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매거진 어쩌다 마주친 발레

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by 에디터 윤 공동작업실 Oct 11. 2016

Romeo & Juliet

Successful Reinterpretation of Character

이번에 출간될 <어쩌다 마주친 발레>에서는 이전 브런치에서는 올리지 않았던 글 몇 개가 추가됩니다. 이번 칼럼은 책에 수록되어 있는 발레 작품 리뷰인 장 크리스토프 마이요(Jean-Christophe Maillot) 버전의 로미오와 줄리엣의 영문판을 올립니다. 출간을 위해서 작품 공유와 사진 사용의 전폭적인 지원을 해 준 모나코 몬테카를로 발레단(Les Ballets de Monte Carlo)에 진심으로 감사드립니다. 안무가이자 예술감독인 장 크리스토프 마이요와 몬테카를로 발레단의 단원들 및 해외 발레팬들과 공유하고자 합니다. 국내 브런치 구독자분들은 <어쩌다 마주친 발레> 책에서 로미오와 줄리엣 한글판 원문의 칼럼을 볼 수 있습니다.

Romeo & Juliet

Successful reinterpretation of Characters

The year 2016 marks the 400-year anniversary of Shakespeare’s death. During his lifetime, his numerous works were prevalent and cherished by the public and in present day they are modernized into various genres. Everyone knows Shakespeare, and everyone knows the story of Romeo and Juliet. However, deciding how to reinterpret such an eminent tale might actually be much more demanding than the creation of one. In this chapter, let’s thoroughly uncover one version of Romeo and Juliet by Jean-Christophe Maillot, the artistic director and executive choreographer of Les Ballets de Monte Carlo. Compared to other various styles of Romeo and Juliet, Jean-Christophe Maillot’s version portrays remarkable perceptions of the characters, as well as, a phenomenal contemporary vibe.

“The main characters are not only Romeo and Juliet, but the success of character depiction”

Scene one. A man dressed in black and white is soundlessly screaming. Normally, black and white represents good and evil. But in this play it does not simply represent a mundane metaphor, but more of an antipodal image, something that could never merge like the night and day. With that in mind, Romeo from the house of Montague wears white, while black represents Juliet from the house of Capulet. These two costumes obviously state the ongoing rivalry between the characters’ psychology. Through the torturous movements and cries, you could already sense a tragic ending awaiting to surface. This distressed man tries to help connect Romeo and Juliet’s love, but in turn, sadly leads them to their deaths. This man is Friar Laurence. And in this performance, he appears as the narrator, as well as, a third person point of view.

Everyone knows Romeo and Juliet’s love is like a moth to a flame. No maturity or waiting, just a raw, youthful love that expires tragically. And, sadly, there isn’t a single rational adult to stop this irrational death. Although Friar Laurence appears to be an adult these juveniles could solely depend on, in reality, he mimics the tentativeness and ambivalence of adults. For instance, when Friar enters, two silhouettes in the form of an altar boy follow him like a shadow. These altar boys frequently dance a tempo slower, and show movements of being hunched up behind Friar, and show their backs. Instead of epitomizing the original connotation of an altar boy, the silhouettes reveal Friar’s feeble mind.

Another character that should be closely analyzed is Madame Capulet. Rather than adding value to her original characterization of a loving mother, she’s presented as the most dominant character of all. And through madame Capulet’s relentless charisma and ineffable aura, the performance continues. To Juliet, madame Capulet showed jealousy for youth, while oppressing her daughter by using her intuition. Simply to say, if Juliet is a bud just starting to flower, madame Capulet is a beautiful flower that bears a fruit. By having an affair with her own nephew, madame Capulet is a true femme fatale.

Through Maillot’s touch, he blows life even into the most typical minor characters. For example, motherhood and femininity are simultaneously emphasized in the Nurse. Instead of simply being defined as the caregiver, she regards Juliet as her own daughter and friend, shows more maternal instincts than that of Juliet’s mother, and occasionally displays her feminine characteristics.

Not a single adult appears in the House of Montague but instead, Romeo’s friend, and cousin Mercutio, and Benvolio represent the House of Montague. Maturing without suffering through any hardships, these two friends are buoyant and premature youths. Heavily interested in women and love, they are perfectly normal adolescents that fail to lack morals of patience and wisdom and let their emotions take over their minds.

Tybalt Capulet, although in the same youthful situation as Mercutio and Benvolio, accentuates a bit more masculinity. Overflowing with charm and skillfully playing games in his affair with madame Capulet, Tybalt is definitely a homme fatale.

“However, the stage is the hidden main character.”

The design of stage setting is simply a set of massive white walls and a slope. The Fake wall is moving when the situations and characters in the play change. From an architect’s point of view, it is not just a moving wall, but rather an idea of a movable wall being animated independently. These walls transform the dimension of the space with coming in and out, and furthermore they represent the mental states of the main characters.

To the viewers, all the things happening on a stage are seen in the raw: in Act 2, a scene of a puppet-show play-within-a-play is carried out in the middle of the stage even without lights-out. By presenting stage forming rather than perfectly set stage, this performance flows autonomously with a moving wall and it brings the moving wall to a life.

In Act 1, the slope is a romantic balcony in the love scene of Romeo and Juliet while in Act 2, it turns out to be the place of death, where Romeo kills Tybalt, which is the beginning of the tragedy. And also in Act 3, the incompletely atypical fan-shaped bed of Juliet appears. Even if a black background lies behind the bed, the intense light coming through the wall implies that Juliet is not in the state of the death, but merely in a deep sleep. However, this fan-shaped bed turns out to be the dagger transpiercing Romeo’s heart. This symbolic but uncluttered stage setting makes ballerinas and ballerinos solely focus on their movements and play. It illuminates the dancers. This clever and keen plan by a choreographer is truly astonishing. Maillot perfectly presents his thoughts as a stage designer, an architect as well as a choreographer.

The original sound by Sergei Prokofiev, which is powerfully shiveringly beautiful score, collaborates with Romeo and Juliet by Maillot in its integrity. Some major scenes are simply described as follows.

In Act 1, after supporting characters are introduced, masquerade of the Capulet unfolds with the very famous main theme of Romeo and Juliet. A mask covering only one pair of eyes is a disguise that one is not willing to reveal one’s identity. This is the scene presenting subtle duality that people hide who they are, but on the other hand, they constantly discover others. While the young from the two families are dancing in a heavy sound of bass wind instruments such as tuba, English horn, bassoon and so on, the scene of madame Capulet checking Tybalt intermittently appears. After that, Romeo falls instantly in love with Juliet. In balcony scene, the highlight of Act 1, which is a slow scene in Maillot’s version, the beautiful and exquisite pas de deux of Romeo and Juliet commences.

In Act 2, Maillot takes a fresh approach focusing on carrying the drama without divertissement (Dibereu tiseumang), which typically comes out in Act 2 in a three act play. The rumor of the love of Romeo and Juliet covertly spreads out, and it leads to the impulsive fight of the young from the two families, and finally to the murder. In the scene of the Tybalt’s furious death, without even a short interlude of feeling panic right after the Tybalt’s slaughtering of George Oliveira’s Mercutio, the tormented priest, Laurence is wandering around, lamenting in anguish. After that, a solo dance (a pas seul) of madame Capulet giving vent to her feelings is the best part in Act 2. This scene curdles viewer’s blood because of a woman’s wild grief more from losing her beloved man than witnessing her nephew’s death.

In Act 3, Juliet has been betrothed by her parents to Paris. The way madame Capulet forces Juliet to marry to Paris is very cruel just like a step mother from a folktale. The short pas de deux reminds us of the Nikia-Gamzatti fight scene in La Bayadere. The scene of the priest, Laurence’s pas de deux with two altar boys, with expressing his mind is another sightworthy one in Act 3.

Romeo and Juliet by Maillot is interpreted in contemporary ballet in a sophisticated way, and at the same time, it keeps the framework of the original well and cleverly finds its optimum level of the public’s understanding. The choreographer organizes the art form as accessible as possible. Besides, he uses innovative stage and unconventional costumes in this world-renowned ballet. Undoubtedly Maillot has been considered as such a genius choreographer for a few decades. It is definitely the master piece of his life that mesmerizes every ballet fan.