Analysis Of Romeo And Juliet

The first thing that caught my eyes entering the theatre was the sheer size of the stage. Conventionally, the stage is as wide as the theatre itself, but what astounded me was the height of the stage. The physical stage itself was extremely wide, tall and deep. The size allowed the director, Alan Paul, to be able to use space and movement to his advantage. After, noticing how vast the stage was, the set design was the next item noticed. The set was a huge sea of red; red carpeting, red walls, red curtains, red doors, etc. The color red typically evokes emotions of anger, passion and love; three very critical emotions throughout the play of Romeo and Juliet. Colors can evoke emotions that sounds and musical stimulation cannot and which is why

The characters’ costumes were very reminiscent of the personality of the characters with a modern twist. Lady Capulet is portrayed as the over-the-top, wealthy housewife and her costume reiterated that statement. She consistently wore expensive-looking shoes, dresses and jewelry. Romeo wore jeans and a t-shirt to show that he is relatively ‘normal’ teenaged boy. Juliet wore juvenile floral tops, jeans and was barefoot most of the show, in contrast to her mother who constantly wore heels, which shows her true age. Same with Mercutio. He always wore gaudy metallic clothing with the ‘rock star’ haircut and eyeliner. The costumes of the characters were modernized to fit the newly portrayed time period without compromising the original personality and background of the characters. This choice was almost necessary due to the modern American concept of the set; the characters could not have been dressed in 15th century Italian clothing while sitting in a plastic chair.

Due to the nature of the play, Romeo & Juliet is an extremely adaptable play and the director took advantage of that. The contemporary American setting made the nearly 500-year-old play relatable and understandable to the typical American audience member. Overall, I found that the production of Romeo & Juliet at the Shakespeare theatre was very well