& Juliet Playhouse Theatre Edinburgh 12th November 2024 Review
& Juliet is at The Playhouse Theatre Edinburgh (13 – 16 November) and if you like the idea of a re-take on the classic play by Shakespeare where Juliet doesn’t die, interwoven with some of the biggest hit songs from artists such as Britney Spears, Pink, Katy Perry, Backstreet Boys and many more, then this might just be the show for you.
The link between all of the artists who have their music featured in this “jukebox musical” is Swedish pop songwriter Max Martin, as he is either the writer or co-writer of all of the songs in this show, and also serves as a producer overseeing all aspects of this show’s development. With hits like “Baby One More Time”, “I’m Not A Girl, Not Yet A Woman”, “Ooops!...I Did It again”, “I Kissed A Girl” and “I Want It That way” (to name just a few) to his credit, Max Martin is one of the most successful songwriters in contemporary music and his songs have, for many people, defined their musical youth.
The depth of successful talent behind this production includes David West Read (book), Luke Sheppard (director), Jennifer Weber (choreographer), and Bill Sherman (music supervisor), so it is little surprise that this show has won so many industry awards since its first performance in 2019.
For me though, there are always going to be potential issues with any “jukebox musical” format show, and the difference between one like this where songs are used for scenes/part dialogue that they were never originally created for and a musical where the songs are specially written for scenes and people is always obvious.” In “& Juliet”, this results in a seemingly endless performance of songs, trying to squeeze as many in as possible in all too short a performance time. This leaves almost no room for individual character or larger story development, and what is left is an assortment of people on-stage that it is very difficult to have any empathy with. For one of the greatest love stories of all time to have so little room for human relationships and emotions is a problem for me.
There are, however, some interesting threads running through this story. Having William Shakespeare (played tonight by Michael Nelson and not Matt Cardle) and his wife Anne Hathaway (Lara Denning) actually creating – well arguing over - the planned ending of Romeo & Juliet is an interesting concept and also opens the way for more than a few Shakespearian references to the two of them.
This show’s Juliet is very different from any Juliet that most people have probably seen on-stage and very much a young woman (older than the 13 year old girl that Shakespeare based his Juliet on) with contemporary attitudes on who she really wants to be and how she wants to live her life. In this title role, Gerardine Sacdalan has the job of hitting the right notes for so many of these songs and judging from the response of the audience tonight, her energetic performance did just that.
Like all musicals of this genre, many of the cast are here because of their vocal abilities and not their dramatic ones, and to be fair this show is not selling itself as a dramatic production, but as a feel-good music show packed with well-known songs. Targeting the audience who remember these songs and the artists who sang them first time around is obviously where this show’s demographic audience lies, and looking around the audience tonight, it seems to have done that perfectly. Often though, it seems to have targeted the show at the age range these people were at first time around as well.
There are new characters here too in this story, and telling you about them would ruin the story line a bit - sorry folks. It does seem odd though that every time producers try to tick every politically correct box that they can, they so often end up creating the very large stereotypes that they are trying so hard to avoid.
Romeo & Juliet always has an inbuilt problem with casting and that is that you need young people in these roles, and here Juliet (Gerardine Sacdalan) and Romeo (Jack Danson) certainly have the youthful energy needed for these roles, but often they are, like here, are in the early years of their professional careers. Tonight, the longer performance experience of Sandra Marvin (Angelique) and Lara Denning (Anne Hathaway) was showing. Not helping matters here was the fact (for me anyhow) that the story and dynamics between William Shakespeare and Anne Hathaway were often far more interesting that Juliet’s story, and Lara Denning stole every scene that she was in.
& Juliet is what it is, a fun show full of many memorable hit songs and this audience was obviously loving every minute of it.
Review by Tom King © 2024
www.artsreviewsedinburgh.com
The link between all of the artists who have their music featured in this “jukebox musical” is Swedish pop songwriter Max Martin, as he is either the writer or co-writer of all of the songs in this show, and also serves as a producer overseeing all aspects of this show’s development. With hits like “Baby One More Time”, “I’m Not A Girl, Not Yet A Woman”, “Ooops!...I Did It again”, “I Kissed A Girl” and “I Want It That way” (to name just a few) to his credit, Max Martin is one of the most successful songwriters in contemporary music and his songs have, for many people, defined their musical youth.
The depth of successful talent behind this production includes David West Read (book), Luke Sheppard (director), Jennifer Weber (choreographer), and Bill Sherman (music supervisor), so it is little surprise that this show has won so many industry awards since its first performance in 2019.
For me though, there are always going to be potential issues with any “jukebox musical” format show, and the difference between one like this where songs are used for scenes/part dialogue that they were never originally created for and a musical where the songs are specially written for scenes and people is always obvious.” In “& Juliet”, this results in a seemingly endless performance of songs, trying to squeeze as many in as possible in all too short a performance time. This leaves almost no room for individual character or larger story development, and what is left is an assortment of people on-stage that it is very difficult to have any empathy with. For one of the greatest love stories of all time to have so little room for human relationships and emotions is a problem for me.
There are, however, some interesting threads running through this story. Having William Shakespeare (played tonight by Michael Nelson and not Matt Cardle) and his wife Anne Hathaway (Lara Denning) actually creating – well arguing over - the planned ending of Romeo & Juliet is an interesting concept and also opens the way for more than a few Shakespearian references to the two of them.
This show’s Juliet is very different from any Juliet that most people have probably seen on-stage and very much a young woman (older than the 13 year old girl that Shakespeare based his Juliet on) with contemporary attitudes on who she really wants to be and how she wants to live her life. In this title role, Gerardine Sacdalan has the job of hitting the right notes for so many of these songs and judging from the response of the audience tonight, her energetic performance did just that.
Like all musicals of this genre, many of the cast are here because of their vocal abilities and not their dramatic ones, and to be fair this show is not selling itself as a dramatic production, but as a feel-good music show packed with well-known songs. Targeting the audience who remember these songs and the artists who sang them first time around is obviously where this show’s demographic audience lies, and looking around the audience tonight, it seems to have done that perfectly. Often though, it seems to have targeted the show at the age range these people were at first time around as well.
There are new characters here too in this story, and telling you about them would ruin the story line a bit - sorry folks. It does seem odd though that every time producers try to tick every politically correct box that they can, they so often end up creating the very large stereotypes that they are trying so hard to avoid.
Romeo & Juliet always has an inbuilt problem with casting and that is that you need young people in these roles, and here Juliet (Gerardine Sacdalan) and Romeo (Jack Danson) certainly have the youthful energy needed for these roles, but often they are, like here, are in the early years of their professional careers. Tonight, the longer performance experience of Sandra Marvin (Angelique) and Lara Denning (Anne Hathaway) was showing. Not helping matters here was the fact (for me anyhow) that the story and dynamics between William Shakespeare and Anne Hathaway were often far more interesting that Juliet’s story, and Lara Denning stole every scene that she was in.
& Juliet is what it is, a fun show full of many memorable hit songs and this audience was obviously loving every minute of it.
Review by Tom King © 2024
www.artsreviewsedinburgh.com