Romeo and Juliet — The Royal Ballet, filmed by Paul Czinner (1966)
Margot Fonteyn and Rudolf Nureyev dance Kenneth MacMillan’s ballet, on film.
A ballet lives in the people dancing it, so film one pair at full stretch and keep the record.
You want to see Fonteyn and Nureyev dance it, and a film from 1966 doesn’t put you off.
What it keeps and what it changes
Keeps: the plot, told start to finish, to Prokofiev’s score.
Changes: the words, into dance, and the stage into a film: Paul Czinner directed it for the screen.
Kenneth MacMillan’s choreography to Prokofiev’s score, as in the 2019 capture, filmed by Paul Czinner in 1966 with Margot Fonteyn as Juliet and Rudolf Nureyev as Romeo. John Lanchbery conducts the Royal Opera House Orchestra.
Whose story is it?
the lovers’, danced by Margot Fonteyn and Rudolf Nureyev.
How much time does it ask?
124 minutes. John Lanchbery conducts the Royal Opera House Orchestra; David Blair is Mercutio and Desmond Doyle is Tybalt.
Learning on Screen’s record: produced and directed by Paul Czinner for Poetic Films and Royal Academy Productions, with Fonteyn as Juliet and Nureyev as Romeo.
Where to find it
Other ways to get it: DVD (Kultur) — Amazon
Borrow it free: Find at your library — WorldCat
More ways into Verona: Romeo and Juliet (George Cukor, 1936) · Romeo and Juliet (Franco Zeffirelli, 1968) · William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet (1996)