Some Grief Shows Much of Love: A Story of Contrasts
Franco Zeffirelli’s 1968 masterpiece of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet has much it can teach us today. Lingering in the space between extremes, he reveals the way light is shrouded by darkness, and love is sprung from hate. Zeffirelli handles these sharp contrasts deftly as he exposes the knife’s edge that separates reason from passion, and grief from love. A story that was relevant 400 years ago, 60 years ago, and today.
Zeffirelli knows how to take us into the heart of suffering, and then to transcend it. Even in the thralls of despair, he finds the intense beauty of the human condition. This is his power. Beauty and pathos carry the story between violent and loving extremes. Even at the most agonizing moments of darkness, Zeffirelli illuminates the characters with love.
Through this exhibition, the most memorable scenes from the Academy-acclaimed film: the Capulet masquerade, the private meeting on the balcony, and finally, the heartbreaking demise of Romeo and Juliet in the Capulet crypt. Contrasting spaces welcome visitors into the arms of young love and joy, and leaves them with the solace of our own mortality. This groundbreaking event showcases universal themes of love, peace, and the struggle to fight for unity.
