Sam Gold’s “Romeo + Juliet” Is Shakespeare for the Youth

Summary

The New Yorker Radio Hour: Sam Gold’s “Romeo + Juliet” Is Shakespeare for the Youth

Episode Title: Sam Gold’s “Romeo + Juliet” Is Shakespeare for the Youth
Host: Vincent Cunningham
Release Date: November 12, 2024

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Introduction

In this episode of The New Yorker Radio Hour, Vincent Cunningham engages in an insightful conversation with Sam Gold, the acclaimed director behind the latest Broadway revival of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. Gold’s rendition is described as a "dark, clubby Gen Z" interpretation, aiming to resonate deeply with today’s youth. The discussion delves into Gold's motivations, directorial choices, and the evolving landscape of theater in appealing to younger audiences.

Production Overview

Sam Gold's Romeo and Juliet stands out in the extensive history of Broadway adaptations, characterized by its modern, edgy take intended to bridge the classical with the contemporary. Gold's vision transforms the timeless tragedy into a relatable narrative for Gen Z, featuring prominent young actors Rachel Ziegler (known for West Side Story) and Kit Connor (from Heart Stopper).

Sam Gold's Motivation and Vision

Gold articulates a clear intent behind his latest production: to engage young people who have become disenchanted with traditional theater formats, especially in the wake of the pandemic and pervasive screen addiction.

[03:09] Sam Gold: “In this moment, after the pandemic and after people have had enough years, like, completely addicted to their phones, that young people are starting to really crave theater.”

He emphasizes the importance of creating theater that speaks directly to the experiences and challenges faced by today’s youth, using Romeo and Juliet as a vehicle to explore themes of conflict, unity, and societal pressures.

Audience Engagement and Demographics

The production has attracted a notably young and enthusiastic audience, particularly young women, creating a vibrant and interactive theatrical environment. Gold highlights the significance of making the play feel personal and relevant to the 18-25 age group.

[05:24] Sam Gold: “What if we make a show where that generation of audience member feels spoken to, feels like this is for me...”

This approach fosters a sense of community and shared experience among the audience, encouraging deeper emotional connections with the narrative.

Directing Approach and Ensemble

Gold’s directorial philosophy centers around ensemble cohesion and authentic engagement with the material. Drawing inspiration from his mentor, Elizabeth LeCompte of the Wooster Group, he emphasizes the seamless flow between different Shakespearean productions, creating a unified body of work that reflects a dynamic and interconnected theatrical ensemble.

[08:17] Sam Gold: “...they were like, they were just so in it with each other. You know, that is ensemble.”

He prioritizes the individual talents of actors, allowing their unique strengths to shape the portrayal of their characters, thereby infusing each production with distinct nuances.

Staging and Technical Choices

Transitioning from traditional proscenium stages to more intimate settings like the round theater at Circle in the Square, Gold seeks to enhance the audience’s connection with the performers. This choice facilitates a more immersive experience, akin to the intimacy of film close-ups, which is particularly appealing to contemporary audiences accustomed to screen-based storytelling.

[16:35] Sam Gold: “The smaller the theater, the closer you can be to the actors, the more I'm able to do my job.”

This strategic shift aims to make the emotional and psychological aspects of the play more palpable, allowing audiences to engage more deeply with the characters’ turmoil and relationships.

Incorporating Contemporary Elements

Gold integrates modern elements into the production to bridge the gap between Shakespearean language and today’s vernacular. By referencing current pop culture and utilizing techniques reminiscent of filmmakers like Quentin Tarantino, he maintains a balance between reverence for the original text and innovative storytelling.

[19:21] Sam Gold: “There’s something about the way Shakespeare works that sort of reminds me a little bit about the way Quentin Tarantino works.”

This blending of old and new aims to make the play more accessible and relatable, ensuring that the timeless themes resonate with a fresh audience.

Actor Collaborations and Audience Perception

Working with actors who have established identities in contemporary media, such as Jeremy Strong from Succession, presents unique challenges and opportunities. Gold navigates audience preconceptions by encouraging viewers to see actors like Strong not just as their well-known characters but as individuals embodying new roles within the Shakespearean framework.

[20:35] Sam Gold: “They will suspend their disbelief, and they will stop seeing Kendall Roy and start seeing Thomas Stockman.”

This approach highlights the versatility of actors and reinforces the universal applicability of Shakespeare’s narratives.

Impact and Reception

The production has received a positive reception, evidenced by enthusiastic audience engagement and enthusiasm at performances. Gold views the strong turnout of young attendees as a testament to the play’s relevance and the enduring need for live storytelling.

[23:22] Sam Gold: “They love Heartstopper. Part of it is that they're addicted to their phones. But part of it is that the play lit them up.”

He acknowledges that theater serves as a crucial outlet for processing contemporary issues such as mental health and societal pressures, positioning Romeo and Juliet as a meaningful intervention for today’s youth.

Conclusion

Sam Gold’s Romeo and Juliet represents a significant evolution in Shakespearean theater, blending classical literature with modern sensibilities to create a compelling and relatable experience for younger audiences. Through innovative staging, ensemble-driven performances, and a keen understanding of contemporary cultural dynamics, Gold successfully reinvigorates a timeless tragedy for the digital age.

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps:

• Sam Gold [03:09]: “In this moment, after the pandemic and after people have had enough years, like, completely addicted to their phones, that young people are starting to really crave theater.”

• Sam Gold [05:24]: “What if we make a show where that generation of audience member feels spoken to, feels like this is for me...”

• Sam Gold [08:17]: “...they were like, they were just so in it with each other. You know, that is ensemble.”

• Sam Gold [16:35]: “The smaller the theater, the closer you can be to the actors, the more I'm able to do my job.”

• Sam Gold [19:21]: “There’s something about the way Shakespeare works that sort of reminds me a little bit about the way Quentin Tarantino works.”

• Sam Gold [20:35]: “They will suspend their disbelief, and they will stop seeing Kendall Roy and start seeing Thomas Stockman.”

• Sam Gold [23:22]: “They love Heartstopper. Part of it is that they're addicted to their phones. But part of it is that the play lit them up.”

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This comprehensive summary captures the essence of Sam Gold's innovative approach to Romeo and Juliet, highlighting his efforts to modernize the classic play for a new generation while maintaining the integrity and emotional depth of Shakespeare’s original work.

Transcript

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[Vincent Cunningham]

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[Vincent Cunningham]

This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm Vincent Cunningham, a staff writer for the New Yorker. There have been at least 37 different productions of Romeo and Juliet on Broadway, not to mention countless high school productions. Maybe you were in one, I don't know. But this new one by the director Sam Gold is kind of a dark, clubby Gen Z Romeo and Juliet. It's as if the teens from Euphoria decided that they had to do Shakespeare and this is what they came up with. The two stars are Rachel Ziegler, who you probably know from the latest movie version of west side Story, and Kit Connor, who's from the teen Netflix hit Heart Stopper. I wanted to talk to Sam Gold partly just because I really admire his work, but also because I always have this question when someone does Romeo and Juliet, and the question is, why now? Gold has famously directed five of Shakespeare's great tragedies, and it seems that he's kind of working through something about Shakespeare in public in front of all of us. So I wanted to understand why Romeo and Juliet, why now? And how he came up with this totally interesting, totally bonkers production. How does Sam Gold find his way into the Middle of this mess. Like, what makes you decide to do Romeo and Juliet now?

[Sam Gold]

I want to think that in this moment, after the pandemic and after people have had enough years, like, completely addicted to their phones, that young people are starting to really crave theater. I just was filled with the desire to make something for young people. And I could see, you know, it was the spring, and I was seeing November 5th coming. You know, we have this election. What if I tried to open a play around the election that was gonna sort of put a fire under young people about what's really, really hard about life right now?

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yeah.

[Sam Gold]

And I immediately thought of Romeo and Juliet. You know, two households, both alike, and dignity. That's the first two lines of the play. It's like we're more the same than we are different.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yeah.

[Sam Gold]

And theater becomes this place where we can come together. Even if you feel really differently than the person sitting next to you about who you're gonna vote for, you breed that same air. And Romeo and Juliet's a play where Shakespeare is sort of sacrificing these two kids with the idea that maybe the adults would wake up a bit to the ways they're hurting each other unnecessarily. That's kind of like the thesis of that play.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Right. Well, you know, it's funny that you framed the play in that way.

[Sam Gold]

Right.

[Vincent Cunningham]

And I've always thought of Romeo and Juliet as a play about young people, but not necessarily as one for young people. There were so many, especially young women in the crowd that I went to. There was certainly, like, a sort of fan aspect of, like, we know these people. We're excited for them. One sort of subtext of the play was, is Kit Connor's triceps are very prominently displayed all play along. But, you know, it just seemed to have this, like, very populist feeling where the people in the audience are being interacted with, are offering their emotions, their sighs, their sort of exclamations. What was your theory of audience in making this show?

[Sam Gold]

I was like, what if we make a show where they. That generation of audience member, feels spoken to, feels like, this is for me, feels like I can come to this. I feel oriented. And then what you give them is Shakespeare. They want to be there, and they want to take in this ritual that really reflects something deep about our society. And they do sort of 18 to 25 is sort of our audience.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yeah.

[Sam Gold]

And they are laughing at 400-year-old jokes. They are hearing the wit, the poetry, the rhymes, the scansion, the sonnets and they are responding to the language. They're not laughing at Kit's triceps, they're laughing at Shakespeare. You know, they're really hearing the play. So that was the goal. It was never to.

[Vincent Cunningham]

I did not mean to denigrate kids triceps. I'm just.

[Sam Gold]

It's not to be cynical. I wanted the world on stage to reflect the world that that generation of audience member experiences in life, which is what Shakespeare did. Shakespeare was a populist. And Shakespeare was putting plays on to communicate very directly with his popular audience. The jokes were of the moment. There's a song referenced in Romeo and Juliet. The nurse's servant Peter, after everybody thinks Juliet's dead, says to the musicians. Cause they're always live musicians in a Shakespeare play. And they sort of break the fourth wall. And Peter says to the musician that is underscoring the Shakespeare play. Will you play Heart's eas? Because my heart is full and we need a silly dump to comfort us. So I use a pop song from this generation's vocabulary. Cause that's what Shakespeare was doing. He was taking a song everybody knew and making a joke, using it to lighten the mood on stage. And that's what I'm doing. It's not cynical. It's genuinely trying to do for a young audience. Now what I firmly believe is what Shakespeare was trying to do with his audience. How sweet.

[Vincent Cunningham]

You're the man of the house to.

[Sam Gold]

Me I watch you from the window When I see you the good in.

[Vincent Cunningham]

You, the good in me that's who.

[Sam Gold]

You are and what I need you.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Sam, you've directed now all five of Shakespeare's tragedies. Othello, Macbeth, King Lear, Hamlet, and now Romeo and Juliet. Has this been a project for you? Because you've also done. You've worked on Ibsen, you've worked on other things, but has this Shakespeare sort of visitation for you? Do you conceive of it as one project?

[Sam Gold]

Yes. And you know, my sort of mentor coming up was the director, Elizabeth Lecompte. And the way Liz would work is.

[Vincent Cunningham]

From the Worcester Group.

[Sam Gold]

Yes, sorry, the Worcester Group. What she does is when she gets to the end of a project, she starts the next project sort of from there. Like the set from one project becomes kind of the raw materials to start making the next one. Like they're all one. They're all sort of flowing one to the next on these Shakespeares. It really goes back to a feeling I had when I was in school. I went to grad school at Juilliard. And there were these really young companies of actors and they, you know, they lived and breathed, you know, 24 hours a day they were together. They knew each other so well. They were all having sex with each other and breaking up and getting drunk at night in their dorm rooms and then getting up at seven in the morning to do fitness class. And, you know, they were like, they were just so in it with each other. You know, that is ensemble. And when I was at school, I just loved making these plays with these young ensembles. So I've been trying to do that with these Shakespeares, to bring these ensembles together. And they all, all five of them come from that same place. They all were, I don't know, almost like kind of rough and ready school, school plays.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Does the makeup of that ensemble, who's in it, what kind of ideas and physicality and everything that they bring. Is that something that develops in conjunction with that ensemble, or do you, as a director, show up with a concept? I want to try this thing. Let's see how this works. How does the idea develop? The thing that makes, I don't know, your Macbeth different than other Macbeths?

[Sam Gold]

I'm really inspired by specific actors. So, you know, Gabby Beans came in to audition and all of a sudden it's like Mercutio and the Friar.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yeah.

[Sam Gold]

And you know, what if Gabby is kind of Shakespeare, kind of the storyteller, kind of like holding it down for us. The mc.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yeah.

[Sam Gold]

That idea of Gabby as a kind of the MC of the evening, that's just Gabby. That's me responding to her talent.

[Vincent Cunningham]

We talked already about notions of sort of what is the popular or what is the sort of the broad audience. You mentioned earlier, the Worcester Group, which is this downtown New York experimental avant garde theater company. Another, I don't wanna say benefit that they have, but a particularity is the idea of a small audience that's coming for something that is self consciously an experiment. Yeah. And you working out on Broadway, which is a very different notion of what it means to be a director. Very different notion of audience, very different prerogatives. How does it feel to do all the things that you're talking about on Broadway, which is the broadest audience possible?

[Sam Gold]

A lot of people falsely sort of label me as like a deconstructionist or something because, like, they're wearing street clothes.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Does that piss you off when people do.

[Sam Gold]

It does piss me off because. Well, it doesn't piss me off. But it's sad that they don't really know what they're saying when they're attributing that to me. I'm not deconstructing these plays. I'm doing the play.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Right.

[Sam Gold]

You know, I've done plays where I think Ben Brantley said the playwright was rolling in his grave, which, you know, it's not the most original piece of criticism. I think it's a gross misunderstanding of the difference between conventions and authentic engagement in a text. Right.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Just because they're not wearing the frills or whatever does not mean that you have therefore, like, sort of desecrated the play.

[Sam Gold]

Yeah, we have conventions. Right. When you're gonna go see an Ibsen play, this is what you picture it looking like.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Right.

[Sam Gold]

And those things come. Those expectations come from some other successful period of theater history. You know, Richard Eyre does enough beautiful Ibsen plays at the Royal national theater in the 90s. And then we think of Ibsen as, when we close our eyes, we see some Richard Ayer production, but it's 40 years later, 30 years later, and that's a convention.

[Vincent Cunningham]

It's not like that production was born in the mind of Ibsen.

[Sam Gold]

Exactly. Nothing to do with it. And I'm actually just reading the play and engaging in the play, and I'm doing a ton of homework on what Elizabethan theater was like, what Elizabethan culture was like, what Elizabethan politics were like. I'm understanding what's going on in religious battles and political battles of the time. And then I'm thinking about what the playwright was trying to do vis a vis all those things and thinking about our own world and how that play could best affect the audience. That doesn't have Those politics from 400 years ago has a different set of politics. So, I mean, with Romeo and Juliet, there will be people that think I have the sound too loud.

[Vincent Cunningham]

You know, the sound is loud.

[Sam Gold]

It's loud.

[Vincent Cunningham]

It's fun.

[Sam Gold]

It's loud in there. And there will be audience members that say, that is too loud. Yeah, that's fine with me, because I have an interest in connecting this text to this specific audience that does not think it's too loud.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Right.

[Sam Gold]

And I'm willing to hear the complaints because I have a sort of risk tolerance that I think has come from starting downtown.

[Vincent Cunningham]

That's the director, Sam Gold, talking about the new Broadway production of Romeo and Juliet. We'll be right back in a moment.

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[Sam Gold]

Hey everyone. Join me, Megan Reinks and me, Melissa D Monts, for Don't Blame Me, But Am I Wrong? Each week we deliver four fun filled shows and Don't Blame Me. We tackle our listeners dilemmas with hilariously honest advice. Then we have But Am I Wrong? Which is for the listeners that didn't take our advice. Plus, we share our hot takes on current events. Then tune in to see you next Tuesday for our listener poll results from But Amirrong. And finally, wrap up your week with Fisting Friday where we catch up and talk all things pop culture. Listen to Don't Blame Me But Am I Wrong? On Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday.

[Vincent Cunningham]

I'm Vincent Cunningham, a staff writer here at the New Yorker, and I've been talking with the director Sam Gold about this latest new production of Romeo and Juliet. We'll continue our conversation now. Does staging something in the round change your whole conception visually as a director? What is the just I've always wondered.

[Sam Gold]

Yeah, the reason why I really love it is the proscenium theaters, the Broadway theaters. They were built in the 19th century with the idea that there was gonna be an actor standing downstage center declaiming, yeah, I'm happy to see Ethel Merman stand down center. Like if I could be taken back in time, I would enjoy going to those shows. It's not that I dislike it, it's that it's an old convention and because of Technological advances, it doesn't really make sense for every play to be done that way. A proscenium doesn't really speak to how a contemporary audience will best engage with storytelling live. And the round is much closer. You get this sort of over the shoulder shot that you're used to in a film, and you get intimacy that film has given us to actors. Like after the close up, it's hard to sit at the back of a thousand seat, 2,000 seat theater. And at Circle in the Square, everybody's in a closeup. There's no bad. There are zero bad seats at Circle in the Square. And so you get that experience. Cause I'm trying to do these plays that I'm saying they're kind of grief rituals, right? We're trying to depict a trauma so that the audience can process their own trauma. That's sort of the basic idea. And I think they work a lot better when you can have intimacy, when you can feel close to the actors, when you can feel them breathe. So to me, the smaller the theater, the closer you can be to the actors, the more I'm able to do my job.

[Vincent Cunningham]

People are increasingly engrossed in screens. Obviously, film precedes all the problems we think about with smartphones and everything. But what is the primary relations between what you do and what shows up on screens in terms of TV and film?

[Sam Gold]

I mean, mostly what I'm doing is I'm trying to tell a story, live with people, and use every tool I can to make it as powerful as possible. And film is now deeply embedded in our psyche. But like, there were all sorts of other kinds of popular entertainments, culture, storytelling that he's engaging with. So I'm just doing what I feel like Shakespeare's doing, you know? You know, wit. This idea in Elizabethan England, it's like a game, a sport, a thing to do after school. How are we to understand that when they. When Romeo and Mercutio and Benvolio, wit as a verb, how are we gonna feel the sort of after school activity of it? The way Shakespeare's society did? And so I'm trying to pull from a toolbox, and one is film. You know, I kept referencing Quentin Tarantino during the Romeo and Juliet rehearsals.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Really?

[Sam Gold]

That's a populist.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Sure.

[Sam Gold]

A populist adventurous artist. Right. There's something about the way Shakespeare works that sort of reminds me a little bit about the way Quentin Tarantino works. They have some things in common about willingness to go from something serious to something funny and back quickly. So you say like, oh, how am I gonna do this? How am I gonna go from this super sad moment to this funny moment? And you think, ugh, people aren't gonna be able to do that. They won't be able to ride that wave. We don't do that anymore. But then I think, no, we do.

[Vincent Cunningham]

We do.

[Sam Gold]

Like in a Tarantino movie. We do. Right? So I use film that way.

[Vincent Cunningham]

You know, one thing that Shakespeare has in common with this is not something that I was ever primed to think about that Shakespeare has in common with Quentin Tarantino is that they are both adept at using the stories of their time. This is a long way of asking what it was like working with Jeremy Strong, who appears in one of the great stories of our time, Succession, when you worked with him on Enemy of the People. You know, you work with somebody that, like, comes from a world of reference. Like, this is the guy who played Kendall Roy. Is that something that I'm using with this person? Is it something that I'm trying to strip away?

[Sam Gold]

I think I've maybe overemphasized that what we are making will stand alone and people will just enter. They'll suspend their disbelief, and they will stop seeing Kendall Roy the second Jeremy enters, and they will start seeing Thomas Stockman. I don't know that that's always been successful, because you can't rip that away from people. And listen, theater is too obsessed with celebrity, but it's. You know, it's also saving the theater from financial ruin to be so obsessed with celebrity. And listen, Jeremy Strong was a brilliant actor 20 years before he was in succession. He and I have done multiple plays together. We grew up together. We've been friends since college. I don't think of him as Kendall Roy from Succession at all. That's, like, very low on my list of references in my mind to the work of Jeremy Strong. So maybe I underestimated that. Most people's relationship to Jeremy is much different than mine.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Right.

[Sam Gold]

And I didn't really think about Kendall Roy, and maybe I should have.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yeah, No, I was thinking about this as I watched again in an amazing way, those young people who were at Romeo and Juliet at the end, just, like, swarming the exits, waiting to receive Rachel and Kit. And I wondered what came into my mind is, you know, whether there is any difference, whether there needs to be any difference between sort of the function of the audience as we classically understand it in theater and the new word that we have, which is like fandom, and whether that at all is something that sort of is in the fringes of your consciousness as you make your word.

[Sam Gold]

I mean, I don't think it's new at all, you know. True.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yes. We have made this term.

[Sam Gold]

And you know, when Richard Burton was playing Hamlet and Elizabeth Taylor would sit in the balcony to watch, everyone would line up around the fucking block to try to see Liz Taylor. Yeah, right. They weren't coming for Richard Burton's Hamlet. They were coming to see Elizabeth Taylor. And that's always been the case. And I think it was the case in Shakespeare's time. And there's nothing I'm enjoying more right now than the fact that there's 19 year old audience members hearing and understanding the poetry of Shakespeare and then being so excited at the end that they wanna stand for an hour to meet the person that delivered that language. And I do think that's part of it. Part of it is that they love Heartstopper. Part of it is that they're addicted to their phones. But part of it is that the play lit them up. But I don't think it's a bad thing for the theater that these young people are. I mean, our stage door is.

[Vincent Cunningham]

I saw it, dude.

[Sam Gold]

And I don't think that's a bad thing.

[Vincent Cunningham]

No, it seemed like a sign of health.

[Sam Gold]

It seems like if those people come see another play. People need theater. Yes, we know. We need to get in a room and tell stories. It is not good. No one thinks like the Surgeon general is telling you, it is not good to be at home looking at social media all the time. We are in a mental health crisis. Teen suicide. I'm doing a play about teen suicide. Right. I'm doing a play about teen suicide.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Right.

[Sam Gold]

And all those young people are coming and I think we can help them. That can be good.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Well, Sam, thank you so much for these interpretations this work and for talking to us. This is great.

[Sam Gold]

Thank you so much.

[Vincent Cunningham]

That's the director, Sam Gold, talking about the latest revival of Romeo and Juliet which is now playing on Broadway at the Circle in the Square theater. And that's the New Yorker Radio Hour for today. I'm Vincent Cunningham, a staff writer at the New Yorker. And by the way, I'm also one of the co hosts of the New Yorker's weekly culture podcast, Critics at Large. New episodes drop every Thursday. David Remnick will be back on Friday. Thanks for listening.

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[Sam Gold]

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