In & Juliet, Anne Hathaway rewrites her husband's tragedy with Max Martin hits
What if Juliet woke up, found Romeo dead and simply carried on living? That question drives & Juliet, a jukebox musical in which Shakespeare's wife seizes the quill, sends the heroine to Paris and scores the escape with pop songs by the Swedish writer Max Martin.
David West Read's book frames the show as a marital argument. At the first performance of Romeo and Juliet, Anne Hathaway, up from Stratford-upon-Avon, suggests a different ending. Her husband dislikes the idea but lets her try. Juliet learns at Romeo's funeral that he had many other lovers, flees her parents' convent plans with her nurse Angelique and her non-binary friend May, and Anne writes herself in as a friend called April. Shakespeare retaliates with twists, including a romance between May and the musician François and Romeo's return from the dead.
The songs are familiar hits Martin co-wrote, sung by new characters: Backstreet Boys, Britney Spears, Katy Perry, Kelly Clarkson and others. Only one number, One More Try, was written fresh for the show. Several songs were dropped in workshops, among them tracks by Adele, Taylor Swift and P!nk. The ending refuses a neat wedding: Juliet chooses for herself, Romeo asks her on a first date, and the two writers agree a new beginning beats a conclusion.
The musical opened at the Manchester Opera House in September 2019 and reached the Shaftesbury Theatre in London two months later. Miriam-Teak Lee won the Olivier for best actress in a musical as Juliet, with Cassidy Janson and David Bedella also winning for supporting roles. Covid closed the London run in March 2020; it came back in September 2021 and ran until 25 March 2023.
A Toronto tryout in 2022 fed a Broadway staging at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre, which drew nine Tony nominations and won none, and is scheduled to close on 3 January 2027. Productions followed in Melbourne, Singapore, Perth and Sydney, an all-Canadian return to Toronto, and touring versions across Britain, Ireland and North America.
Source: & Juliet
