Juliet & Romeo: a hollow Shakespeare musical

It is said that William Shakespeare’s oeuvre speaks to every part of our lives: Romeo and Juliet for when we are young, dumb, and in love; Hamlet for when we lose a parent; King Lear for when we are old. Juliet & Romeo is a desperate attempt to resonate with today’s youth, presumably to get them interested in Shakespeare, but also diverges from the original in baffling and counterintuitive ways that undermine or erase the text’s timeless messages. This begs the question: if this adaptation isn’t faithful (as Baz Luhrmann’s was) and its alterations aren’t daring (as problematic opera maestro Franco Zeffirelli’s was), what’s the point of all this?  

There is no one right answer, although it probably has something to do with Hollywood’s longstanding love of established intellectual property and a desire to sell copies of brothers Evan Kidd Bogart and Justin Gray’s soundtrack. Despite the duo’s bona fides – Bogart wrote or co-wrote (among many other songs) Rihanna’s SOS and Sean Kingston’s Take You There, while Gray has worked with Avril Lavigne, Mariah Carey, and John Legend – the songs are extremely tedious. Not quite pop music and not quite showstopping musical numbers, we’re treated to auto-tuned actors pushing through 15 very long songs with lyrics like “Maybe I’m not meant for you / Sometimes hearts are meant to break instead” (sung by the star-crossed lovers) and “The role I play / every goddamned day” (sung by Rebel Wilson’s Lady Capulet and other female characters struggling against gender roles thrust upon wealthy Veronese women). The more established or respectable thespians involved in the production – Rupert Everett (in a few brief appearances), Jason Isaacs, Wilson, Rupert Graves, and Derek Jacobi (the only one not phoning it in) – are mostly relegated to standing around and watching the kids sing and dance.  

While a musical adaptation is perfectly suited to a well-known story like this, it’s undermined by Juliet & Romeo’s hollowness and condescension. This is a movie made by adults who think they know what kids think is funny and cool. The apothecary (Dan Fogler) who makes the sleeping-death potion is reimagined as Jewish to vaguely gesture at medieval antisemitism, but also serves as Romeo’s weed dealer. (“These are just herbs, but they will make you dreeeeammm,” he assures Romeo.) The obsession with the potion doesn’t stop there: how it works is repeatedly explained through dialogue, and then again through a montage of those same dialogue scenes before Juliet and Romeo – prepare yourself – wake up and escape. Lest you fret, the titles assure us this is “to be continued.” 

► Juliet & Romeo is in UK cinemas now.