Romeo and Juliet - Rethinking love

The tale of Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy no different to any other doomed romance. But I, the ever hopeless romantic, yearn for an alternate ending every time. And the national theatre production featuring Jessie Buckley and Josh O’Connor, was no different (spoiler alert). Emotions ran high, intense eye contact was made, and it was once again proved that Shakespeare’s verse is timeless.

Admittedly, sitting down to watch this with my family turned what could have been a very somber experience into something more lighthearted. Between my mum asking if Friar Lawrence was a drug pusher to my stepdads horror that his favourite lines had been cut, much of the tragedy was transformed into a more comedic view. And still, I was moved more than I had ever imagined possible by the raw vulnerability portrayed in the production.

I find heterosexual drama tiring. I am the first person to say I’m sick of seeing these strange dynamics play out on my screen. So why, then, did this drive me to tears, why did I beg Romeo to wait just one more minute for Juliet to wake up while on my sofa, face in hands? Was it my period hormones, was it my touch-starved lockdown angst, or am I just more of a romantic than I previously realised?

This play made me reevaluate my own views on love and romance. My family’s surprise that I was visibly upset by a romance was amusing, but also made me wonder, ‘god, am I really that stone cold?’. The Romantic Lit student in me wants a marriage in one day, violent end, sweep me off my feet type of romance. But I am nothing if not practical and cautious - I am my mother’s daughter. I could never see myself claiming love at first sight, even less believing in soulmates. But for a short while, Romeo and Juliet made me believe it was truly possible, that, if I let myself, I could give in to softness.

Maybe I was just seduced by the candlelight and flowers and masquerade masks. But this production made me want to fall head over heels, to sacrifice it all, to marry someone my parents hate and meet a bitter end. This gorgeous film-theatre hybrid seemed to hit home for me in a way I could never have expected, perhaps because of my thing for Josh O’Connor, or perhaps simply, because it caught me at a tender and transient moment in my life.

Is the Bard criticising the drama and the excesses of love? Certainly. But to me, he seems more to be criticising the institutions preventing this ridiculous, charming, lustful union. Perhaps love is supposed to be ridiculous and caught up in the moment. Perhaps I am just learning that.