Paul Bucknor’s 6-year journey to bring ‘Romeo n Juliet 4EVA’ to life

Creating the Jamaican movie Romeo n Juliet 4EVA from the Shakespearean classic Romeo and Juliet, is a task producer Paul Bucknor never imagined would have taken him six years.

Filming began in 2018, with production lasting 13 days, but even then it took months before Bucknor, who was working on 16 episodes of Conquering Shakespeare at the time, could work on the film. He even had to learn to use a new editing software to complete the project.

“It takes time. It’s not just that it takes time, it takes my time. Editing takes time. I edited it on my laptop in different countries. Versions of this film travelled around different countries and it’s been a long process, but we’re here now,” Bucknor, who is now proud of the final version, told The Gleaner during an interview after the first private viewing of Romeo n Juliet 4EVA at the Palace Cineplex, located at the Sovereign Centre in Kingston.

Another challenge which Bucknor faced, was that after the final video shoot, there was absolutely no audio saved for the recording, and he had to re-engage all actors to do voiceovers which then had to be matched with the video recordings and b-rolls.

“I just had to rerecord all the audio for the last scene, and this was three years after we shot it, and it was just the pitfalls of filmmaking,” he said.

The Shakespearean classic would go on to receive a sold-out special Jamaica Independence Day screening at Brixton’s Ritzy Cinema on August 6, though it was not finished being edited.

The goal of Bucknor and his team was always to bring the movie to an international level, as a result, when the film received a 2 out of 10 rating from the Toronto Star, they were open to adjustments.

“One thing he [a friend and Jamaican journalist at the Toronto Star] said to me, at the time, is that he would have thought the music would have been better, so that encouraged me to get better music,” said Bucknor, adding that he then brought on Jamaican John Williams to do the soundtrack.

Bucknor, who is widely known as the producer of The Full Monty and Better Mus’ Come, says the idea of the Romeo N Juliet 4EVA movie came from the local Shakespeare Schools’ Championship.

“Each school had to choose a play from Shakespeare and interpret it in a Jamaican context,” Bucknor shared, adding that the aim was to take the local winning school’s cast to the United Kingdom (UK) for live performances.

In the first year, Bucknor became a mentor for Papine High School on Hamlet. Papine made it to the final, but not the Top 3, with Campion College taking the win.

In the second year of the championship, Bucknor took on a greater role in the competition, even filming some of Hailie Selassie High School’s production of Romeo and Juliet on his phone and pitching it to Television Jamaica and securing a partnership for a 16-part reality show showing schools trying to put their productions together.

Though Knox College won that year, availability led to the students of Haile Selassie High School taking the spotlight. The main characters of Romeo n Juliet 4EVA were students of Michael Forest, a teacher at the school. Deshawn Miller plays the role of Romeo and Shanice Gowans, Juliet.

The movie opens at the Haile Selassie High and highlights the struggles of the two main characters. Romeo takes care of his ailing mother who is unable to pay rent, forcing him to fend for the home and keep up with school. He operates a Dumpling Shop while keeping up with his studies. The dream of Romeo and Juliet begins in his mind.

In love with his neighbour, Juliet, Romeo immediately hits a roadblock when it comes to winning her hand in the form of Juliet’s mother who has already decided who Juliet should marry.

Jamaicans can expect the movie to hit local theatres in November. The film will also go to screen again in the UK for three days at the Brixton Ritzy Cinema between October 12 and 14.

ainsworth.morris@gleanerjm.com