Unfortunately, despite her confident poise and mastery of the script, Brittany Bellizeare’s Juliet just does not connect emotionally. In this production, the passion, and often physical violence between these two, manifest closer to a real connection than the star-crossed lovers. His compatriot Mercutio is played with a quickly alternating fiery intensity and joyful jest by Nate Burger, whose years as a company member with the outstanding American Players Theater in Spring Green, WI explains his comfort with the bard. Edgar Miguel Sanchez is delightful as Romeo passionate, giddy, and often playfully breaking the fourth wall to address audience members. Gaines reminds us that “Romeo and Juliet” has a great deal of humor, mostly in the first three acts (but also in Juliet’s first feigned “death” in Act IV), and she takes a good deal of liberty with the script in order to double down on the laughs, bringing out the best in her actors. But Barbara Gaines, Artistic Director of Chicago Shakespeare Theater, is up to that challenge and has some real success, while several parts of this new production fall short. This story is so seeped into popular culture and has been produced so many ways, that to find a unique take is a challenge.
The great part of reviewing “Romeo and Juliet” is that there is no call to critique the script (it was decent, Shakespeare is OK). Pictured: Brittany Bellizeare and Edgar Miguel Sanchez.
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