Paul Giamatti will marry Romeo and Juliet.
“Romeo and Juliet” is, of course, the greatest teen love story of them all, but let’s be honest–there are a few shaky things in the plot. Like that whole “take this poison, it will make you look dead, then you can escape thing.” Is it me or does that have “Things That Can Go Wrong” written all over it?
But logic has never stood in the way of true love and teen tragedy, so that tends to get swept under the rug, never more than in the many film versions of “Romeo and Juliet.” Now we have word from Variety (via ComingSoon) that Paul Giamatti will play Friar Laurence, the man with the poison plan, in the next film adaptation of “Romeo and Juliet. Carlo Carlei is directing and Julian Fellowes wrote the adaptation. Hailee Steinfeld and Douglas Booth star as Juliet and Romeo. Ed Westwick plays Tybalt, Kodi Smit-McPhee is Benvolio, and lucky Christian Cooke gets to be Mercutio.
The film is being described as ” “Romeo and Juliet” for the “Twilight” generation. I honestly have no idea what that implies. Filming is set to begin in Italy this month.
Giamatti was seen last year in “The Ides of March.” He has “John Dies at the End” at Sundance now and will be seen later this year in “Rock of Ages.”
