Yes, I have heard the argument that "Gee, Officer Krupke" is supposed to be an angry song. Yes, I have heard the argument that "Cool" was meant to show Riff as a powerful leader. But those arguments still do not match up, and I'll tell you why.
The Jets may have been angry when singing "Gee, Officer Krupke," but there were still comical elements in the song that's guaranteed to make people laugh. Its style is very humorous. After Riff's death, we are not supposed to laugh. The enjoyable moments were supposed to be before the rumble, and now that it's happened and lives have been lost now it is time to get serious. The movie did a wonderful job of making this clear but the play did not. And just the general way this scene was written, it just didn't have that same effect on me. It didn't seem to me that the Jets were really that concerned about what just happened, that they even cared. They just didn't seem to be reacting as urgently and drastically as they should have been. Unlike in the movie, where they were going insane and ready to tear the Sharks limb from limb, and where "Cool" actually applied to the particular situation, they showed little worry about the after-effects of the rumble, they sang "Gee, Officer Krupke" even though it had nothing to do with making sure they got revenge on the Sharks, and then when Anybodys shows up then they decide to take their situation seriously. That seemed really forced and out of place.
Which brings me to my next point; of all the Jets they could have chosen to take Riff's place as leader, they chose Action.
And they don't give any early hints or indications that Action is going to mature enough to be a good leader when the story calls for it, Oh No!! He goes out of character and immediately becomes the cool-headed, authoritative type for no reason when throughout the entire story, he is consistently portrayed as hot-headed, always ready to fight, always yelling and using his fists, and he would NEVER make the good decisions the writers forced him to make. This is what I mean by character inconsistencies. Action didn't become the way he did in the second act because he had the character development for it, he became the cool-headed authority because the plot needed him to be. The way they placed "Cool" was very extreme for the situation it was given in the play. It totally works after the rumble, but before the war council...? What are they supposed to keep cool for? The Sharks? Doc? It didn't come across to me as a desperate, life-or-death situation that the context of the song calls for. "Cool" is too intense for the pre-rumble atmosphere, and the lyrics alone beg to be placed after the rumble in the stressed out, explosive attitude that the boys are now supposed to have. Once again, Arthur Laurents, your writing leaves a lot to be desired, and this scene was very forced and out of place.
Here is where the movie got this right: They, as we know, put "Gee, Officer Krupke" after the dance and before the war council, and they put "Cool" after the rumble which, as I said, applied way better to their current situation and actually made sense. AND, they kept Action in character and chose a better, more realistic candidate to replace Riff: Ice. This character should have been in the play!
Another scene that was forced and made no sense in the play was the "America" scene. I had no issue with it being after "Tonight," but here is what happens in the movie: Anita and Bernardo get into a heated debate about living in America, and it builds up to what becomes a very entertaining and hilarious song and dance number. Every line in that song was witty, clever, and very funny. The dance parts were awesome. It's one of West Side Story's memorable and most amazing scenes, and when many people think of WSS, "America" is one of the first songs to pop in their heads.
The play's version of "America" is nothing like that. In THAT one, Bernardo and Anita do get into that debate, but then he and his gang just leave for the war council, and then it's only the Shark girls singing that song. And in that song, it is many girls who are in love with America pitted against one girl, Rosalia, who is feeling homesick. This scene might have worked if there were at least several more girls on Rosalia's side and the girls who were on the side of America didn't have an unfair advantage. Plus, the lyrics, like the dialogue, were awkward, rushed, choppy, and pathetic. They were not funny or entertaining like the movie's lyrics were. I remember being in the show myself, and it was even more bland and boring to watch then to read or listen to in the Broadway recording.
The writers completely missed the opportunity for not only what could have been a very entertaining scene, but a very well-developed scene for the Shark boys and girls to interact with each other (which the movie made up for). Yes, they did share dialogue before the song in the play, but that aspect was only developed halfway before the Shark's departure killed what this scene was leading up to. I remember reading this scene and thinking "That's it???"
The lyrics in the movie's version of America were wittier and much more clever. It is also more entertaining when it's the boys against the girls, plus it doesn't force the situation by forcing Bernardo to leave before the song. It further develops the scene by having him stay, and actually letting him have a singing part. This is one of the play's biggest flaws; it tells you that Bernardo is a lead role, and yet he doesn't sing once by himself.
Another song in a different scene I sort of have a problem with is "I Feel Pretty" taking place after the rumble and before Maria finds out that Tony killed her brother Bernardo. I'm not as nit-picky about this scene as the other ones I mentioned, because you can't really blame Maria for not knowing the truth yet. But at the same time, the tone of this scene is still inappropriate if it immediately follows a horrible, gut-wrenching sequence of violence. And in the back of our minds we know that Maria's happiness is going to be horribly shattered when she hears what Tony did, and it's just more torture on the audience. At least in the movie, when the song took place in the bridal shop, you still had hope that everything was going to work out well for our two lovers. Seeing her perform it after the rumble is just torture, and for the same reason I gave for "Gee, Officer Krupke," there's not supposed to be more fun to play out through the plot. After the rumble, it's serious business.
The dialogue also flows better in the movie; when reading the script most of the lines were shorter, more choppy, and just plain awkward like they've turned in the first rough draft. You could just tell the writers could have worded the lines a lot better. In the movie, I felt like the lines were almost perfect.
I'm not saying I didn't like the play, but I sure as heck liked the movie a LOT better than I did the play. I still consider West Side Story to be my favorite musical of all time, and Tony is still my number one dream role onstage. Hopefully, if I even do get the role the director might make similar changes to the script to make it more like the movie. I know that's not likely to happen but I can dream.
I heard they put on a revival of West Side Story a couple of years ago if I'm not mistaken. All I heard was they gave the Sharks more dialogue in Spanish, and dubbed the entire "I Feel Pretty" number in Spanish. I don't know what else they did, but I don't think it included putting "Cool" and "Gee, Officer Krupke" in their proper places. You would think after making the movie and seeing the difference of the plot's improvement, they would have made those same changes to the play so it would have made more sense. Unfortunately, they still haven't, and that just really gets on my nerves. At least I still have the movie to enjoy; the people who made that at least fixed those mistakes.
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