Tools of Characterization

Characterization in West Side Story

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The Jets hate the Sharks. The Sharks hate the Jets. They've got nothing much in their lives except their anger and their pride. You can see this every time they share the screen—the glares, the taunts, the eventual violent confrontations.

Tony and Maria, on the other hand, do a lot of snuggling and cuddling, as if to protect each other from the world bearing down on top of them. Their songs are gentle and romantic. They even move differently from the other characters. There's no better example than the rumble, where the two sides are actively trying to kill each other, and the scene before it, where Tony and Maria actually pretend to get married. Everything the gangs do screams hate and intolerance; Tony and Maria's actions embody love.

Awww…

Social Status

When you're a Jet, you're a Jet all the way, but you'd better not think about filling out a loan application or trying to buy a car. The characters in this film are mostly poor folks without a whole lot of options. The Jets even have a song about how tough it is to be young and poor: "Gee, Officer Krupke!"

The Sharks are in an even worse position: not only poor, but hated for their ethnicity and their immigrant status. In this film, being Puerto Rican means you've been on the receiving end of contempt and discrimination.

At the top of this pecking order are cops, interested largely in keeping those poor kids in line. Notice that Lt. Schrank is never in a scene when it opens. He just kind of shows up: an outsider from another part of town who clearly doesn't belong.

Doc and Tony occupy an in-between social status, working stiffs who are still poor but are strivers. For Tony, the future looks bright. Until.

Everyone in the movie—the JDs and the cops—seem to be stuck where they are in life. Even Schrank and Krupke seem dispirited and exhausted, maybe hoping to get a cushy job in some quiet town upstate.

Speech and Dialogue

The Puerto Ricans in this film suffer prejudice in part because of their accents. There's even a line about it in the song "America."

ANITA: I'll get a terrace apartment.

BERNARDO: Better get rid of your accent!

Accents mark them as brand-new immigrants and make it easy for anyone to single them out for abuse. It's an easy "us" vs. "them" cinematic tool.

The sung dialogue in the film demonstrates motive and lets us see very clearly what the characters are thinking about. That's the nice thing about musicals: they're rarely subtle. Look at the Jets singing about the Sharks:

JETS: The Jets are in gear,
Our cylinders are clickin'!
The Sharks'll steer clear
'Cause every Puerto Rican's
A lousy chicken! 

Even within the singing, there are distinctions. Maria, the naïve innocent, is a soprano; the sultry, more experienced Anita sings in a lower range. (In fact, for "A Boy Like That," Moreno had to be dubbed because she couldn't reach some of those low notes.) Tony, the romantic, is a soaring tenor. Chakiris, as Bernardo, isn't really much of a singer. (But man, that boy can dance.)

There's straight dialogue in West Side Story, but the real emotion gets expressed in song. You can find out everything you want to know about the characters. Tony's dreaminess, Anita's sultriness, Maria's innocence, Bernardo's bitterness—they're all there. All you have to do is listen.

Sex and Love

Anita and Bernardo have a pretty highly-octane relationship. They're all over each other in the "America" sequence, and Anita's not afraid to express her desire. As she slowly pulls on her stockings getting ready for the after-rumble hookup with Bernardo, she sings:

ANITA: Anita's going to get her kicks tonight.
We'll have our private little "mix" tonight."
He'll walk in hot and tired, poor dear.
Don't matter if he's tired, as long as he's here.

In the stage version, those last two lines read; "He'll walk in hot and tired/ So what. Don't matter if he's tired/as long as he's hot!" Either the writers thought that 1960s general audiences couldn't handle that, or the censors had a hand in it. Anyway, Anita and Bernardo definitely sizzle, censors or not. You have to wonder if the steamy scenes between the two are promoting the stereotype of the hot-blooded Latin lovers. The Sharks definitely out-mambo the white kids at the dance, too; the girls are dressed in brighter, sexier colors. Essay question opportunity, Shmoopers.

Tony and Maria seem more innocent. Their attraction is just as powerful, but it's portrayed more subtly, and as less overtly sexual. But at the end of the scene when Tony goes Maria and confesses to killing her brother, they fall out of the camera frame as they sink slowly onto her bed. Because Maria's such an innocent, we know that bedding Tony means that they're now promised to each other. This is what she implies when she sings to Anita:

MARIA: I love him. We're one.
There's nothing to be done.
Not a thing I can do.

The look on Anita's face tells us what she thinks about Maria sleeping with the man who's just killed Anita's own lover.

Endless Love

The lovers in the film will do anything for each other, including ignoring the disapproval of just about everybody, and even putting their own safety aside. Case in point: Tony suicidally runs out to die in the streets when he thinks Maria's dead. In their own way, Bernardo and Anita are the same. Anita's pretty clear her love for Bernardo is just as strong as Maria's Tony for Tony.

MARIA: If Chino hurts him, if he touches him, I swear to you I'll...

ANITA: You'll do what Tony did to Bernardo?

MARIA: I love Tony.

ANITA: I know. I loved Bernardo. 

Two epic loves, two tragic ends.

We Are Family

Even though parents seem to be non-existent in this film, there's still family love.

• Bernardo adores his little sister Maria and tries to make sure she picks the right guy to marry.
• Tony and Riff share a love like brothers. We don't get the backstory, but we know that Riff's lived with Tony's family for years.
• On a more father-son level, Doc loves Tony like a son and tries to protect him from making dangerous decisions and getting hurt. He fails, but it's the effort that counts.

Point is, the characters'' capacity for love clues us in for hat kind of people they are. The fact that Riff loves Tony and Bernardo loves Maria shows us that these guys have another side to them; they can't be all bad.