Romeo and Juliet is irresistibly relevant (the ultimate accolade de nos jours): warring families, rebellion, youthful energy expressing itself in violence and passion, bewilderment between the generations, and, like a flower in the desert, the possibility of true love and redemption. All of this is common ground shared by the sixteenth century and our world today. Some aspects of the play even seem shockingly modern: what is Mercutio but a contemporary hyper ADHD kid? Isn't Tybalt a streetwise, feral psychopath ruling the Estate? Arranged marriages and honour killings are still going on, and lovers on the rebound still gatecrash parties and meet someone else the same evening. No wonder that from West Side Story to Romeo + Juliet to the present touring production by Headlong Theatre the play has been presented in contemporary terms.There are, of course, elements of the play that are remote to us, and which we need to accommodate imaginatively if we are to enjoy a modernising production: not many of us live in a city state under the absolute power of a prince; few teenage lovers would rush off to the Friar, or marry in his cell; not many teenage girls have nurses, and family wars don't, as far as I know, generally lead to the construction of kitsch golden monuments to their victims. And so the play comes close to us, and then, in an instant, backs off and reminds us it's from somewhere else altogether.
Headlong Theatre's production, directed by Robert Icke, brings out the perennial relevance of the play without trying to hide the strictly Renaissance aspects under a blanket of gimmicks and concepts. We started without the sonnet prologue (a mistake, I think, traditionalist that I am), and went straight into the action with a ticking digital clock. The story was played out with a stress on the compressed action, a narrative energy we recognise from shows like 24 and The Killing. One brilliant idea was to have double takes (Sliding Doors, Run Lola Run and a staple of video games) of some scenes as alternative scenarios were played out: tiny alterations to events mean the two lovers don't meet at the party, or the Nurse never gets to deliver Juliet's message, or Romeo in Mantua learns of Juliet's plan in time. It brought home the hugely contingent nature of the tragedy, which depends on so many near hits and near misses. A dull brick wall closing off a space on which about the only furniture was the bed (sliding on and off) was enough to suggest the oppressive enclosure in which the young generation are struggling to make something of their lives. The besuited Prince behind a microphone was enough to place it in the modern world of rolling news.
There was a great deal more inventive theatre to admire, some of it refreshingly simple. It was good to see the fights, which are massive choreographed events in the films by Zeffirelli and Luhrmann, played out as tawdry scuffles (and an opening double take suggested that it was one tiny accident that set the whole train of events in motion). Mercutio (played by Tom Mothersdale) was convincingly brilliant and troubled, the ace student who's still expelled from a new school every year. In the last fifteen minutes or so before the interval acting and directorial ideas came together to create a huge emotional impact: scenes between the Friar and Romeo and the Nurse and Juliet were intercut, played out at the same time on the same space, while a traumatised Benvolio (Danny Kirrane) described the deaths of first Mercutio and then Tybalt from a screen-shaped balcony area. This really brought over the sense of everything happening at once, and the musical accompaniment of Tori Amos singing 'I Don't Like Mondays' expressed the sense of melancholy and alienation beneath the action. It was a triumphant feat of stagecraft, taking us right into the emotional vortex of the play. I also loved the hallucinatory sequence using film as Juliet's potion goes through her system (though I was sorry to lose my favourite line, Capulet's 'Death lies on her ...'). And there was wonderfully simple idea for staging Romeo buying his poison from an apothecary (musical background, and the weirdly blank look of the dealer were typical of the sense of detail in the production).
So there were lots of clever theatrical ideas, but it wasn't over-directed. There was room for the acting to engage us. The star-crossed lovers, played by Daniel Boyd and Catrin Stewart, were gauche teenagers, hardly comprehending or even believing the emotions going through them. I liked Romeo's nervy, trying-to-keep-his-cool body language. Juliet took us through her emotional journey, largely imprisoned on the bed which was her own private theatre of love and death (and full marks to her and to Brigid Zengari's Nurse for perfect diction; some other moments in the evening were a notch too quiet, given the competition of some noisy lighting fans). The production was at its strongest in bringing out the Capulet family drama: I'd never really noticed before the significance of Juliet being the only surviving child, on whom the dreams of the dynasty are pinned. That helped to explain Capulet's furious treatment of her when she goes against his wishes. The idea of Lady Capulet and Tybalt having a fling at the party had a fantastic pay-off later, as we saw Lady C after Tybalt's death crumbling away as she contemplated the expiry of her own chances of happiness. The Capulet parents (Keith Bartlett and Caroline Faber) had a great depth and presence, and the mother-daughter scenes were touchingly played, close yet awkward. Because of this focus on Juliet's family drama the Montague-Capulet feuding had less weight. When Montague appeared at the end, I realised I'd almost forgotten there was an inter-family feud. And the Prince was left with his lines but not integrated into the story in other ways (eg by appearing on the streets, but that is a problem in the script). So private ensemble tragedy came over more powerfully than the public and political. But now that large-scale movies have stressed the political side (LA gangs, immigrants etc) it is surely right for stage productions to remind us that the play is predominantly a small-scale chamber drama.
The production engaged us constantly with inventiveness and detail, while allowing Shakespeare's verse to breathe. Imaginative staging helped to bring out the inner drama of the characters' feelings. But what feelings are they, exactly? Language and love constantly evade each other, as sincerity collapses into cliché. In whatever guise it is presented, Shakespeare's great tragic love story (though he did not make up the story) casts a shadow. For there is, inescapably, the possibility that this love is just another infatuation of Romeo's, Juliet conveniently taking the place of Rosaline as the latest dreamgirl. A double suicide caused by an infatuation and a series of accidents? That tragedy would be too dark altogether. So we hold onto the notion of mutual adoration that the lyrical poetry offers us, believing that, to be the cause of so much suffering, the passion of the couple must also be real. And perhaps it is believing it that makes it true.
To end with the production, though. Headlong were in association with Nottingham Playhouse and Hull Truck. They are an exciting company, and the young trio of Daniel Boyd / Catrin Stewart and Robert Icke are names to watch. Great to see such a good Romeo and Juliet just down the road in Southampton's Nuffield Theatre. There's a nice review of it by Lyn Gardner in The Guardian, too. Strongly recommended.
