Start with Shakespeare’s "star-crossed" lovers and fold in the songs of Swedish pop hitmaker Max Martin… what do you get? The hit Broadway musical & Juliet, currently running at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre in New York and nominated for nine Tony Awards, including Best Musical and Best Book of a Musical.

The show imagines what would happen if Juliet woke up after Romeo’s death and decided not to end it all. Instead, she goes on a trip to Paris with some new friends, including Shakespeare and Anne Hathaway. Juliet discovers that Romeo isn’t really dead… but he’s also not exactly boyfriend material. And every so often, the characters break into song with Max Martin’s hits for Britney Spears, Backstreet Boys, and Katy Perry.

The writer behind this mash-up is David West Read. He previously served as writer and executive producer of the comedy series Schitt’s Creek, and he created The Big Door Prize and the forthcoming Brother from Another Mother, both running on AppleTV+. Host Barbara Bogaev talks with Read about & Juliet… and the concussion that inspired it.

Get tickets to & Juliet here, and tune in to the Tonys broadcast on Sunday, June 11 at 8 pm ET on CBS.

From our Shakespeare Unlimited podcast. Published June 6, 2023. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This episode was produced by Matt Frassica. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. Leonor Fernandez edits our transcripts. We had technical help from Claire Reynolds in Atlanta and Voice Trax West in Studio City, California. Final mixing services provided by Clean Cuts at Three Seas, Inc.

David West Read on & Juliet

Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Galway Kinnell, who died in October of 2014, wrote poems that snuck up on you—starting from their titles to opening lines, they often put the reader right in the middle of a circumstance, conversation, or event. Kinnell read here at the Folger on March 24, 2008. Listen to his poems “Everyone Was in Love” and “How Could She Not?” 

Kinnell published several volumes of poetry, including "Strong Is Your Hold"; "A New Selected Poems"; "Imperfect Thirst"; "When One Has Lived a Long Time Alone"; and "Selected Poems", for which he received both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award.

Kinnell was the recipient of the 2010 Wallace Stevens Award for proven mastery in the art of poetry by the Academy of American Poets. His other honors include a MacArthur Fellowship, a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, a Rockefeller Grant, the 2002 Frost Medal from the Poetry Society of America, the 1974 Shelley Prize from the Poetry Society of America, and the 1975 Medal of Merit from the National Institute of Arts and Letters. 

Published September 4, 2018. ©Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This recording was produced by Hayden Arp and Teri Cross-Davis. The music is ""Retrograde" by Hayden Arp. Ben Lauer is the web producer.

Galway Kinnell reads at the Folger

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David West Read on & Juliet

Folger Shakespeare Library

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