Condola Rashad To Star In Interracial Romeo & Juliet With Orlando Bloom On Broadway
Condola Rashad, currently starring in a Broadway production of The Trip To Bountiful, has been cast in a new Broadway role. This time the 26-year-old actress will play Juliet in an interracial adaptation of Romeo and Juliet. Orlando Bloom has been cast as Romeo.
The play will be set in modern times, and won’t be a strict adaptation. The Capulets will be an all-Black family, while the Montagues will be all White.
Director David Leveaux told the New York Times:
They could have been any number of different ethnicities…The two actors I wanted to be together producing sparks just happened to be those two and I followed my nose in casting the families.
and
I’m not about to turn a contemporary version of Shakespeare into a sociological or political point…. We know there are families from one background or another who would reject their children getting together with someone from another group. Romeo and Juliet reject that notion. It is still the case that children try to oppose the cultural expectations thrust upon them, the rigidity of tribes, the rigidity of fundamentalism.
The director’s quotes suggest that the differing races of the characters was an afterthought, and the idea of a Black and White Romeo and Juliet only came about after choosing two actors.
The play will begin previews August 24th, 2013, and officially open a month later on September 19th.
