Modern dress is a term used in theatre

Theatre

Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...

 and film

Film

A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...

 to refer to productions of plays

Play (theatre)

A play is a form of literature written by a playwright, usually consisting of scripted dialogue between characters, intended for theatrical performance rather than just reading. There are rare dramatists, notably George Bernard Shaw, who have had little preference whether their plays were performed...

 from the past in which the setting is updated to the present day (or at least to a more recent time period), but the text is left relatively unchanged. For example, Baz Luhrmann

Baz Luhrmann

Mark Anthony "Baz" Luhrmann is an Australian film director, screenwriter, and producer best known for The Red Curtain Trilogy, which includes his films Strictly Ballroom, William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet and Moulin Rouge!...

's film Romeo and Juliet uses a relatively unaltered text of Shakespeare's play but updates the setting to contemporary America.