years later and which is believed to be based on Shakespeare's notes. On the other hand the first quarto, being apparently derived from an actual performance, may be a closer text to what was actually performed. Its shortness makes it closer to the "two hours' traffic" promised by the prologue.

If you are thinking, not of two versions of the script, but of two versions of performance, then your question is nonsense. This is one of the most popular plays in the world and has been on the stage continuously for more than 400 years--hundreds of thousands of productions, no two of them alike, each with different methods of acting, costumes, props, sets, timing and the like. Even if you are thinking of recorded performances, either films made from a screenplay adapted from the script or filmed performances of the play, there are still dozens of such films. I can think of nine which are not too difficult to find on DVD. And, as likely as not, someone somewhere is right now planning to make another film version.

Answer 5

The script went through five editions on its own as well as being included in the Folios or collected works from the beginning. The first published version is quite a bit different from the others which are pretty much the same. But the one you buy from the store will probably be a different version again.

If you mean stage versions, every performance is different. Every production is different too and there have been far too many of these to count.

If you mean film versions, IMDB lists 72 titles. Some of these are not in English, some are ballets, some are operas, some have plots that are only barely related to the play by Shakespeare. But if you are interested in versions of the play by Shakespeare adapted for film, you might consider the following list:

1. Leslie Howard and Norma Shearer, 1936. Black and white and the actors are way too old for the parts. John Barrymore is a good Mercutio.

2. Patrick Ryecart and Rebecca Saire, 1978. Part of the BBC series, has a really young Alan Rickman as Tybalt.

3. Jonathan Firth and Geraldine Somerville, 1994. Ms. Somerville plays the part of Lily Potter in the Harry Potter movies.

4. Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes, 1996. I'm sure you've heard of this one.

5. Christopher Neame and Anne Hasson, 1976. Actually not too bad, if conventional.

6. Lawrence Harvey and Susan Shentall, 1954. Lush Italian scenery, kind of ten years ahead of . . .

7. Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey, 1968. Even more lush Italian scenery, one of the most famous films of this play, directed by Zeffirelli.

8. Clive Francis and Angela Scoular, 1965. A black and white school production.

9. Antoni Cimolino and Megan Follows, 1993. Filmed performance at the Stratford Festival. Colm Feore is a super Mercutio.

10. Editomiwa Edun and Ellie Kendrick, 2010. Filmed performance at the Globe in London.

Answer 6

You need to be more specific. Are you asking what the differences are between the 1597 published version of the play and the 1599 one? One difference is that the prologue in the first version is not a Sonnet.

Are you talking about two stage versions you saw? Sorry, can't help there.

Are you talking about two different films? If so, which two? There have been many of them made either for theatre release or for television. The 1936 version was in black and white, and most of the others are in colour. The 1996 film was reset in modern (well, 1990s) California. The 1955 and 1968 films are both Italian and very similar, although the latter had better music. Of the tv versions, the BBC version from 1978 stars a very young Alan Rickman as Tybalt.

Answer 7

Many of Shakespeare's plays were printed more than once in his lifetime, and sometimes the different versions were very different indeed. Possible reasons for this could be that the publisher started with a poor text (perhaps someone's recollected text), or that alterations had been made to the text from time to time. For this reason, many plays start out with multiple versions, and editors have to decide whether to take one, or another, or put both together into one. In the case of Hamlet, putting them both together makes for a ridiculously long play; in the case of King Lear, it makes a play which makes no sense. On top of that, editors have always tried to change spelling and punctuation to appear more consistent with itself or with modern usage. Sometimes editors replace a word in the early printed texts with another which they think makes more sense. For example, in Hamlet Act I Scene 2, a number of editors have printed "O that this too too sullied flesh would melt" even though the word "sullied" does not appear in any of the sources (They either say "sallied" or "solid".) Finally, some people have decided that for one or other reason, what Shakespeare wrote needed fixing up, and so we have people who changed the ending of King Lear to a happy one, or who took all the dirty jokes and references out of the plays. All of these are reasons why there are a number of different versions of the plays.

Answer 8

because someone thought the story should be a different way the Shakespeare's version