The Broadway revival of “Romeo + Juliet” plays to the TikTok crowd. But maybe that’s a beneficial thing. Who can forget the classic first line of “Romeo and Juliet”: “How y’all doin’ today?”
Well, perhaps not so classic. But as uttered at the start of the play’s 36th Broadway revival, which opened Thursday at Circle in the Square, the words are certainly more welcoming to the production’s youthful target audience than the traditional iambic pentameter ones: “Two households, both alike in dignity.”
The director Sam Gold’s rec-room adaptation doesn’t actually feature two households. The director Sam Gold has discarded Romeo’s parents and a clutch of other characters. One actor plays both Juliets, merely altering their inflection. And though Kit ConWhile Kit Connor and Rachel Zegler, the box office draws, portray only one star-crossed lover each—he as a beagly Romeo, she as a beamish Juliet—the other eight cast members, adorably, if often indistinguishably, take on 17 roles.
But before you wonder whether this production was sponsored by CliffsNotes, with only as much poetry and staying power as an Instagram story, bear in mind that many of the characters are teenagers and that the play may most usefully be directed at people seeing it for the first time, not the 36th. Indeed, Gold has employed all the tools in his formidable arsenal—scissors, hammers, punches, and wrenches—to pique young people’s interest in a world that resembles their own, rather than Elizabethan London or Renaissance Verona.
So after an energetic preshow filled with flirting, peacocking, and snits of aggression, the story begins with that casual greeting from Gabby Beans, the play’s chorus. Beans, later a hotheaded Mercutio, a beneficent Friar Lawrence, and a barely there Prince Escalus, makes a relatable hype woman, introducing the rest of the cast by first name and telling us whom they’ll be playing. If you’re confused—and even a frequent flyer might be—you can consult a program insert that visualizes the Montagues and Capulets as a mood board.
The show is moody. The funky-sparkly costumes (by Enver Chakartash) and the dusky-stroby lighting (by Isabella Byrd) create a feeling of extremes without much middle. Taylor Swift’s producer Jack Antonoff’s music, which at one point includes a lustful performance of “We Are Young,” does the same, except when it throbs or nods anxiously in the background, as if to maintain the spell.
That’s mostly harmless and entirely unnecessary. Connor needs no help in keeping and maintaining the emotional temperature, easily enlarging the tenderness and obliviousness of his Nick on “Heartstopper” to fit the stage. When he looks into Juliet’s eyes, you see what he wants and how seriously he wants it; when he walks among his riotous peers, as they hump Teddy bears and sniff out insults, you see how little that means to him now.
Connor, being a very physical actor, exercises his recently beefed-up, often tank-topped body. Instead of just climbing to Juliet’s balcony—rrepresented by the design collective dots as a flowery bed that descends from the heavens—hhe does a leaping pull-up from the ground to get there, then lifts himself farther to achieve full face time. This is a lover with lats.
But a manly Romeo and a tiny Juliet—CConnor is nearly a foot taller than Zegler—create, or reinforce, a problem. The statement by Lady Capulet to her 13-year-old daughter that “ladies of esteem” her age are “already made mothers” in Shakespeare’s play is disturbing enough. With an actor who, despite his baby face, looks much older than his years (Connor is 20) and an actress who looks much younger than hers (Zegler is 23), you’re left in an indeterminate space between ancient and current levels of ick.
It’s wise, then, that Gold restricts the pair’s lovemaking to gropes and kisses, despite the supercharged sexuality of the staging otherwise. However, Zegler, similar to Juliet, feels undervalued during this process. She is immensely appealing as a bubbly ingénue with an easy, brilliant, good-girl smile and the crafty intelligence of a captive who sees a key. Her perspective on Paris, the man her father wants her to marry, who is hilariously dressed in a “Gift of God” T-shirt, is priceless; she can’t wipe his kiss off her mouth quickly enough.
However, similar to Maria, the Juliet-analog she portrayed in the 2021 reimagining of “West Side Story,” Zegler doesn’t strictly adhere to the original plan. Society’s rules transform Juliet into a woman who sees only one way to exert her power and uses it. The tragedy here is not tragic enough.