West Side Story trailer: Ansel Elgort and Rachel Zegler play star-crossed lovers in Steven Spielberg’s musical

The official trailer for West Side Story has finally arrived, and it begs the question, what can’t Steven Spielberg do?

West Side Story is an adaptation of the legendary Broadway play of the same name by Arthur Laurents, Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim.

The trailer starts off with the song ‘Tonight’ featuring Rachel Zegler as Maria Vasquez, a young woman who finds herself in love with Ansel Elgort’s Tony. The trailer also lays out the Romeo and Juliet styled tone of the plot. 

As Maria and Tony’s relationship is clearly a forbidden one, as their families’ animosity seems to get in the way. The clip features several shots of the two romancing each other.

While the trailer does not particularly include a lot of musical moments from the movie, its focus is primarily on Zegler’s character Maria, instead of banking on bigger names like Elgort and Spielberg. 

West Side Story also stars Ariana DeBose, David Alvarez, Mike Faist, Corey Stoll, Brian d'Arcy James and Rita Moreno. Moreno is one of the few actors who have won the Academy, Emmy, Grammy, Tony and Peabody Awards. She will play Valentina, the woman who owns the corner shop in which Tony works in the film.

This movie marks Steven Spielberg’s first ever musical in an illustrious career consisting of sci-fi classics to epic war dramas.

Delayed due to the pandemic, West Side Story faced a release delay, and will be out on 10 October. 

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