okay notes on the romeo & juliet production i saw the other day:
set in modern-day appalachia and going in i didn't think too hard about that beyond "oh cool" but it worked really really well. gave the whole thing an intense vibe of "this town has been left behind by the rest of america and everyone thinks we're backward assholes and we're clinging to all the pride we have left in our families and our history even when it's history we should actually probably let go of." like rewired my brain for real i had not considered the degree to which the city of verona can be a character in itself
also they played live music!!! mostly folk/country; the show opened with mercutio on guitar singing "ain't no grave" & everyone else joined in
the cast also did a very short reprise at the end which did something to my brain. something about how the play opens telling you what's going to happen and then ends with it happening, but this version of the play opens with a promise of life beyond death and ends with the actors standing up and shaking themselves off and smiling
looooots of folksy singing at the capulet ball. mercutio and benvolio got romeo to do a very dejected drum accompaniment, which he did like he was being tortured UNTIL
juliet did a banjo cover of nina simone's "when i was a young girl" and it was incredible and lovely and also lyrically devastating in context
and THAT was what got romeo's attention and got him to start engaging socially with anyone
romeo was wearing a tina turner shirt :)
tybalt meanwhile was wearing a natty lite shirt
paris looked exactly like a pedro/napoleon dynamite lovechild. i'm sorry for saying it that way but there's no other way to put it. he had the curly hair and the doofy mustache and these dorky overalls and probably a pocket protector. normally i have very few feelings about paris but i really felt bad for this paris; he was clearly just another kid emotionally in over his head and he didn't seem to know what was going on at ANY point which emphasized how much he was just collateral damage in the violence
all of the actors were amazing but the absolute standout was juliet. this juliet was SO good. this juliet is going to be the defining juliet interpretation in my head until the end of fucking days
she was soooooo thirteen years old. so angsty shy gangly teen always hovering between being brilliant + still being the girl who hugs her parents and clings onto their arm and hides her face in their shoulders. the actress was SO good at hitting the exact mark of displaying how bright and determined juliet is and also how she is soooooooooooooo scowly little preteen
also her pajamas were PJ shorts and a britney spears shirt
very good tybalt. he was hot-headed as any tybalt would be but he honestly felt a little hotspurcore--at the capulets' ball when he saw romeo, everything about his body language and tone of voice was very clearly communicating not JUST anger but deep confusion/frustration about why he was the only person taking shit seriously. the feud runs everybody's life and yet in this scene he is the ONLY person who seems to understand that and he looked genuinely disoriented that lord capulet told him off
which lord capulet did do. loudly. to the point where everyone else at the party started looking nervously in their direction even when lord capulet was like "aha no keep partying <3"
i know i'm saying this about every character but fantastic mercutio. he hit the exact right note of being 80% dickhead teen who causes problems on purpose and 20% Abruptly And Darkly Intense In A Scary Way. also he carried the guitar around all the time and sang lewd jokes at people
during the queen mab speech he got benvolio to act out being the fairies' charioteer, which benvolio did by hunching down in a carriage-driver pose and making a gargoyle sound
i thought they weren't using fake blood because sometimes you just have to imagine the blood with your beautiful mind. and then the duel scene hit and ohhhhh man. mercutio did his first “i am hurt!” like when you stub your toe. and then he turned around and i heard someone in the audience make a sound because it was GUSHING. romeo rushed over to hold him up and mercutio collapsed into him with this sort of desperate exhaustion and you could hear the blood continuing to dribble and slop around on the floor it was NASTY AND LOUD
his wound was just your generic actor's faked stab wound. but romeo slit tybalt's throat. and tybalt had been intense and scary up to that point but after killing mercutio he was clearly wobbly and as romeo held the knife up he went "no, wait--" very small
and then, unlike mercutio (who died offscreen), he thrashed around on the floor for like a full thirty seconds
juliet's "tybalt is dead that would have killed my husband so i gotta stop crying" was transparently her trying to convince herself not to mourn tybalt but then she broke down sobbing again
that ^ scene was intercut with romeo and the friar talking about banishment so both of them were on stage at once but still unable to reach each other. very good
my beef with the friar + nurse is always "how are you THIS reckless with leaving these kids to their own devices when you have each had to talk each of them down from suicide like three times" and in this one. when the nurse found juliet "dead" in her coma. she thought juliet was sleeping until she found the empty vial of sleeping draught. and for a second she didn't yell for the capulet parents she just stared at the vial in total devastation. not surprised at all. just horrified.
and then when she screamed for juliet's parents she shoved the vial in her coat so they wouldn't see it. maybe to protect juliet or maybe so they didn't have to know
my shocker dark horse second favorite role interpretation was honest to god lord capulet. which is incredible because i've hated him violently since i read this play in high school english. but the actor very obviously had an EXTREMELY clear picture of his motivations and also that he loved his kid so fucking much
like far be it from me to defend the guy who screams at his daughter and threatens to throw her out on the street (he was frightening in that scene. really well-acted) but in every interaction between them up to that point his pride and adoration for her shone out of his body language. and at the start of that scene before he started yelling juliet (sobbing) ran up to him and grabbed him in a hug and he looked distraught
very painfully clear that he was trying to make her feel better. and also stressed out of his mind, especially after tybalt died, but mostly that he was really really really fucking worried about his daughter and trying desperately to make her better but always picking the exact wrong thing. STILL AN ASSHOLE! but devastating!
and when everyone thought juliet was dead the nurse + lady capulet were screaming but lord capulet just sat next to comatose juliet and very gently put her head in his lap and started stroking her hair murmuring "shh, shh" like man it takes a LOT for me to believe that man sees juliet as anything but a bargaining tool but THEY SOLD ME ON IT!
and then the nurse FUCKING SANG THE NINA SIMONE SONG AGAIN AS THEY CARRIED HER BODY OUT
romeo died very peacefully. he drank the poison + he kissed juliet + then he settled down next to her like he was falling asleep. but juliet. ohhhh god. juliet stabbed herself because that's what juliet does and it wasn't an easy hollywood-shakespeare one-pretty-knife-movement-and-she-gasps-and-dies stabbing. it was slow and agonizing and she twisted the knife in her own stomach and then she was sort of thrashing around on stage hyperventilating in violent terror like she was reaching out for someone to rescue her
has anyone noticed that they both have the same last word which is "die." the word being die honestly matters way less to me than the two of them having the same last word. after their first conversation made a sonnet. always on the same exact page in their language
this ^ was the point at which i started bawling and then i did not stop for I Shit You Not A Real Human Hour
