My History with West Side Story.
It began when I was about five. I was in Mom's room watching the family TV, when over the white noise of the idiot's lantern, I heard a man singing in a voice that hinted at mischief and mockery. I entered the living room where Mom was playing "Gee, Officer Krupke" from the motion picture soundtrack of West Side Story . I imagined the singer in a rakish Elizabethan get up: A garish red jacket ruffled shirt, tight leggings, and an audacious cap with a flamboyant feather as its centerpiece. I didn't realize how off target I was with the time and place of the story, yet at the same time so close. Not long after, West Side Story was playing on television. My family was gathered in Mom's bedroom and I saw this world for the first time in my life. It was New York City - MY city. An aerial view swept over the blooming skyscrapers and rectlinear streets until it finally settled on the slums of what would one day become Lincoln Center. My h...