West Side Story: Viral Video Turns Tony Into a Velociraptor

By Spencer Perry

The breadth of Steven Spielberg's filmography knows no bounds. Not only is the man who directed Raiders of the Lost Ark the same one that made Hook, but the man who Munich also made War of the Worlds (released in the same year no less!). Spielberg's latest, the Best Picture nominated West Side Story, marks the first musical from the prolific filmmaker but one viral video has combined it with one of his biggest films and perhaps made an improvement that even Steven hadn't considered, what if West Side Story was the same but Ansel Elgort's Tony was replaced with a Velociraptor? Check out the video from VFX and Chill below.

Despite the critical acclaim of West Side Story and the multiple Academy Awards it was nominated for (winning only Best Supporting Actress for Ariana DeBose), Spielberg has already said that he has no intention of making another musical in his career, though he is co-producing the musical adaptation of The Color Purple with Fantasia Barrino and Danielle Brooks in the lead roles. It also seems unlikely that Spielberg will be making another dinosaur movie, but he remains a producer on the Jurassic World films, with the next film in the series, Jurassic World: Dominion set to arrive this summer. Spielberg also squashed any idea of working on sequels as well in a recent chat.

"My sequels aren't as good as my originals because I go onto every sequel I've made and I'm too confident," Spielberg admitted to The New York Times about his work on sequels. "This movie made a ka-zillion dollars, which justifies the sequel, so I come in like it's going to be a slam dunk and I wind up making an inferior movie to the one before. I'm talking about The Lost World and Jurassic Park."

As for Spielberg's current projects, the filmmaker is currently directing The Fabelmans, a fictionalized account of his own life as a child and teenager in Arizona. The film stars Michelle Williams, Paul Dano, Seth Rogen, and David Lynch. That film is currently in post-production and is scheduled to open in theaters on November 23. 

West Side Story is now streaming on Disney+ and HBO Max.  

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