There have been many untraditional film adaptations of Shakespeare’s, but few have been as unorthodox as this one, which plays out as a star-crossed romance between rival Satmar Jewish sects on the mean streets of Williamsburg (and Coney Island) in what’s billed as the first mumblecore film in Yiddish.
Romeo is played by Lazer Weiss and Juliet (who has a tasteful nude scene) by Melissa Weisz, a real-life couple with palpable chemistry. Like most of the cast, they’re nonprofessional actors who dropped out of the Orthodox Jewish community but continue speaking Yiddish.
“Romeo and Juliet in Yiddish” also includes a more awkward framing story in English. Eve Annenberg (a professional actress who wrote and directed the film) plays a middle-aged secular Jew who hires a group of Orthodox-dropout grifters to help her “update” Shakespeare’s play into Yiddish and in the process gets in touch with her roots.