Romeo and Juliet, one of William Shakespeare's most well-known and beloved plays, has been performed in many iterations and eras over the years. It was the inspiration for the 1950s Broadway musical West Side Story, which placed the tale of two star-crossed lovers in urban New York City. Director Baz Luhrmann's 1996 film version was set in the fictional post-modern city of Lake Verona, with lots of yelling and gunshots.
Now, the New Cannon Theatre Company, the community arts organization based here in Monterey, is doing their own version of the play, set in 1968 at the height of the Vietnam War and nationwide civil unrest. In this version, Juliet's family, the Capulets, are aligned with authority, tradition, and war, while Romeo and the Montagues are rooted in protest culture and social change. I spoke recently with the play's director, Noah Luce, and I asked him how he came up with the idea to set the play in the turbulent 1960s:
NOAH LUCE: All I could see in my brain was the, you know, the grouping of people who identified as free love, some people might colloquially call them 'hippies,' versus more of that conservative type of being. I saw this clash of color and monochromatic.
From there, through a lot of conversations, we settled on the year 1968. We are at the precipice of the Vietnam War. One of the unique troubles with Romeo and Juliet that I've always experienced as a person watching it is Romeo's need to find love. We get introduced to Romeo very early in the play, and he's obsessively depressed over his relationship with a woman named Rosaline. Then in one scene, he's completely in love with Juliet, and they get married, right? It happens all so fast. And by setting it in 1968 on the precipice of the draft, that really helps clarify that character's need to find a love connection.
Click the audio player at the top of this story to listen to the interview or read the highlights below. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Actor Celeste Lagrange, who plays Juliet, on the development of this hawkish version of the character:
CELESTE LAGRANGE: In this Juliet that Noah and I have been building, we want to establish that she is a product of the Capulets, and the Capulets are strong and sharp and politically savvy and extremely powerful. I like to think of this Juliet as extremely cunning and intelligent and a true Capulet. But perhaps she is questioning the things that she's seeing around her. And then she meets Romeo, and her whole world is shifted.
Actor Elijah Hernandez on how they identified with the doveish version of Romeo in New Canon's version of Romeo and Juliet:
ELIJAH HERNANDEZ: The actual implications of the time period, that was what was my key into this Romeo. It is these people who are in to peace and love but get into some scraps and are getting tear gas thrown at them...so many pieces of that counterculture that I myself very much identify with.
I come from a border town, so there's been a lot of advocating for ourselves and our communities, so it was important to me to be able to avoid the stereotypical hippie. It is a deep feeling of love that is so much more radical and, dare I say, violent. Mercutio has a line that says, "if love be rough with you, be rough with love." And so that is the thesis and ethos for the Montague family and for this Romeo.
Director Noah Luce on how this version of Romeo and Juliet, set in the 1960s, still resonates today:
NOAH LUCE: We're in a conflict with Iran. We have a government that's incredibly divisive. We're living through a very similar point in time. I see so many friends and family who are struggling to stay in connection with each other because of their political ideology. And this play, I think, highlights that for so many. So I hope people can come and examine where they are at currently in their lives and their family and their relationships.
New Cannon Theatre's production of "Romeo and Juliet" opens tomorrow night at the outdoor Forest Theatre in Carmel and runs through June 28th. New Canon Theatre is one of KAZU's many underwriters. Our editorial decisions are made independently of sponsorship agreements.
![Hernandez, [l] and Legrange [r] as the title characters in New Canon Theatre's production of "Romeo and Juliet."](https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/743429c/2147483647/strip/true/crop/1783x2500+0+0/resize/840x1178!/format/webp/quality/90/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F25%2F4e%2F6c58d2784fb4a90fde2ac77356f1%2Fdscf0033.jpeg)