so a traveling shakespeare troupe came to my school today and performed romeo and juliet and it was just so good and
-the actor playing romeo was hella short and the actor playing benvolio was hella tall. at several points he just picked romeo up and moved him around the stage/out of his way.
-when the nurse delivered juliet’s letter they played it up like she was flirting with mercutio but mercutio just looked at her, wrapped his arm around benvolio, and more or less gave her an expression that said “i’m gay”
-when mercutio and benvolio were making fun of romeo for being Heterosexual™ (aka for loving juliet), benvolio picked him up and mercutio gave him a purple nurple
-juliet wore no shoes throughout the entire show except during the wedding when she wore these giant sparkly pink pumps with platform heels
-when mercutio gave the queen mab speech they had benvolio stand behind him and click castanets and go “ooooooooh” every time he dropped a dramatic line
-they had friar lawerance and the nurse say the prologue and the end lines and like…..that changed the impact of the lines and their character significantly. i’ve made a post or two about this before but i personally interpret romeo and juliet as a story about two kids too afraid to come to their parents with a problem because they’re afraid of repercussions. but what about the adults in their life that DID try to help with them with their problems, but still ended up failing them? let’s just say it hit hard and was very telling when the friar and the nurse choked out the last lines of the play while sobbing.
-whenever there was a fight scene, mercutio and benvolio were constantly trying to keep romeo away from the action, as if he was their younger brother who they didn’t want to get hurt in a brawl. during mercutio’s fight with tybalt, benvolio was shielding romeo with his body and physically picked him up and held him back at times. that really changed the dynamic of the three of them and made it even funnier when ben and merc were teasing romeo about his crush on juliet.
-romeo killed paris by hitting him on the head with a flashlight
-the apothecary that sold romeo poison was dressed up as your typical TV drug dealer and he acted like one as well
-while benvolio more or less disappears from the written play after romeo is banished, they kept him around this time and he followed romeo around to make sure he was okay but didn’t say anything. it was implied he didn’t talk because he was still grieving mercutio. (he also wasn’t there when romeo killed himself)
-i was watching it with a bunch of freshmen who hadn’t read the play before but when juliet killed herself nearly half the room started screaming because they were so shocked
honestly this cast was just so good. i’ve also seen them perform julius caesar set in a modern politician’s world and m*cbeth in a post-apocalyptic setting. i absolutely loved this production and i hope i can see more of their work soon
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