Straight talk about "Romeo and Juliet' (2nd review)

I looked up "Romeo" in my old red dictionary. The definition reads: "Any male lover, after the romantic lover of Juliet in Shakespeare's tragedy Romeo and Juliet."

I've been thinking a lot about the archetypal lovers after taking in the Arden Theatre Company's Romeo and Juliet. The press release calls it a "tale of pure passion." "It's a play about love and hate," director Matt Pfeiffer writes in the playbill. R & J's deaths, he says, are tragic but necessary, because a society needs that loss of innocence to see itself, to forgive and love again. The Arden's producing artistic director, Terry Nolen, notes (also in the playbill) that Pfeiffer recently got married, so "who better to direct this story of passion and promise?"

Not to be outdone, the Arden production's sponsor— Thomas M. Petro, CEO of Fox Chase Bank— informs us that R & J's love "explodes onto the stage with all of its violent, ecstatic, overpowering forcefulness superseding all other values, loyalties and emotions."

After I see a Shakespeare play, I can never resist pulling out my battered Complete Works to drink in the actual text as I consider a director's arrangement or cuts. R & J is no different"“ I may start by tracking down a certain line of Friar Lawrence's, but the peerless language draws me in until I surface halfway down the next page, trying to remember my original thought. This is why it's a bit painful to say what I'm about to say.

"Pure passion"? Pure fatal whining, more like.

I smell a plot device

Of course, as a tragedy, Romeo and Juliet ranks right up there with Hamlet, especially if we're talking Act V body count. I enjoyed the stark and stirring lighting and costume design of the Arden's show, thanks to Thom Weaver and Rosemary McKelvey, especially at the inevitable tableau o' death. But honestly, I didn't feel much. And that's not Matt Pfeiffer's fault.

Why don't I feel sad? Yes, yes, the Capulets and Montagues hate each other. It's an ancient grudge. But how did all this stabbing and thumb biting get started? I smell a plot device.

The families might be bitter rivals, but it's not a matter of a deliciously vengeful, ambitious schemer like Lady Macbeth or Iago, spinning love and glory into ultimate doom. It's just an overly optimistic friar and nurse who, if they had a shred of common sense, wouldn't have entertained this liaison.

And what's the final death knell of this star-cross'd marriage? An undelivered letter. Here it is again. Oops.

What would papa say?

And do you really think Romeo could come back to life with 20 hundred thousand times more joy? If he revived, things might be blissful— until the weekend, when Romeo would meet another, less problematic girl. And Juliet would be rejected by papa, since she's (a) alive and (b) married to the man of her choice, both of which surely qualify as gadding. The lovers would be disowned, destitute, and toting three kids by the time they were 19.

R & J contains some pretty strong hate. But love? Our star-crossed lovers have known each other for less than a week. If we'd spent the last four centuries merely refraining from pointing out the brainless folly of committing suicide over someone you've known for three or four days, the adage "Speak no ill of the dead" might come to mind. Instead, we've not only avoided emphasizing Romeo and Juliet's lethal silliness, we've canonized them as paragons of true passion.

Consider Kate and Petruchio

My encounters with R & J actually remind me of Shakespeare's similarly flawed The Taming of the Shrew. Is Katharina really subjugated, or is her newfound submission, all in good fun, the product of true love? Even when productions play the politically correct latter, Shrew still doesn't sit right with me. In order for us enlightened modern folks to happily stomach the end of Shrew, we must assume that Kate's really fallen for Petruchio, despite some rather violent indications to the contrary.

Similarly, for us to buy into the R & J brand as a heartbreaking, significant piece of theater, we have to believe in a very ill-founded love: that getting married to the boy you met yesterday at your parents' party"“ and then stabbing yourself upon his death a few days later"“ is the ultimate show of passion and faith.

Am I a Philistine?

Maybe I wish I could tear up and give a good R & J a standing ovation like everyone else. Am I a hard-hearted Philistine? Oh, I have cried over R & J "“ when I was 14. But a more adult perspective on partnership has squelched my enjoyment of R & J. Why have we enshrined the fickle, maudlin young Romeo as a synonym for "lover"?

Cut R & J some slack, says my husband"“ it's only a play, even if it is Shakespeare. No one claimed R & J is a true story. But "one of the greatest stories of all time" (in Matt Pfeiffer's words)?

All of us read R & J in high school, and maybe this consistent early familiarity breeds the play's modern success. Too early seen unknown, I say. Awed as I was as a teenager by the incandescent language and overblown emotions, I mistook R & J for a story about true love. The play is worth revisiting as an adult, but not necessarily to affirm its worth. ♦


To read Jim Rutter's review of the Arden production, click here.
To read a response, click here.