The curtain rises on fair Verona, but peace in the city has recently been disturbed by new discord between two noble households who bear an ancient grudge. Young men, servants and gentlemen alike, from the rival houses of Capulet and Montague, roam the streets in search of quarrel. It is not long before fighting breaks out, only halted by the ruling Prince, who is enraged by this civil strife and issues stern warnings to both leaders. The eldest Montague son, Romeo, did not take part in this latest fray, for he has been eschewing social company, distracted by the self-conscious melancholy of an unrequited love. This very night, however, Romeo will be persuaded to attend a party at the rival Capulets, where a sudden but seismic moment of enchantment will change his destiny and that of both families.
This is of course the start of what is arguably the most famous love story of all time, William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. The tragic tale of the young lovers who fall deeply in love at first sight, and in a mad rush seek to defy their families to be together is probably Shakespeare’s most popular play, not only in the theatre but also in the countless forms it has been retold, in musicals, dance, opera, and film. Romeo and Juliet’s ecstatic young love, and their terrible fate has become iconic, a model for romantic plot lines in any setting or time. As it happens, I am just back from a visit to Verona, where the lovers’ names live on in innumerable bogus forms, and still draw millions to pay homage.
As we record this episode, a typically daring new production of the play directed by Robert Icke is playing in London’s West End, with Sadie Sink and Noah Jupe starring as the “star-crossed lovers”. I’m delighted to have this production as a prompt to cover the play, and even more excited to be able to welcome a proper expert to guide us through it, Shakespearean scholar, Dr Hester Lees-Jeffries. Hester is a Director of Studies in English at Cambridge University, where she specialises in Shakespeare and early modern drama. She is the author of the introduction to the third edition of the New Cambridge Shakespeare edition of the text of Romeo and Juliet.
Shakespeare’s plays covered on The Play Podcast:
104 – Twelfth Night
103 – Titus Andronicus
076 – Othello
070 – King Lear
064 – A Midsummer Night’s Dream
048 – Much Ado About Nothing
038 – Macbeth
036 – Hamlet
005 – The Tempest
