About Anita


I don't really know whether anyone here brought this up, but I'm going to voice it out anyway, during the song A Boy Like That. She spoken up about Tony saying that he killed Bernardo to Maria, I mean, he killed Riff. Was she completely aware of this or not?

You jump, I jump

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Probably, but why would it matter to her, or to Maria, for that matter?

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What I think the OP is trying to say is Anita says: " a boy who kills cannot love, a boy who kills has no heart" etc
and that's sort of hypocritical of Anita because Bernardo killed someone too.

But I think its obvious that those words are said in grief, Anita's just lashing out at Maria because she's in pain and she's worried about her friend getting hurt. So we should probably cut her some slack.

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But then Anita forgives Maria and understands that Maria's really in love with Tony, and they become friends again. Anita very reluctantly goes to Doc's Candy Stare, at Maria's insistence, to give Tony the message that Chino is gunning for him, but she encounters the other Jets, who insult her, rough her up, and prevent her from going downstairs to the basement of Doc's Candy Store to warn him about Chino, due to their prejudices and their fear that she'll give away Tony's hiding place (Doc's cellar) to Chino.

When Action and the other Jets rough Anita up and insult her, Anita retaliates by giving the Jets a different message: that Chino has found out about Tony and Maria and killed her.

That, in turn, devastates Tony, who runs out in to the street, ultimately blowing his own cover, and ultimately getting gunned down by an enraged and jealous Chino.

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I'm sure the only report Anita got was from The Sharks. I doubt they could be counted on to give an unbiased, objective account. I'd say it's very likely that the story Anita got (or any of them in the Barrio) was only there was a fight and Tony killed Beenardo. Maria knew the truth because Tony told her, but Anita would only have heard whatever The Skarks told her...just the way all the people from the Jets' neighborhood would only hear the crimes of The Sharks. They would probably paint it like Bernardo stabbed Riff dead and none of them did anything to The Sharks.

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Actually, however, Anita tells Maria that she (over)heard the Shark guys talking about how Chino had a gun and was hunting for Tony.

When Maria was up on their tenement roof waiting for Tony's arrival, however, Chino came up to the roof and told Maria that Bernardo had been killed by Tony during the Rumble. Since Tony had promised Maria that he'd go and stop the rumble (which he tried to do, with disastrous results.), Maria was still under the impression that Tony had put a stop to the Rumble, and didn't believe Chino, until he convinced her that the Rumble, despite good intentions, had happened, and Bernardo had gotten killed by Tony, in apparent retaliation for Bernardo's having killed Tony's buddy, Riff.

Getting back to the subject at hand, however, Anita, I think that you're correct in assuming that Anita only got the Sharks' point of view regarding the story, and that had things turned any other way, only the Jets' point of view would've been heard.

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[deleted]

She didn't care about what Bernardo did, just what Tony did. Remember, Bernardo was her boyfriend.

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This:

She didn't care about what Bernardo did, just what Tony did.


may or may not be true, stevenackerman69, but I think that Anita may have just been a little bit shortsighted in that respect, due to her intense grief over Bernardo's (her boyfriend) death.

When Anita was insulted, attacked and almost raped by the Jets at Doc's Candy Store (Doc's arrival at that moment saved her.), when she was leaving the Candy Store, she said
"Bernardo was right! If one of you was lying' in the street bleeding, I'd walk by and spit on you!"
, she clearly revealed her anger at the way she and the other Sharks and their girls had been treated by the Jets. When one of the Jets says "Don't let her go! She'll tell Chino that Tony's hiding in the cellar!", Anita says "
I'll give you the message for your American buddy! You tell that murderer that Maria's never going to meet him. Chino found out about both of them...and shot her! She's dead!"
and then slams out of the Candy Store.

Doc's impatience and exasperation with the Jets also spills over in
When do you kids stop? You make this world lousy!


When Doc goes down to tell Tony about Anita's message, Tony refuses to believe that there's no Maria, and he excitedly tells Doc about his plans with Maria to run away to the country to live and have lots of kids. The conversation between a now-totally exasperated Doc and Tony goes like this:

Tony:
You know what we're going to do in the country, Maria and me? We're going to have lots and lots of kids, and we'll name them all after you...even the girls. That way, when you
come to visit.....


Doc (slapping Tony in exasperation):
Wake up! Is this the only way to get through to you? Do just what you all do? Bust like a hot water pipe? Why do you kids live like there's a war on? Why do you kill?


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