Romeo and Juliet

[ceebeegee]

I have wanted to do this play for a while, but have hesitated because there are so few juicy roles for women--the Nurse and Juliet, and that's pretty much it. (Another reason is that you need a SET for R&J, you really can't do it outside.) I always thought, if Holla Holla did do it, I would cast Mercutio as a woman, perhaps in love with Romeo which would shed some light on Mercutio's later actions. But looking through the character list, I might be able to convert some other roles:

Prince Escalus: Prince of Verona--could easily be a Princess.

Benvolio: Cousin of Romeo--I can't remember much about what he does, but could this be cast as a woman?

The Chorus--definitely.

I don't want to mix it up too much, because with R&J I feel there's a lot of testosterone in it--that the feud is so senselessly murderous that on some level it's a dick-measuring contest. So I don't want to cross-cast Tybalt or Paris or the servants who mix it up at the beginning.

Comments

Re: Tell us how you really feel...

[melebeth]

Ugh. Not at all what I want to do with it. I want to take as a jumping point his early scene with Romeo where he discusses all the girls Romeo has loved before (who've travelled in and out his door), and focus on what his motivation might be for pushing _this_ pairing. Star crossed lovers, my ass.

Re: Tell us how you really feel...

[carasol.livejournal.com]

See, that would be interesting!! I'd actually be interested in seeing that, because you're completely right, they aren't star-crossed at all. Without the Friar and the Nurse helping out, the play would never happen.

In the play I saw, Romeo and Juliet are only ever offstage characters. The only people we see are the Friar and the Nurse, and the only time a word of Shakespeare is spoken is when the Friar gets word (from offstage, of course) that his letter to Romeo never arrived. My friend (Ben, actually) said that the whole theme of the play seemed to be "Easy come, easy go," as in "Oh, well, they're dead, easy come, easy go. Now let's talk about me leaving the clergy and us getting married."

Bah.