Lady Capulet

Romeo and Juliet is one of the most famous Shakespeare’s writings and also one of the most famous stories around the world. This romantic tragedy story portraying young love between Romeo and Juliet is known for being recreated several times on movies. One of these movies is ‘Romeo + Juliet’ with stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes. As in the book, Romeo + Juliet has the same dialogues and characters, but completely different place and time. As it is a complete modernization of the play, characters are psychologically different on the movie from the ones on the book. Lady Capulet is the best character adaptation on the movie.

First, Lady Capulet is the funniest character on ‘Romeo + Juliet’. The way she walks is very comical; actually she looks like a bad fashion parade apprentice. Her speaking way is really peculiar. Even the dialogues remain just as they are on the book; Lady Capulet gives them a special touch of comedy that makes her unique. Her outfits are completely weird; although she is older than Juliet, Lady Capulet wears eccentric random stuff as if going to a Halloween party.

Lady Capulet is extremely cheerful. On the book, Lady Capulet is thought to be a completely serious and demure woman, while on the movie is very dynamic. She shouts more than I could imagine; instead of talking at normal decibels, her voice is really acute and noisy.  Also, she made me laugh out loud because her behavior is completely exaggerated according to what she, as Juliet’s mother, is supposed to be.

She portrays a regular mother behavior. As she wants her daughter to be married with a great guy, she talks to Juliet about Paris in a very joyful way so to convince her. Immediately, she starts to lead up for her daughter’s wedding in order to give Juliet a moment worth of her. She also supports Juliet when the idea of getting married to Paris is not that great for her, just as a regular mother would do.

I think 1996’s ‘Romeo + Juliet’ is a very good recreation of Shakespeare’s romantic tragedy Romeo and Juliet. Even though Lady Capulet has an exaggerated personality, we can perfectly understand what this tragedy is about and still have this anxiety to know what is going to happen next. Therefore she is the best character adaptation on the film.