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Leonardo DiCaprio in High School Musical
35 Plays1 month ago
Join us as we discuss the Shakespearean tragedy (and satire) Romeo & Juliet and its cult classic 1996 film adaptation Romeo + Juliet.
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Transcript
Introduction of Hosts and Podcast
00:00:01
Speaker
Two nerds went to college and found each other in the English department basement and became instant friends. Eight years and three degrees later, they're reunited.
00:00:12
Speaker
You're listening to Book Club, the movie, the podcast.
Summary of 'Romeo and Juliet'
00:00:40
Speaker
Hello everyone, and welcome to Book Club The Movie The Podcast, where we read, watch, and discuss books and their film adaptations. I'm your host, Jen. And I'm your other host, Em. We hope you read the book. But if you didn't, here's the summary.
00:00:56
Speaker
Romeo and Juliet. Yeah. So, synopsis. First of all, if you are listening to this and you are not in high school, stop. Go outside and play and come back when you're at least 15. If you somehow got through high school without reading Romeo and Juliet, DM us right now and tell us how.
00:01:15
Speaker
But for those of us who read it in high school, here's a quick refresher on Romeo and Juliet. It's a Shakespearean tragedy about two young lovers named Romeo. And Juliette. No way.
00:01:28
Speaker
um They are each from opposing feuding Italian families, the Montagues and Capulets. The plot is based on a story originally written by Matteo Bendello in the mid fifteen hundreds Shakespeare borrowed heavily from this original tale, but expanded the plot and developed supporting characters and first published the play in 1597.
Shakespeare's Plots and Humor
00:01:52
Speaker
I think I didn't know that it was originally based on a story by someone else, but that doesn't actually surprise me.
00:02:00
Speaker
All of his stuff was i borrowed heavily from other things. That's just ridiculous. life and art it's what it is yeah yeah nothing's original so no but i feel like everybody like today is like well everything goes back to shakespeare and i'm like well no it doesn't because no shakespeare stuff is original there were people telling stories before him too right so i think all stories borrow heavily from this one old guy who sat at the mouth of the cave and wouldn't let you come inside to go to bed or eat dinner until you listen to just one one thing he thought of his name was grog and he he had onion breath or something
00:02:50
Speaker
and when he died someone replaced him I think one of the things with Shakespeare, and I definitely didn't appreciate this in high school at all, but Shakespeare's hilarious. Shakespeare is so damn funny.
00:03:03
Speaker
And it's just so hard to appreciate it unless you're like reading one of the ah like modernized versions of the script.
1996 Film Adaptation: Humor and Authenticity
00:03:10
Speaker
Right. And I feel like the humor in his plays don't really get transferred well at all to the movies. I feel like people aren't, I don't know. It should have been a whole lot funnier.
00:03:23
Speaker
than it was Claire Danes, beautiful, has a pretty funny face. She could have been hilarious. Right. And she wasn't. Nobody was. It was not a funny movie. Yeah. So Claire Danes who played Juliet in the 1996 Romeo plus Juliet. Very. think the the full title was William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Oh, is that?
00:03:46
Speaker
Is that true? I think so. i just thought it was Romeo plus Juliet, which is like a very chic way of writing it. I'm looking.
00:03:59
Speaker
I might have just been making that up because I really, really. Okay. What the hell? No, it is Romeo plus sign Juliet. Whatever. I don't know what i'm talking about.
00:04:11
Speaker
I've read the damn thing. I watched the movie and a whole bunch of other movies. Whatever. Anyway, Shakespeare's funny. I liked the scene where, and this didn't even make it in the movie, which again, ah whatever. Anyway. No, actually, on the, on the, um on the, what's it called? The cover image for the the movie poster cover image thing. Yeah. There are a lot of guns. So, trigger warning, double entendre. They're just like a bunch of freaking nine millimeters. There's a little, a little William Shakespeare.
00:04:46
Speaker
uh-huh above the romeo plus juliet whatever maybe the plus sign is actually like supposed to be like crosshair time fact guns a love story hey that could have been a subtitle guns a love story starring children right So good.
00:05:09
Speaker
And their family.
Humor Lost in Adaptations
00:05:10
Speaker
So, yeah, no, Shakespeare is actually very funny. And I think that's something that gets lost in translation a lot because 100 percent. We're centuries later.
00:05:22
Speaker
We're a centuries later audience. That and, you know, there's nothing funnier than having a joke explained to you of why it's funny. But i I kind of gave like a little, huh, like that kind of laugh. Just you exhale and then a little bit of noise comes out. ah It's at the very beginning of the play whenever Romeo and um his buddy, whose name I'm just, i don't remember.
00:05:47
Speaker
Anyway, Romeo and his friend. It doesn't matter. merco Anyway. Yeah, there we go. Hie and Mercuccio are like, ah let's go get something to eat. And then they go into a place to get food.
00:06:02
Speaker
And ah guy comes up and he's like, hey, what's up? Are you literate? Basically. And Romeo's like, oh, I mean, like kind of sometimes if I know the the letters and the language and and the guy asking them if they want food and if they can read is just like, oh, you brave soul. Thank you for opening up to me about your illiteracy. That's funny. That's very funny. But again, had to read the explanation because it's written in Elizabethan language and I don't know what the hell they're talking about. Right.
00:06:33
Speaker
Right. So it's not funny anymore. yeah And I think that's unfortunate because even in these modern retellings, and I don't really know if I count the 1996 version as a modern retelling because it's pretty much it's almost word for word they've cut out a lot of it but it's it's the exact same words it's the exact same like language as in the play which is not modern so i ah frustratingly while clutching my english degree to my chest didn't understand what was going on.
Casting Changes: Portman vs. Danes
00:07:02
Speaker
Right. And it wasn't funny and they didn't try to make it funny, which is unfortunate. Yeah. And i I didn't catch the humor there, but after I watched Romeo plus Juliet, I watched the Stratford Festival like recorded production of the play. Stage production. yeah Stage production yeah of the play. i mean, it's, you know, they're professional actors. Leonardo DiCaprio is not a professional actor. Well, no, I just mean to say that it's not like...
00:07:30
Speaker
<unk>s I'd never heard of the Stratford festival before, but like, yeah. For teachers, like it, I think it can be used as educational, like material. If you're like, Oh, I don't want to do like a movie. You can do a recording stage, a recorded stage production um by, you know, professional stage actors that aren't film actors. Who know Shakespeare.
00:07:57
Speaker
Like I try to follow along with the script and watching the the the film, I guess. um They don't say every line, but they're pretty darn close to saying every line. But that scene. They really cut down the monologues. they cut Well, in this instance, the Stratford Festival, like they cut down the monologues a little bit, but they do say most of them. But that scene in particular. oh yeah. No, I meant the movie did. oh yeah. The movie for sure cuts down. Way down.
00:08:23
Speaker
um Thank God. But um the scene that you're talking about and specifically, like. Yeah. I totally got the humor there because the actors understood Shakespeare or had maybe maybe they didn't originally. But in preparing for the play, someone explained it to them, thankfully. Yeah. It was just so hard to listen to. um Oh my gosh.
00:08:51
Speaker
I don't remember. Whatever. The redheaded one. and he had like a hardcore like bro accent. Like the, the with the pink hair? movie. Maybe it was pink. don't remember. he was relative of Romeo? Yeah.
00:09:05
Speaker
Yeah. um
00:09:09
Speaker
He was really tall. I don't remember. It doesn't matter. Either way, it was so funny to hear like these super like poetic verses from Shakespeare come out of that mouth and that accent.
00:09:20
Speaker
Yeah. Like it was, God, the only thing I can think of is one of Juliet's lines. So it's like, ah Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo? Like it was so, ha it was so cringy.
00:09:33
Speaker
It was gross. It was really cringy. Not into it. No. Yeah. i was I asked Jason if he wanted to watch it with me and he said, no, thank you. And then he left the apartment for like three hours.
Partners Avoiding the Movie
00:09:45
Speaker
Yeah. Adam was in another room all day. just Just so in case he wouldn't have to walk in on it. And he likes Shakespeare. He actually genuinely likes it. oh Adam does not. And he didn't want to watch it. Yeah. That's.
00:09:58
Speaker
He doesn't like it. He was not interested. if he wasn't away from home, he was in another room. So. Yeah. Yeah.
00:10:17
Speaker
Let's talk about Natalie Portman. I love Natalie Portman so much. Yeah. Would you have loved her playing Juliet in this movie across from Leonardo DiCaprio? Not a snowball's chance in Texas.
00:10:32
Speaker
No, absolutely not. And I mean, she did get the job first. She was cast. She was going to play Juliet because at the time she was like 12 or 13. Juliet is thought to be anywhere between 12 and 14, depending on how you Google it. Right.
00:10:48
Speaker
And she got the role and she like read really well and everything. And then they realized that baby Natalie Portman being made up making out with 22 year old Leonardo DiCaprio.
00:11:05
Speaker
Doesn't matter. Fair, fair, fair. Full adult. Cuddly dream. It was going to be really, really gross. Yeah. And look like a salt, which is totally fair. ah So Natalie Portman, they were like, hey, this is gross, right? And the 13-year-old Natalie Portman was like, yeah, it's really gross. I will bow out.
00:11:27
Speaker
it gross so now we have clear danes who i thought she was phenomenal in it but i just like her anyway and she still looked like young she's but it's weird though because leonardo dicaprio has always looked like a 15 year old boy or a 45 year old man and there's almost in between in my own personal opinion but i don't find him attractive and never have so i think there was a time where he like I think was in his thirties and look like he was in his thirties. And I think that's my, my Leo that I prefer. i do not have a Leo that I like. Yeah. I don't think, I mean, he's a, and I don't even want to say that he's a good actor. Cause, and yeah, he is. He's a really good actor.
00:12:12
Speaker
But, but. I don't want to say he's a good actor. Okay. He plays the same character in every single movie that he's in, except for What's He It in Gilbert Grape. We've talked about this before.
00:12:25
Speaker
we've had this exact same conversation don't think he plays the exact same character i think it's the exact same character and that's fine because he does it really well i think he recycles a few characters but he has maybe a limited range yes but not but what he has fits in so many roles I just feel like he's nothing against him. It's just the same. He's really great at being a lead white guy.
00:12:58
Speaker
Yeah. We don't have enough of those.
Shakespeare in Modern Contexts
00:13:01
Speaker
Hey, you know, he had to go through a lot of trials and tribulations to get his first Oscar or whatever, so
00:13:11
Speaker
Another thing that Shakespeare is really funny about is how it has translated into these more modern retellings and the way that we've changed things to make it make sense.
00:13:22
Speaker
And so I would like for you to tell me about the Post-Haste Dispatch. Yeah, so in the Romeo and Juliet 1996 version, Right. So um in the play, we've got the friar, Lawrence, who's sending Romeo this letter saying, spoiler alert, Juliet's not really dead. I just gave her some drugs to make her look dead for four and twenty hours. i.e. one day. so in the play, Friar John is the carrier of that note. And he stopped along the way because he's been told that he's come into contact with someone with the plague. And so he's like, oh, no, the plague. And he gets derailed or delayed. Why didn't he just like say, OK, that's fine. i will go sit in my room.
00:14:15
Speaker
me put on a mask. Will you please take this and deliver it to Romeo? I think it's important. Or something. Like, he was just like, okay. And then just. Right. then just like, oh, I'm going to go die now. Like, I don't know. He really dropped the ball. I think that's like second degree right there. Like two counts. But in the 1996 version, which i was.
00:14:40
Speaker
I was a 95 baby, right? This movie came out when I was a year old. So I don't know what the world's relationship was with FedEx. So maybe this was really, really, really funny. Well, we had like Castaway. 96. Oh, that's true.
00:14:55
Speaker
But anyway, so in 1996, they've got like this like mail carrier service called Post Haste Dispatch. Okay, Castaway didn't come out until 2000, but still still. Yeah, I mean, you know, shit still gets lost in the mail in 2024 and 2023. Yeah, so the Father Lawrence is trying to send Romeo mail and it literally...
00:15:19
Speaker
what's the point of paying for it if they're not going to complete the delivery? Right. They just like stick this little, little note in, in, uh, Romeo's trailer and wherever he's exiled to, i forget the name of it. Um, yeah, Mantua and, uh, While you're out!
00:15:39
Speaker
Like tumbleweeds, it blows out of the door a crack and then ah he doesn't notice it because he's out hitting rocks. He's in the back playing in the dirt because he's a child.
00:15:51
Speaker
Literally. Because he's a child, an old child. He's a very old, he's an elderly child. Well, he might be 21 in real life, but I think in the play, he's supposed to be like 14 to Juliet. No, in the play, depending on which source you look at, it's either 17 or it's like 25. I swear to God.
00:16:11
Speaker
Nobody can, nobody can agree on it. No, he is way older than her. No, he's like way older than her, which makes it a satire. Okay.
00:16:22
Speaker
Yeah. But again, it depends on the way you Google it. Okay. Well, so so and we thought that was really great and really funny because we've all come home from work to those little sticky notes and we're like, why didn't you just leave it in the stupid deck box where it says, leave packages here. or it was it was tube socks. I spent $10 on a pack of socks.
00:16:48
Speaker
I just need them. But you, I don't, if somebody stole them, I would have just reported it stolen and then I would have got my money back. But instead, would have my tooth socks. Yeah. Or, oh my God. Okay. If I were retelling it, if I needed to come up with,
00:17:05
Speaker
the reason why Romeo wasn't told and I wanted to steal it directly from this movie, I probably still would have used post, but i would have made them like put it in like the lockers at the apartment complex, the parcel pending stuff, because literally anytime that I get a moderately sized box, they shove it into a really small locker and then the door gets stuck.
00:17:28
Speaker
And then I get to have little, um anxiety, panics about it, and cry in my bathroom because I can't get it open and my nobody will help me. So I don't order dog food anymore. i just go pick it up. We're done with Chewy. I'm done. But anyway, if I wanted to like just basically steal that, if I weren't doing the ah the FedEx or the post-taste dispatch note, it would be like, oh, it's in parcel pending locker. And then he'd go over there and he would put in the numbers like 15 times in a row and the locker still won't open. And his apartment complex people in Mantua where he has been exiled into a nice little apartment that has lockers. for thet They won't help him. They're like, you got to call parcel pending. And he's like, I called parcel pending. They said I need to talk to you. And they're like no, you just you got to you got to call them. And then they'll they'll they'll work you. They'll walk you through it. They'd tell you the right way to kick the door open to maybe unstick it. he's like, I've been kicking the door. Anyway, that's probably what I would have done.
00:18:25
Speaker
Yeah. That's funny. It's not funny to me. I hate it. God, this is stupid. Okay. Anyway, did you watch?
Widespread Influence and Adaptations
00:18:34
Speaker
watched so many things.
00:18:36
Speaker
I watched quite a few things. I just really wanted to make sure that I had way too much stuff to edit later. We've used, as a human race, the world, we've used Romeo and Juliet.
00:18:47
Speaker
everywhere for a whole bunch of different things. I feel like, yeah, we gave like the synopsis, but I don't think anybody, people have skipped over the synopsis. They didn't need to hear that. Everybody knows it. I would like to see more or not, not a parody of satire. That's the right word. um It's a satire. And I would really like to see more satirical versions of it.
00:19:08
Speaker
ah You know, the way that it was intended. um i also watched Gnomeo and Juliet. So I watched Gnomeo and Juliet. I liked it. It wasn't bad. Um, it wasn't good. I'll never watch it again, but it wasn't bad. Uh, and then I also watched West Side Story, which is another really famous retelling of Romeo and Juliet. And I skipped most of the songs because I just couldn't get into it.
00:19:30
Speaker
And another one, which I actually didn't, ah realized that this was supposed to be a retelling of Romeo and Juliet, but Warm Bodies, ah the book came out 2010, movie 2013. It's not a faithful adaptation at all. It takes a whole bunch of liberties with the retelling. It's about zombies and surviving a zombie apocalypse and how that gets resolved and everything. The main characters are literally literally named Julie, like Juliet, Julie and R, which is the first letter in Romeo.
00:20:00
Speaker
And I didn't realize that this was a Romeo and Juliet story. We both watched Rosaline. Rosaline? It's hard to know. Okay, I've heard it pronounced like a million different
Exploration of 'Rosaline'
00:20:12
Speaker
ways. I've heard it Rosaline, Rosaline, and I've also heard Rosaline, which I think is adorable. That's the one that I pick. And then Rosaline. Okay, so we watched Rosaline.
00:20:24
Speaker
Rosaline? Rosaline. How are we going to say it? Mm-hmm.
00:20:31
Speaker
Let's call her bras. We watched Rosaline as well as Romeo plus Juliet, which is a film from 2022. Fun fact, I first watched this the first time I got COVID.
00:20:47
Speaker
So far, the only time I think I've gotten COVID. So that was a good time, but I was happy to rewatch it and it was still just as good. It's so cute and funny. It's really funny. It's really good.
00:21:00
Speaker
It's considering that the focus is not on Romeo and Juliet, ignoring that really, really big part of what makes the movie what it is, it's a very faithful adaptation. really Like, it really, truly is. And it flows really, really well and does a really great job of filling in a different part of the story and, like, imagining a version of the narrative where Romeo and Juliet don't die and then what it looks like when they have to live with one another. Romeo and Juliet in the boat at the end of that movie where they're just like, what do we do now
00:21:40
Speaker
Now what? What do we do now? h we are teenagers and did not think this through but yeah so i thought it was i did think it was really cool that the movie we got to see it through a secondary female character because if we don't get enough that if anyone recalls in the play um romeo is all out of sorts in love with rosalind rosaline At the beginning of Romeo and Juliet. And that's who he is head over heels, can't live without. That's who he's crying about under the grove of Sycamore until he goes to this Capulet ball.
00:22:24
Speaker
Right? Yeah, he's a Montague. Until he's invited to this secret Capulet. I mean, not secret Capulet ball, but he's invited to this Capulet. Well, he's not invited, but he crashes. Yes, he is a ball crasher. Romeo, do you want to crash my balls?
00:22:44
Speaker
ah We both need more sleep. Anyway, until he crashes the Capulet ball. and Crashes the Capulet's balls.
00:22:59
Speaker
I'm 32-year-old adult recording a podcast in my walk-in closet with two big dogs and laughing about balls.
00:23:13
Speaker
Anyway,
00:23:17
Speaker
it's really funny because I completely forgot that he was all hung up on Rosalind. Until watching the movie, reading, you know, reading it again, being re-exposed to it this time around.
00:23:30
Speaker
um Like, did not realize that was a thing. Even when I watched the movie in 2022. But again, I did have COVID. um So there was that. But... Well, because that's that's part of the joke. That's part of the joke of the entire story that Bill wrote. I was like, who's Bill?
00:23:48
Speaker
yeah And was like, oh, yeah. That is the whole point that old Billy was trying to make. And nobody uses that. Like, it's hilarious. And it just doesn't.
00:24:01
Speaker
Right, right, right. Because he was so hung up on her and then just dropped her like a hat, which. of us um ah on the call here listening in has has been like has felt like that has happened to us. where We're Roz in this situation. we had a guy on the line.
Societal Norms in Shakespeare's Time
00:24:22
Speaker
You were always Juliette.
00:24:24
Speaker
I always broke up with them before they could break up with me every single time. But I've never been broken up with. I always got to it first. Thank you, Grandma. Yeah. I mean, i I'm not talking about them breaking up with you. i'm meant more like the crush stage.
00:24:43
Speaker
Oh, I had a crush on literally everybody. Flirting and your things are going well. Because that's how I see Rosalind and Romeo. Like, that's where they were, right? There's that infatuation. Will they, won't they? and he was looking to get married. Right. But, like, was he?
00:25:02
Speaker
And then he stumbled upon Juliet. And it's like, that's what the kids did back then. They just got married. It didn't mean as much. Secretly. no plan. Yeah. So the mortality rates were higher. you had to get married sooner. you only live once and statistically not for very long. Divorce rates were at zero because like it wasn't allowed. i don't know. Paul Rudd, little, little baby Paul Rudd. He plays Count Paris.
00:25:30
Speaker
paris Paris. He plays, which Paris is like my favorite character out of Rosalind or Rosalind. Yeah, because... Out of Roz. Yeah. Roz the movie. Yeah. He's so... ah He's justs just perfect. that um I don't want to marry woman. Yeah.
00:25:51
Speaker
Which, I mean, I'm like, dude... People got married. It's just a it's a business thing. It's not back then. It's it's just a transit transactional thing. it's It's business. Right, buddy? so you just do it to make sure that you're taken care of and that she's taken care of And then I feel like a lot of the time, people were just kind of continuing with their own extramarital affairs and that was like as they saw fit. Yeah.
00:26:18
Speaker
Yeah, it's fine. As long she didn't have any babies by... As long as the women didn't have babies. Who would Like, men were probably... was cool. It was fine to have a few bastards.
00:26:30
Speaker
Oh, all the time. All the time. So, Paul Rudd would have been Claire Dane's love a husband interest on this.
Paul Rudd's Role and Titanic Advice
00:26:43
Speaker
He was so cute. He was.
00:26:47
Speaker
Well, 1996 Paul Rudd and like whenever they were dancing at the at the balls that ah that Romeo crushed. um but Just because it was so funny, too, because um it had like the beautiful like aria playing in the background and they were like.
00:27:05
Speaker
fucking boogieing down which didn't match at all it was awesome in romeo plus juliet uh leonard leonardo dicaprio was like i don't know man like my agent said something about this movie about the titanic that i've been offered a role who cares i don't know if I should do it. I don't think he was even like, who cares about it? But he was just like, question mark. Yeah. He's like, meh.
00:27:36
Speaker
And Paul Rudd's like, you need to do this movie. The Titanic's important. and Because like his his dad was just like a history buff and knew and talked about. That was his special interest.
00:27:50
Speaker
It was like the Titanic. Paul Rudd's dad. Yeah. Yeah. that cute? That's why Paul Redd's cute. It's because his dad's cute. Well, he like normal parents, right? Yeah.
00:28:01
Speaker
Romeo and Juliet, love story or satire? Ready, set, go.
00:28:07
Speaker
Which one are we talking about? Well, you. Go. Is it a love story or a satire? I think if we're talking about the original play, what it was supposed to be, this is a satire.
Satire or Love Story?
00:28:23
Speaker
Satires can also be sad. Satires can also be tragedies or whatever. This is satire. This is a joke. This is a big, long joke making fun of people and the idea of love at first sight.
00:28:35
Speaker
That's what it is. Yeah. I mean, I don't think it's like, I don't think it's real love, right? Like there's no nothing. There's no substance there. They don't know each other. They haven't had time to know each other. They're too young.
00:28:53
Speaker
to have they they're too young and and and too naive to develop well she's definitely too young and it's debatable as to how much too young he is honestly even if he's 25 they're both stupid yeah is they're both making really they're not they need actual adults they need real supervision right um like yeah love real love true love is multifaceted um and the only one looking out for like reality and like their best interest was Tybalt look what happened to him yeah yeah maybe Benvolio too but in the play he also does I don't even remember Benvolio I don't remember ever reading that no i remember it oh wait no Benvolio he was on rome he was on the cap the Montague he's Romeo's cousin who tries to keep the peace in the that was the that was
00:29:50
Speaker
that was Was that the beefy guy that I was talking about where he's like the palest pale that ever paled and you see his chest a lot? I don't know how beefy he is. he has like blonde hair. no like not No, not like beefy as in like strong. i just mean like he was a large, not and I don't mean like overweight either.
00:30:10
Speaker
i hated this movie. I hope I never watch it again.
Cult Following of 1996 Film
00:30:18
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, like, I'm glad I've never seen it before. i can totally see why there's kind of a cult following on it because there were some scenes and shit where I'm like, oh, that's why you're a little bit, like, iconic. I get it. Like, there were some things where I'm like, oh, I feel like I've seen this on Tumblr before. um but i don't think he was in the movie at all. i don't see him. Benvolio!
00:30:46
Speaker
he He was the, he was Tybalt's equivalent for the cap for the Montagues. I don't think that's true. I can't find him. Oh my God. Oh, but I forgot that a nurse, ah Juliet's nurse is played by, um oh my God.
00:31:08
Speaker
oh my God. She's hilarious. Miriam, Miriam Margoil's. ah She played Professor Sprout i in the Harry Potter movies.
Accents and Reception
00:31:21
Speaker
And ah now she just does stuff with BBC. And she's just this cute old lady. I love her so much. Who's Benvolio and why can't I find him? i will send you a picture.
00:31:37
Speaker
don't know why you're having such trouble because I just typed in Benvolio. the hell is Dash Mihawk? Okay, that's who I'm talking about. Are you okay?
00:31:48
Speaker
No, I'm not okay. That's the whole, that's, that's the thesis statement of this episode. I'm not okay. Yeah, I, his accent and also Leonardo DiCaprio's accent.
00:32:02
Speaker
in this movie just cracked me the F up. I could not. I could not handle it. It just, it took me out of something I didn't want to be in already. so they didn't even have to be that bad. But just Leonardo DiCaprio's accent in this movie made me Google, what part of the Midwest is he from? Because it just sounded like such a dorky drawl He's literally from Hollywood. Why does he talk like that? Is that a Californian accent?
00:32:29
Speaker
What is happening? confused. I didn't ki i didn't just notice any accents on anyone except for Juliet's mom. It sounded like she was talking with the country girl. But everybody else and was just like speaking Victorian.
00:32:45
Speaker
Like, it didn't sound like they had accents. It's just that they were saying Victorian like words. So... I feel like my list of things that I hate just really kind of bleeds over into everything else because I just did not enjoy the movie at all. And i watched it twice in one day. That's probably why you hated it so much. I mean, I hated it too, but I only watched it once and you could not have paid me enough money to watch it another time. Well, no, no, you could pay me.
Adaptations and Original Intent
00:33:11
Speaker
you could. It wouldn't even take that much money. i would do it. I have bills. could pay me money to watch it a second time, but it would take a bit.
00:33:18
Speaker
i'm I'm not cheap. It would be more more than a Benjamin. Yeah, probably for me too. More than a single solitary Benjamin. I got, I'm trying to. Yeah. But I mean, like I got into it watching it and I'm like, you're not going to enjoy this, Emily, but you're probably the problem. So give it a chance.
00:33:37
Speaker
And I think there's some truth to that statement. I will say I did chuckle. if just agreed. I did chuckle a little bit when the Capulet, Lord and Lady Capulet are in the limo. And he goes, throw me my long sword, ho.
00:33:56
Speaker
and it's pretty early in the film. And I did kind of, that got a chuckle. i know. Yeah. So. yeah so
00:34:08
Speaker
The chuckles were few and far between. The only time that I like kind of laughed, and again, it wasn't a real laugh, was whenever they were in the elevator and they were making out and he was saying Shakespeare words at her and she was saying Shakespeare words back at him.
00:34:23
Speaker
And he was like, yes, this is love. And she's like, m I don't know, boy. And then the door opens and then she goes out and then he comes and grabs her and then her mom's there and she's very drunk.
00:34:34
Speaker
Yeah. Everybody is just trashed. ah However many sheets to the wind and um however that goes. And then they just jump back into the elevator and then her mom's like, Juliet, because her mother just screams the whole movie. ah Does not ever say her name normal once. She just screams Juliet. And then they just bounce back in there and her mom screams Juliet right as the doors close again. And I don't know why,
00:35:02
Speaker
That tickled me a little bit. Like not even like a lot, but I was just kind of like, like the doors closed and I went, huh. There were a lot of things that I did not like about this movie.
00:35:16
Speaker
There were so many things I didn't like. yes I'm sorry, It was really cringy. and don't think you have to apologize to Bill. I think you have to apologize Yeah. I mean, nah, he knew what he was doing. I think I don't really necessarily, i don't know. I just think of all of like the spiritual like royalties that William Shakespeare is owed after everything that has been done to his genuinely funny for the time play. And he's like, you idiots couldn't even translate this shit. You couldn't translate it. Or when you did translate it, you did it wrong.
00:35:55
Speaker
Like the people on stage, they're doing great. I don't think plays make as much money as movies do though.
Costumes and Iconography
00:36:02
Speaker
so no, no, they probably don't. They definitely don't. 100 theaters are closing everywhere.
00:36:10
Speaker
There were a lot of Hawaiian shirts. Was that a 1996 thing? I don't know, but i really, really, really, whyily shiley really in really didn't work out. I didn't like... Because, like, it's Leonardo DiCaprio and he's, like...
00:36:26
Speaker
you know, ah a squiggly little scrawny guy and he's supposed to be like so beautiful and he's putting on a Hawaiian shirt and it's just not attractive. It did nothing for nobody. And then also whenever, uh, fought like Friar Lawrence was like just shirtless.
00:36:42
Speaker
Yeah.
00:36:49
Speaker
don't do that don't put that on the screen we don't want to see that we don't want to insinuate that that's going to be with this movie forever so he's just standing there shirtless and it's like oh how could this get any worse well let me tell you he puts on a hawaiian shirt So funny story about that actor, i mean not about the actor, but for me in that actor. Who is that actor?
00:37:13
Speaker
I think his name is Peter. ah Peter. can't say. Yeah. Is that also? Yeah, that's right. I totally thought that he was the butler Parent Trap.
00:37:27
Speaker
um i totally thought that he was the butler in parent trap
00:37:36
Speaker
They kind of look similar. Like what? Like the the first parent trap? No, in the Lindsay Lohan parent trap. There was a butler in the Lindsay Lohan one? Yeah.
00:37:48
Speaker
He does the handshake. Who was butler? Martin, the James family's butler. Who falls in love with Chesney. Simon Coons?
00:37:58
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah.
00:38:01
Speaker
I assumed that it was going to be, um oh my gosh, what is his name? ah He joked about it whenever he guest starred on American Dad, um The Princess Diaries. He plays a concierge like everywhere. oh my God. Hold on Why are we doing a podcast about movies if we don't know who the hell anybody is? i don't know. I'm really bad with the actors' names. Like really bad.
00:38:27
Speaker
I'm not so bad with their faces.
00:38:31
Speaker
I'm really bad at faces too. I think I have mild facial blindness. I am not going to lie. Anyway, I was thinking of Hector Elizondo. Well, no, I was, I was thinking he was, I was like, oh, it's, it's the butler from the parent trap.
00:38:45
Speaker
But no, that is Simon Coons. who looks like he could be his brother or something. Anyway, so Peter Postlethwaite has a little bit more harsher of a face than Simon Kuhn's, but they do look very similar, I think.
00:39:01
Speaker
Similar-ish. Do you know who else looks related? Who?
00:39:07
Speaker
Who else looks related that was in this movie in the 1996 version of Romeo julia and Juliet? Leo and Claire look like they could be brother and sister and it's kind weird. Or cousins. On a bad day, they look like their siblings. Like, same mom, same dad.
00:39:27
Speaker
ah on a really good day, they could be first cousins. Yeah, first cousins, but their dads are like identical twins.
00:39:38
Speaker
They look like they share a lot of DNA. I think it's the nose. I don't know. They they look... They look related. They look related. yeah It's really weird. That's both a thing that I hate and also a thing that I love because that makes it more of a comedy. Yeah, it's really well, but it's not a comedy because it's like they didn't call it out. They didn't call attention to it they did not were They did not make it funny. like I think know it's your duty when something like that happens. You've got to like do something, you know, and the aquarium scene. They could have done something with it.
00:40:15
Speaker
Anyway. No. Actually, the way that they filmed the aquarium scene, because I care way more about like the making of things than the things themselves sometimes, I the lights that were actually in the aquarium were the only lights used to light that entire scene. ah They, ah the lighting, like the lighting director, like really, really struggled with it. Cause any other lights and stuff, any, any studio things that they would normally use caused like a really bad glare. And then you either couldn't see Leo or you couldn't see Claire and it was just chaos. And he was like going bald by the minute he, it was driving him nuts. Right. ah
00:40:54
Speaker
And so they ended up sticking like tube lights in the bottom of the aquarium and then that worked and they're like, okay, dope. So that's how that scene happened and that's great. i didn't like the Catholic iconography either because it just felt so forced and I guess I just didn't like the It was right next to the Hawaiian shirts and it was making their nine millimeters just look really fruity and just not, I just, I
Catholicism's Impact on Storyline
00:41:22
Speaker
didn't like it. It was, I i don't know what those big statue things were. Like, I don't understand.
00:41:30
Speaker
It kept showing like, i don't, okay. So that made me think whenever I first started watching it, I'm like, is this supposed to take place in a fictional version of Brazil? Because that looks like Christ on the Mount. That statue,
00:41:43
Speaker
In Rio de Janeiro? Yeah. Maybe. What was that? Why did they show it every other scene constantly? That was like, they were like, oh, you remember how in like Huckleberry Finn and how like the river was its own character? What if we did a weird a wish version of Christ on the Mount and that'll be a character in the movie? was really weird. Anyway. It was weird. And it was just, it was a lot of filler. It's like they, I know that they wanted to make the movie exactly two hours long to match the, ah
00:42:17
Speaker
the opening monologue from the chorus, which I did like that part, how they had the chorus ah read as if a TV report. I liked that. That's cool. That's a cool way of, that's a smart way of modernizing it and everything. But,
00:42:32
Speaker
in the very you know opening lines is like, this is a two hour play. You're in this for two hours. And I'm like, we're in this for two hours. And I think in order to make it that long, they just kept showing that damn statue. i didn't like that. I i it know that like Catholicism was a thing in the play too, because that was most of what was going on Christianity wise and everything. I don't know. i just know that nowadays, if you want to get married in the Catholic church, they make you go to classes first. So I think,
00:43:01
Speaker
friar lawrence was just not good at his job right i mean also you know fifteen hundreds it could have been different i don't know like sure but this happened in 1996 so what they didn't change the the lines they
Comparing Play and Movie Adaptations
00:43:18
Speaker
didn't change the dialogue
00:43:23
Speaker
Okay, so what didn't make the cut? ah Too many things were left in, I think. I could have done with less of this movie. i don't know why we picked this movie. Why didn't we just do Rosalind? I think we picked this movie because I hadn't seen it at all, and I think it'd been a while since you'd seen it.
00:43:43
Speaker
Yeah, and i I hadn't seen it before. I'd only ever seen the last scene. i wouldn't say that I disliked the movie as a whole. I just am never going to watch it ever won't either. I might make a drinking game out of it someday.
00:43:56
Speaker
Like if other people wanted to do that, I would do that. I would join, but yeah, I wouldn't do that on my own. I don't drink alone. I don't like alcohol that much personally. um Okay. So what didn't make the cut? um So in the play, Romeo kills Paris, Count Paris, i.e. Paul Rudd's character outside of Juliet's tomb.
00:44:21
Speaker
And then drags him in. So there's three of them in there. Paris gets stabbed. And Paris is like, oh, my God, just let me die by her. And and Romeo is like, OK, I just killed you. But sure, i love Juliet more, but I'm OK with you being a third wheel. And I'm pretty sure Paris is like outside of Juliet's tomb like forever.
00:44:46
Speaker
mourning and then Romeo comes up and is like this is my girl and Count Paris is like ni no no no no no I'm mourning her and Romeo's like I'll fight yeah actually I don't know who starts it anyway they fight Romeo wins by day by killing Count Paris he is an expert swordsman i but he has like no social skills But in both Rosaline and in Romeo plus Juliet, Count Paris gets to live. Yay.
00:45:26
Speaker
In Gnomeo and Juliet. um Paris is just this like adorable little cutesy gnome with glasses and he's a dork. And um and Lord Capulet is like, oh, Juliet, ah you here's this guy. He's great. And then ah her nurse is played by like a frog figurine that sprays water. And so Frog Lady was like, mm, that...
00:45:52
Speaker
He can hit it. And so then she ah she falls in love with dorky gnome Paris so that ah Juliet can go run around and be a wild child. Nice.
00:46:03
Speaker
Go nurse. Glonomio and Juliet left that part That's good. That's good. At least. Yeah. Yeah. I don't remember Benvolio, so you need to talk about him because I don't know. don't know. Yeah, so in the play, Benvolio dies off scene. Yeah. um But in both movies, like, he doesn't die at all. So that's great. And then in the movies, well, so in Rosaline...
00:46:28
Speaker
like a lot of the monologues are included because it's mostly from Rosalind's like point of view perspective. um So let's all make a moot point, but in Romeo and Juliet, the movie, a lot of the monologues were cut down to just, like one or two lines um or yeah kind of the meat potatoes of the line so we got the gist but um the meat and potatoes monologue so they did you a favor there kids i always seem to take issue with like the most nitpickiest of things so at the very end of the play spoiler alert they die
00:47:09
Speaker
Romeo takes poison, which he takes poison in the play, right?
Realism in Death Scenes
00:47:13
Speaker
He gets it from John. Yeah. on In the play, but in the... Yeah. In the movie, he gets it from the, like, billiards hall attendant sketchy dude.
00:47:27
Speaker
He just gets it from some guy. and I'm like, how do you know he didn't give you sugar water? How do you know that you're... This is just some guy. We do see him earlier in the movie when they're out shooting pool or whatever, but I don't know how Romeo knew to go to heaven to get poison. like I don't know. They knew where to get ecstasy in the 90s.
00:47:50
Speaker
I assume that means that they also know where to get their poison from. ok i don't I don't know. I don't know. I'm not going to argue with it. Okay. Anyway, nitpicky things that I tend to look at is like, okay, what are entrance wounds and exit wounds going to look like with the ah particular weapons that they're using? Or would they really have died that way? I don't know what's wrong with me. I just have to Google it. I have to know. And ah so at the end of the play, Juliet stabs herself, right? Because there's no more poison left. she kisses Romeo's lips and he's left no more poison on on them for her and but he has his dagger and so that's what she uses yeah so I'm like listen knowing what I know with all of my family in medicine and they've all been like yeah ER r like not oh my gosh they've all been EMTs etc etc etc um
00:48:46
Speaker
It takes a lot of stabs to die from a stab wound. So, I mean, for play's sake, yeah, that's at least, like, dramatic. Fine. That's great. But shooting yourself in the head with a 9mm handgun is not a romantic way to die. You know?
00:49:02
Speaker
That's not pretty. And we didn't get the scene where everybody comes into the tomb for some reason again to be like, oh, there's three bodies here and now or two bodies here now. We don't have that. That wasn't... The movie just ended with, like, a bird's eye panning out view of them being dead and beautiful together, right? And I'm kind of like, it would be a lot grosser than that. it just It's not sure it's like romantic or whatever, but i ah live in reality and I feel like it would have been really gross.
00:49:32
Speaker
It would have been more than like a few beautiful little splatters of blood. You needed Quentin Tarantino ending, not a Baz Luhrmann ending scene? Yes. Anyway...
00:49:44
Speaker
So many guns. I did kind of like, though, with the guns, how ah at every party they had to like check their guns, like put them away. And like at the very beginning, whenever Mercutio and Leonardo DiCaprio are leaving the movie, not the movie, oh my word, i need to go to bed, they're leaving the party and the sign on the little tent says, no ticket, no gun. Yeah, that's pretty cute. I liked that.
Changes to Monologues
00:50:11
Speaker
Yep, yep, yep. So, yeah. All in all, not a whole lot was left out of the movies or especially like Romeo and Juliet because โ probably, most likely, because a play, Doit, adapts to the screen a lot better than a book.
00:50:27
Speaker
You know, the play was only like, I don't know, 40 pages or so. i don't know. I was like whenever I had to like read the whole thing, which โ I was Googling like how long does it take the average person to read this play? One source said it'll take three hours if you're doing this many words per minute. And i'm like, cool. I am a good but slow reader. So I looked and others were like longer, like it's more it's more than 40 pages. I guess my copy doesn't have like footnotes really. Like it's just the play.
00:50:58
Speaker
Yeah. Mine had, I told him, go find me one with footnotes. I sent Jason out into the world. I said, I need to read this damn book because we're supposed to be recording this this weekend.
00:51:09
Speaker
And then turns out we didn't record them. The audiobook was three hours. mean, it's... And then the play that I watched that covered, like, every line they cut down, like... don't know, they probably cut, like, ten lines from the whole thing because I followed right along was, like, two and a half hours. Okay, most of this play.
00:51:27
Speaker
it It's not that long. If you just... If you can force yourself to stick with it. Yeah. I mean, it's... It's like five acts. It's not a short play either.
00:51:40
Speaker
It's play length, whatever that is. right But they didn't have to cut out a whole lot for the movie. Obviously, with Rosalind, they cut out all of it. Right. Well, it's not about Romeo and Juliet.
00:51:52
Speaker
It's about Rosalind, which we don't really get to see her at all because she's not at the Capulet Ball for some reason. Yeah. she's not even She's not even in the play. She's just mentioned, isn't she? she's just mentioned, and then they tease her about it.
00:52:07
Speaker
Or tease Romeo about about it. I tease him too, dumbass.
00:52:18
Speaker
So I have to ask, are you Jen, a play nerd or a movie buff? I'd have to say... I am a movie buff, but explicitly for Rosalind, not Romeo and Juliet, the movie.
00:52:35
Speaker
And I'm certainly not play nerd for play. So and are you a play nerd or a movie buff?
00:52:47
Speaker
Okay. I am never, no offense to Shakespeare, no offense to my English teachers, no offense to anybody, but I don't think I'm ever going to read the play again.
Play vs. Movie Preference
00:52:58
Speaker
I just don't see it happening.
00:53:00
Speaker
I don't think I'm ever ever, ever again. Like I'm going to go take this book back to half price books. I think, I don't know if they do returns, if they don't do returns, thrift books now has a beta version of sell your own books. We'll do that. or I don't know.
00:53:15
Speaker
I don't know. I'm never going to read it again. It's not going to happen. I will never watch the 1996 version again. If I'm ever with my nephew or my niece and they're watching Gnomeo and Juliet, I will probably pause in the room and watch it a little bit because it wasn't bad.
00:53:38
Speaker
was very silly, but it was fine. i would maybe i would never put it on again. i really like Rosalind, but I don't know if I'm ever going to need to watch that again either. i abstain, i think. a zero Like a no vote. Are you even allowed to do that?
00:53:55
Speaker
Okay, Hawaiian shirt to the head. i will be a movie buff. And I will pick Rosalyn.
00:54:12
Speaker
Did you like that?
00:54:16
Speaker
i I don't think I have been able to come up with that if I had more sleep.
00:54:22
Speaker
That's the caption.
00:54:27
Speaker
No, we can't put it in a caption because if anybody makes it this far into the episode, they need to have a good joke.
Closing Thanks and Listener Engagement
00:54:50
Speaker
Thank you for listening to Book Club, the movie, the podcast. Watch for new episodes out the third Thursday of each month. You can find us on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen.
00:55:01
Speaker
Follow us on Instagram and TikTok at Book Club The Movie. You can also find us on Patreon, Facebook, or on our website, bookclubthemovie.com. This podcast was created and produced by Jen Moyer and M. Lord. Our music and mixing is by Jason Lord of Studio Topaz.
00:55:19
Speaker
Voice acted by Ethan Gallardo. And we just want to give a big thank you to our friends and family for your love and support. And thank you, dear listener, for joining our book club. See you next time, nerds. And buffs.
00:55:32
Speaker
Bye!
00:55:39
Speaker
I mean, yeah. In a game of marry, fuck, kill, you marry Paul Rudd. You fuck Paul Rudd. Also. And then you you kill Leonard Decapio. We have to have a third person thrown in there.
00:55:57
Speaker
No, no. Paul Rudd can do both of those. He's not versatile.