The first image of Orlando Bloom as Romeo from the upcoming Broadway production of Romeo and Juliet has been released. The actor will be taking on the role of the star-crossed lover alongside two-time Tony Award nominee Condola Rashad in the mixed-raced contemporary production. The simple yet effective image shows the characters dressed in crisp white shirts gazing at each other while lying on a bed.
Orlando, who has the same name as a character in Shakespeare’s As You Like It, will be directed by five-time Tony Award nominee David Leveaux. Leveaux’s production will feature Shakespeare’s original language while in a modern setting.
Further conflict is added to the tragedy as the Montague family is white and the Capulets black. The race issue was addressed in the press release: ‘While race defines the family lineages, the original cause of the ‘ancient quarrel,’ passed down by successive generations to their young, has been lost to time.’ Speaking about the modern setting director Leveaux told the Associated Press: ‘The last thing we wanted to do was to do a sort of pompous, classic version of Romeo and Juliet.
‘I’m just taking away all the wallpaper and mantelpieces, all the kind of pompous stuff we associate with grand Shakespearean productions, and try to go as simple as possible.’ Romeo and Juliet, which has not appeared on Broadway since 1977, will also star Brent Carver, Jayne Houdyshell, Chuck Cooper, Christian Camargo, Roslyn Ruff, Conrad Kemp and American Idol star Justin Guarini.
Orlando, who famously starred in Lord Of The Rings, has reportedly relocated to New York alongside his wife Miranda Kerr and two-year-old son Flynn. While the 36-year-old hasn’t starred in a Shakespeare play before he has performed some of Romeo’s speeches as part of the 2011 Los Angeles Philharmonic orchestra concert that saw Tchaikovsky’s music paired with Shakespearean texts that inspired them. The Pirates Of The Caribbean star made his professional stage debut in David Storey’s Celebration in London six years ago. Director Leveaux said it was a no brainer casting the handsome star: ‘I was just so fascinated by his passion and his absolute boyish love of this language that I thought: ‘Yep, that feels like our Romeo’.’
Bloom takes on Broadway! Actors debut in Romeo and Juliet
