I have transitioned this year!

Yes, right! I have transitioned from feeling disappointed to feeling “pretty” disappointed. Err, let me explain. I’m referring to Broadway’s latest revamp of the musical West Side Story. This has dropped, amongst other things, I Feel Pretty, the jubilant song of the heroine Maria, because its director is after a rendition “for the 21st century”.  Maybe “I Feel Sexy” would fit the bill for him?

Well, instead of the Sharks and the Jets, perhaps we can do a British version with the Bojos and the Starmerites? “It’s alarming how harming we are,” nicely sanitised with the knife fight scenes removed  and replaced with some “Strictly Come Dancing” street contest …

Thank goodness! Maybe now we can look forward to a happy ending for Romeo and His Juliet. (Transgender by the time you see it: Romeo and Their Juliet, if you please.) As for the balcony scene, Juliet would have to wear a safety harness and Romeo would have to go on a ladder-climbing course.

Not to mention a Broadway reimagining of Hamlet 2020 – Hamlet: “To be or-”. Director: “Cut, that’s a wrap, let’s keep it relevant. Hey, would it be OK for this Hamlet guy to do less talking? Can’t understand a word he’s saying anyway through that mask of his.”

Yes, it’s about time those archaic plays by the Bard were updated. For starters, Desdemona needs to do a runner and get the hell away from her abusive and disturbed husband – she should run away with Cassio. Lady Macbeth should be more sympathetic to her husband’s ambitious but weak personality and tell him to accept his lot. Henry V should avoid so such warmongering. And Caesar should simply listen to his wife and stay at home!

It’s PC gone mad, I tell you! Also woke, virtue signalling and snowflakery. If, according to Broadway, “the classics needed refreshing to maintain their relevance” how do they become classics in the first place?

Answer: by not being messed about by individuals hitching a ride on their excellence.

Nora Johnson’s psychological crime thrillers ‘No Safe Place’, ‘Betrayal’, ‘The Girl in the Woods’, ‘The Girl in the Red Dress’, ‘No Way Back’, ‘Landscape of Lies’, ‘Retribution’, ‘Soul Stealer’, ‘The De Clerambault Code’ (www.nora-johnson.net) available online as eBook (€0.99;£0.99), Apple Books, paperback & audiobook.All profits to Costa del Sol Cudeca cancer charity  

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Nora Johnson

Novelist Nora Johnson offers insights on everything from current affairs to life in Spain, with humour and a keen eye for detail.

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