If the ultimate goal of the jukebox musical & Juliet is to make you laugh, it certainly achieves that. At Mirvish’s new all-Canadian-cast production, however, my laughter at this shiny, ironic, over-the-top, confetti-infused spectacle quickly gave way to frustration with some of the show’s narrative choices.
As a subversive take on not only the story but also the authorship of Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet, the musical has proved itself as a global crowd-pleaser. After its 2019 premiere in London’s West End, & Juliet debuted in Toronto and on Broadway in 2022, earning multiple Tony Award nominations, before touring internationally. With no prior experience of the show beyond this Mirvish reincarnation, however, I was surprised that it somehow didn’t live up to its artistic reputation. In its reimagination, & Juliet tries for the zany, flamboyant too-muchness of a feel-good camp aesthetic. Sadly, the musical becomes too anxiously engaged with its own politics and remains mediocre in its narrative ambition.
Created by writer David West Read of Schitt’s Creek fame, with musical covers of songwriter-producer Max Martin’s greatest hits, & Juliet dares to ask the questions: What would have happened if Juliet didn’t follow Romeo to the grave? What if Shakespeare’s wife Anne Hathaway helped him rewrite the ending to his most famous romantic tragedy while inserting herself into the script? What if Juliet really, really loved the song “Roar” by Katy Perry?
And so, we follow Juliet-the-powerhouse-vocalist (Vanessa Sears) away from the incident of her would-be tragic death to Paris, France with her friends May (Matt Raffy) and April (Anne Hathaway in disguise, usually Julia McLellan but played by understudy Tiera Lee Watts at the performance I attended), as well as her nurse Angelique (usually Sarah Nairne, played by understudy Saccha Dennis) as she attempts to imagine a life past her canonical four days with Romeo.
Sears braves the vocal challenge of Juliet with the utmost confidence and precision. Given that she’s also dancing and delivering lines on stage, I couldn’t help but applaud each time she finished a number. Against Sears’ optimistically naive Juliet, Dennis’ Angelique is caring, protective, and pessimistic; the two are this musical’s most moving and virtuosic pairing. At the performance reviewed, Dennis delivered the standout performance, offering up the extreme ebullience, earnestness, and passion which scratched my itch for camp; she easily turned P!nk’s sombre “F**kin Perfect” into the most hilarious song of the show.
Besides Sears and Dennis, David Silvestri’s Lance and David Jeffery’s Romeo are often funny and occasionally charming, and Watts’ singing voice is piercingly beautiful. The rest of the cast, however, struggles to transcend the narrative’s anxiety about its representational politics, which accumulate in the character of May as performed by Raffy.
With May, a character extending Shakespeare’s penchant for androgyny, & Juliet fumbles a rare opportunity for truly dynamic representation. By relying on pop lyrics conceived within the rigid terms of binary gender, the show smugly frames May as a disruptive force without ever labouring beyond the limits of those terms. The production merely repeats these terms in song, leaving May complicit in the constraints upon their own expression. Most telling is the lyric “I’m not yet a girl… not yet a woman,” which, rather than describing who May is, describes them by what they are not, in terms of the gendered binary. Without a sense of who May is, they become a canvas upon which other characters sketch themselves, notably Francois (Brandon Antonio), for whom May is a condition for his righteous rebellion against his father, and who must choose May as his lover for them to have a happy ending.
Raffy’s vocal performance as May suffered from poor enunciation and vowel placement too. But ironically, this lured me back into the musical. In Raffy’s naively earnest style, they poignantly overcome the constrained contents of May’s character by performing against the grain. As such, they unveil what Susan Sontag in her essay “Notes on Camp” describes as “a double sense in which things can be taken.” Rather than bad, this became delightfully camp for me. Most of all, it allowed Raffy to tactfully disturb the flat conformity of May’s character from within their glittery pop veneer. More than anything, this moved me.
Furthermore, Jennifer Weber’s vigorously child-like choreography, Luke Sheppard’s technically astounding direction, Soutra Gilmour’s extravagant set design, and Paloma Young’s deliciously garish costumes come together excellently. These aspects of the show are rightfully excessive, fabulous, and gauche, solidifying the camp grounding upon which I came to appreciate the show as a whole.
And so & Juliet excels in its more physical and technical aspects even as its storyline struggles. Rather than the feel-good camp which the production’s technical too-muchness led me to expect, & Juliet delivers wonderful — if pedestrian — amusement. Overall, beautiful gowns. At least you can have fun with this.
& Juliet runs at the Royal Alexandra Theatre until May 17. More information is available here.
Intermission reviews are independent and unrelated to Intermission’s partnered content. Learn more about Intermission’s partnership model here.
WRITTEN BY
Divine Angubua
Jonathan Divine Angubua is a freelance arts and culture critic living in Toronto. Divine holds a Bachelor of Arts degree with concentrations in Political Science, History, and Creative Writing from the University of Toronto. He enjoys any interesting art and is always looking for great book recommendations. As a writer and lover of theatre, he is most inspired by the strangest things.
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