My Review of “Romeo & Juliet” at the PSF
I saw Romeo and Juliet at the Philadelphia Shakespeare Festival last night. First things first : I’m very grateful to the PSF for working so hard over the last 11 years to bring Shakespeare to the Philadelphia area. Like many other people, I often struggle with Shakespeare, but each year, I find that I get more and more out of it. Over the last four years, I’ve seen Taming of the Shrew, Julius Caesar, The Condensed Works of William Shakespeare, and now Romeo and Juliet. The PSF is just a wonderful opportunity for local folks like myself hone their skills as a Shakespeare audience. Oh yeah, one more big shout out to Dave Liegeot for talking me into going each year !!Now, about last night’s production. It’s been quite a few years since I saw R&J, and forgot just how much depth there is to the story. I think PSF did a wonderful job capturing and exploring that depth, and in the end, I was incredibly moved by the tragedy. To me, that’s the first and last criteria for a terrific show.
Romeo (David Raphaely) did a great job. I think he portrayed the love-struck character really well, without taking it too far, and going off the deep end with it. Romeo was believable from front to back. He’s just a kid knocked on his heels by love at first sight.
I was a little bit confused by the portrayal of Juliet by Melissa Dunphy. I believe Melissa hails from Australia, and she brought her native accent to the stage in playing Juliet. I’m not sure whether she’s just still working on her American accent, or if playing Juliet with an Australian accent was a conscious choice, but either way, it was distracting for me. It’s not that there’s anything wrong with an Australian accent, in fact I quite like it; however, it was inconsistent with the rest of the cast, and it kept bringing me out of the story. Outside of that, I think her portrayal was quite good.
Within the rest of the cast, Damon Bonetti’s portrayal of Mercutio was my favorite. He made some really big choices with the character, and it was just plain entertaining each time he walked on the stage.
If you want to see it, you’ve got two more weeks. Been thinking about boning up your Shakespeare ? Then Romeo & Juliet is for you ! By it’s very popularity, it’s an easy story to follow, which helps immensely when trying to understand the language. Hop to it, and make the plunge !