Opinion: Why do directors keep reinventing 'Romeo and Juliet'?

As Robert Icke's new production comes to the West End with Sadie Sink and Noah Jupe, learn more about Shakespeare's most excitingly adaptable play.

Summary

• Romeo and Juliet is back in the West End directed by Robert Icke and starring Sadie Sink and Noah Jupe
• The production follows several eye-catching recent revivals both in London and on Broadway
• We have also seen Romeo and Juliet reborn on film thanks to directors like Baz Luhrmann
• Directors continue to be inspired by reinventing Shakespeare's beloved romantic tragedy

You could say parting is such sweet sorrow, but then you never have to wait too long before a fresh production of Shakespeare’s heart-breaking tragedy brings his star-crossed lovers back to the stage. Romeo and Juliet is among his most regularly revived plays – but we certainly don’t get the same version every time.

On the contrary: Romeo and Juliet seems to be ripe for reinvention. We’ll see another take on it from leading director Robert Icke in the West End in 2026, led by Sadie Sink (Stranger Things) and Noah Jupe (Hamnet) – and given how Icke has electrifyingly remade classics in the past, from the Oresteia and Hamlet to Oedipus, we can expect a Romeo and Juliet we’ve never seen before.

But just why does this romantic tragedy lend itself to such interesting readings, and why do pioneering directors so enjoy putting their stamp on it? Ahead of your trip to see it at the Harold Pinter Theatre, learn more about this ever-shapeshifting play.

Book Romeo & Juliet tickets on LondonTheatre.co.uk.

It’s a familiar story – so you can do anything

The play probably has the best-known plot of all Shakespeare’s works, and can even lay claim to being one of the most familiar stories in drama. Even if they can’t recite every tiny detail, most people know the main plot points: that these two painfully young lovers come from feuding families, that their romance is kept secret, and that it ends in death and heartbreak.

That means directors can be confident that they don’t need to keep the show in its exact period setting or place (Verona, Italy) or spell out the story to audiences – and so they have the freedom to use the play as a launching pad and experiment with location, time period, bold production elements, different character interpretations, and more.

We’ve seen numerous punchy versions on both stage and screen, including Baz Luhrmann’s iconic 1996 movie Romeo + Juliet, set in contemporary America and starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes. Recently, on both sides of the pond, directors have staged the play in very different ways: Jamie Lloyd’s stripped-back, semi-filmed, moody West End production, led by Tom Holland and Francesca Amewudah-Rivers, vs Sam Gold’s sexy, bold, rock-concert Broadway version starring Kit Connor and Rachel Zegler.

There have also been more extensive reworkings of Romeo and Juliet, such as the remarkable musical West Side Story, numerous ballets and operas, and it forms the basis of everything from Shakespeare in Love to High School Musical. It is endlessly, brilliantly, adaptable.

It has a youthful and rebellious energy

The defining feature of our star-crossed lovers is that they will not follow the rules. They defy their families and friends by falling for a mortal enemy, hooking up in secret, and refusing to let go even if it might prove fatal. It’s a play that cries out for a director to similarly smash the system and trust in their own voice.

The likes of Lloyd, Icke and Gold hardly need to be told, but there does seem to be something innate in Romeo and Juliet that inspires a theatrical revolution. Perhaps that’s why Gold introduced a gig into his production, courtesy of Jack Antonoff’s electrifying songs, or why Rebecca Frecknall took her extraordinary Almeida version at such a breathless pace that it felt like being plunged headlong into hormonal teenage impulsiveness.

It’s also a show that, unlike some classic works, immediately chimes with younger audiences. They can see themselves reflected in its characters, who are often misunderstood or let down by adults. Luhrmann’s film nails that youth appeal with a spectacular sensory overload of a film that is precisely aimed at the MTV generation, right down to its banging pop score.

Gold also captured the imagination of a Gen Z audience when he had Connor (beloved star of Netflix’s queer teen drama Heartstopper) do the famous balcony scene while grabbing hold of Juliet’s airborne bed and doing an impressive pull-up, muscles flexing, in order to kiss her. Swoon! Cue a viral sensation.

It has two iconic roles

Romeo and Juliet is one of the greatest love stories ever told, and at its centre are two amazing roles that all kinds of actors want to get their hands on. That creates an exciting opportunity for directors to cast everyone from big celebrities to talented rising stars: you really do have carte blanche with such a cherished play.

Over the years, we’ve seen some unforgettable pairings in these dramatic, passionate, all-consuming roles. On the big screen: Leslie Howard and Norma Shearer, Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey, Laurence Harvey and Susan Shentall, DiCaprio and Danes. On stage, the likes of Ian McKellen and Francesca Annis, Laurence Olivier and Peggy Ashcroft, Orlando Bloom and Condola Rashad, and, in Frecknall’s version, Toheeb Jimoh and Isis Hainsworth.

Most recently, of course, Romeo and Juliet lured in Spider-Man himself, Tom Holland, and with him a whole new audience for the play, plus a wonderful fresh talent, Amewudah-Rivers, to star opposite him. Broadway also saw huge excitement when Connor and Zegler trod the boards – the latter had gone stratospheric thanks to movies West Side Story and Snow White.

Now Icke has the opportunity to remake the play for the next generation, with two zeitgeist-grabbing leads. Sink became a household name thanks to her role as Max in Stranger Things, and burnished her stage credentials with the super-buzzy Broadway play John Proctor Is the Villain (coming to London shortly). Jupe is following suit: he was in movies A Quiet Place and Ford v Ferrari, and is in the cast of the upcoming Oscar-tipped film Hamnet.

Together they can sink their teeth into a play that really does have everything: ardent poetry and sword fights, family strife and friend groups, parties and weddings, death and undying love. Meanwhile Icke can pick from a number of different resonant themes and ideas – whether the tension between older and younger generations, or perhaps inherited violence, prejudice, toxic masculinity, tribalism, or anything else that speaks to him and to the moment. Romeo and Juliet will be reborn once again.

Book Romeo & Juliet tickets on LondonTheatre.co.uk.

Main photo credit: Noah Jupe and Sadie Sink. (Photo by Helen Murray). Inset: Tom Holland and Francesca Amewudah-Rivers, Claire Danes and Leonardo DiCaprio, Rachel Zegler and Kit Connor (Photos by Marc Brenner, courtesy of the movie, Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman)