Imagine you’re walking down a High Street. It’s a mild, summer evening and you see a crowd gathered around a balcony. You then hear a woman’s voice exclaim, ‘O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?’ This is exactly what passers-by will experience between 21 June and 13 July this year in Guildford Town Centre.
Just in time for the Bard’s 408th birthday, the Guildford Shakespeare Company (GSC) have released tickets for an immersive, outdoor production of Romeo & Juliet which will take place on the streets of Guildford. This year, the company are celebrating their 18th birthday, and so are pushing the boat out with this highly ambitious, multi-venue production of Shakespeare’s classic love story.
Director Matt Pinches enthusiastically provides a briefing on the locations of the play in a video posted on the GSC YouTube channel. The story will begin on the steps of Guildford’s Holy Trinity Church, introducing the two families, and then move into Abbot’s Hospital, which will be the home of Capulets. Shopping centre Tunsgate Quarter will play host to the Capulet party, which Romeo, Mercutio and Benvolio gate crash and where the titular lovers first meet.
The famous balcony scene will take place on the Guildford balcony; the audience situated on the street below with Romeo, with an enamoured Juliet looking down from the balcony itself. Further locations include new art café on the High Street, Art & Grind, and the Guildford Castle Gardens, where the entire second half of the play will take place.
The professional cast will be joined by local schools and GSC’s own drama groups which will form gang members of Montagues and Capulets, as well as guests at the Capulet’s masked ball. Inspired by the themes of Romeo and Juliet, a knife crime awareness programme run alongside the production by local schools and drama groups, which consists of a special public presentation by one of GSC’s drama groups, and other various talks. This is reminiscent of Playing Shakespeare with Deutsche Bank’s recent production of Romeo and Juliet at Shakespeare’s Globe, which poignantly wove themes of knife crime into its visceral, modern setting.
Tickets are now available for this unique telling of Shakespeare’s iconic tale in Guildford Town Centre on the GSC website.
Words by Gareth Griffiths
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