I interviewed Arthur Laurents on this subject right before his "Spanish-language" WSS opened on Broadway. He thought having a lot of the dialogue in Spanish would make audiences identify with the Sharks. I told him that audiences didn't identify with the Sharks because those characters didn't have many songs, unlike the Jets, who get to sing three songs plus the "Tonight" ensemble. I said that the movie version partially rectified this problem by giving the Sharks "America" to sing along with their girlfriends. Laurents got angry. He responded that the movie was horrible. He didn't agree that the Sharks needed more songs. He was not a man who admitted mistakes.
