Theatre: Romeo and Juliet

I have had a blasphemous suspicion for quite some time now that Romeo and Juliet is not a very good play.

Asia Osborne’s enjoyable but flawed production at the Broadway Studio Theatre has confirmed this notion.

David Foster Wallace criticised Brett Easton Ellis’s American Psycho by suggesting that, “If readers simply believe the world is stupid and shallow and mean, then Ellis can write a mean, shallow, stupid novel that becomes a mordant deadpan commentary on the badness of everything.” The point Wallace makes is that American Psycho is a mean, shallow and stupid novel (discuss).

Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet is commonly understood to be about love. It is also about angsty, albeit articulate, teenagers angsting at each other, the moon and anyone else they can get their hands on. Consequently, no matter how clever the wordplay we still have to spend the whole of the second half rolling our eyes while Juliet and her Romeo spout rubbish. If discovered in an old “My Poetry – PRIVATE” notebook amongst other teenage possessions, it would make us burst out in acne again, that sort of rubbish.

I have often stared at actresses playing the mysteriously coveted Juliet and thought, “Where did they pick her up? She can’t act for toffee.” I was watching Rachel Winters and thinking exactly that when I suddenly realised it wasn’t her fault. It’s a terrible part. Winters was everything and more that a stereotypical Juliet should be: sweet, petite, wide-eyed with distress and wonder, playful as a puppy, loveable and pitiable. But that is not enough.

Winters and her romantic counterpart, Karl Brown, achieve a very believable chemistry but they need more direction. There was a lot of pointless and distracting running around the stage and sawing the air with arms. A few times they both slipped into that high-pitched, breathy style of Shakespeare acting – Osbourne should notice this and mend it.

In general, the whole cast need to be more still. Ben Riddle’s Mercutio somehow contrived to run across the stage after being shot in the gut (this is a contemporary production). Josh Rochford stood out as Friar Laurence because he was physically calm and grounded. This, coupled with his frustrated response to all of Romeo’s nonsense, produced an excellent performance.

There were some nice directorial touches: a well-structured opening brawl where Montague (David Vaughan Knight) and Capulet (James Law) were puppet masters controlling the younger men; Romeo and Juliet making love for the first time while behind them her parents agree to marry her off. The pace was quicker and livelier than I’ve seen it done before: a perfect complement to the never-ending witty chat. Sadly, the production was seriously let down by a terrible, amateur set (Libby Todd, constructed by Helen Clarke). Why was there a miniature lamppost in the middle of the stage? Why?!

The brilliant, natural banter and play between Mercutio, Romeo and Benvolio (a very funny Will Close) was the show’s highlight; it was excellently staged and often delightful. Oddly, this made me realise that perhaps the greater tragedy in the play is the destruction of the young threesome’s friendship, a love perhaps more genuine than the sudden infatuation of Romeo and Juliet.

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