The "cross'd" in "star-cross'd" means hindered, frustrated, saddened, and defeated. Such will be the love of Romeo and Juliet, because of the stars. This is like a horoscope because when you read it, it predicts your destiny. In the stars is the destiny that causes "misadventured piteous overthrows." A "misadventure" is a twist of fate or misfortune. By the misfortunate death of Romeo and Juliet, the sadness between the two families ends the feud between them. The rest of the prologue repeats the message that the lovers will die and their deaths will stop the feud, and then tells us that all this will be shown in of our stage.” (Line 12)
In the production by Baz Luhrmann, the prologue starts off with “ Bazmark Productions” There was a constant clicking sound like someone changing channels with the remote control. Then the screen changed pitch black and out of nowhere appeared a television set. As the TV drew closer to the screen, a woman newsreader was citing the prologue as if it was a newsflash. As she was reading the TV began to get even closer until it disappeared. The screen changes and then the words ‘IN FAIR VERONA’ keep on flashing on the screen. There is operatic music in the background. The pace of the music is quite fast and has a feel of war and turbulence towards the scene. Now there is a man repeating the prologue while different images describe the setting. The images used to describe the Montague’s and the Capulet’s were a newspaper article with a picture of the two families. This shows that the war between the two families is a public affair that affects many people. Then there was another newspaper article with the heading ‘Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean’. The lines of the Prologue that the man is quoting are written in white writing against a black background. There are many images of violence and chaos. The city seems like it is divided into two. On one side, there is a tall building with the Capulet sign above it in pink with a symbol of a tiger’s face. On the other side, there is another tall building with the Montague sign in blue above it with the symbol of three hexagons. The way that the two buildings stand out against the city shows that there is a lot of war between them.
The only similarities that bring the two families together are their religion. Christ represents love, hope, and unity. There are two Christ figures being constantly shown in this scene. The Christ figures tower over the city and look down on it as if Christ is judging the two families. The two families only have one child each, Romeo and Juliet. Capulet vs. Montague comes up in flames, it sounds like war and danger. Air shots show a beautiful city. When you look from the ground, it shows a troubled and chaotic city.
“ A pair of star-crossed lovers” From this point in the scene there are no images. The ‘T’ in take is put in the form of a cross; it is bold and spaced out. This links with Christianity. The fire reminds you of hell, as if Romeo and Juliet sold their souls to hell. The text ‘In fair Verona’ flashes quickly at the same speed with the music. A night scene with fireworks links with the music. The fireworks are loud and immense and the music is at a fast pace and quite loud.
There is a part in the Prologue scene where all the images are shown at a very fast pace with the music. The choirboy represents peace and he is shown singing at the wedding. Juliet is dressed all in white. This is modern. You then see the choirboy again and then back to Juliet as if she is lifting the veil to reveal her identity.
Tybalt, Juliet’s cousin has a gun in his hand. The way that he points the gun looks like he is pointing it towards the audience. He looks like a gunman. There is a child in the scene that looks shocked and scared. This is shown by the way that his eyes are wide open in dismay. There are more scenes of violence. There is a person with his back towards the audience is shooting.
We come to a black screen and fireworks again. There is a bedroom scene where we see Juliet’s mother dressed as ‘Cleopatra’. After that, we see Tybalt. Every time Tybalt is shown, he has a gun. Tybalt is shown here shooting one of Romeo’s cousins. The black screen appears again and there is a red cross in the middle screen with a ‘&’ in between the red cross. The red represents blood. The blood is a symbol of the blood that was shed for the sake of love between Romeo and Juliet. The cross gets smaller and smaller and then into the ‘and’ in William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.