(See an introduction to this playlet here )
Leonardo DiCaprio plays Paris, Friar Laurence and Lady Capulet.
CYCLE I
MUSIC: The 20th Century Fox anthem. This is effectively LEO’s signature anthem as it will be used throughout at this point to link each cycle to the next.
LEO Good evening, my name is Leonardo DiCaprio. Call me Leo. Some of you may have seen me in ‘The Beach’. Call me Lenny. I was in a great movie called ‘Titanic’. About a boat? Very sad. But it’s great to be here. Call me Leonardo. That’s what I’m called. Right now I’m involved in a terrifically powerful love story. I hope you like it. Here comes Paris, a Count in distress. His love was extinguished before it even took aflame.
LEO PLAYS PARIS:
PARIS My page lies under yond yew-trees prone
His ear to the chill and hollow ground press’d
Lest those approach who’d find me fond in this,
My mission to bestrew the grave of she
Who groundless makes my love and bids me drift
In seas of obsequy no tide can shift.
WHISTLE OFF
What cursed foot wanders this way to-night,
When stern phantasmal shades do all affright?
PARIS HIDES
ENTER ROMEO
HE FACES THE GRAVE AND ADDRESSES IT IN ANGER
ROMEO Thou detestable maw, thou womb of death,
Gorged with the dearest morsel of the earth,
Thus I enforce thy rotten jaws to open,
And, in despite, I’ll cram thee with more food!
HE OPENS THE TOMB
PARIS This is that banish’d haughty Montague,
That murder’d my love’s cousin, with which grief,
It is supposed, the fair creature died;
And here is come to do some villanous shame
To the dead bodies: I will apprehend him.
PARIS COMES FORWARD
Stop thy unhallow’d toil, vile Montague!
Can vengeance be pursued further than death?
Condemned villain, I do apprehend thee:
Obey, and go with me; for thou must die.
ROMEO I must indeed; and therefore came I hither.
Good gentle youth, tempt not a desperate man;
Put not another sin upon my head,
By urging me to fury: O, be gone!
PARIS I do defy thy conjurations,
And apprehend thee for a felon here.
ROMEO Wilt thou provoke me? Then have at thee, boy!
THEY FIGHT WITH KNIVES
PARIS O, I am slain!
HE FALLS
If thou be merciful,
Open the tomb, lay me with Juliet.
HE DIES.
ROMEO In faith, I will. Let me peruse this face.
Mercutio’s kinsman, noble County Paris!
I’ll bury thee in a triumphant grave;
A grave? O no! a lantern, slaughter’d youth,
For here lies Juliet, and her beauty makes
This vault a feasting presence full of light.
Death, lie thou there, by a dead man interr’d.
HE LAYS PARIS ON THE TOMB (NOT FOR LONG – LEO WILL SOON BE NEEDED TO PLAY FRIAR LAURENCE)
ROMEO THEN TURNS TO JULIET’S BODY
ROMEO O my love! my wife!
Death, that hath suck’d the honey of thy breath,
Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty:
Thou art not conquer’d; beauty’s ensign yet
Is crimson in thy lips and in thy cheeks,
And death’s pale flag is not advanced there.
Ah, dear Juliet,
Why art thou yet so fair? shall I believe
That unsubstantial death is amorous,
And that the lean abhorred monster keeps
Thee here in dark to be his paramour?
For fear of that, I still will stay with thee;
And never from this palace of dim night
Depart again: here, here will I remain
With worms that are thy chamber-maids; O, here
Will I set up my everlasting rest,
And shake the yoke of inauspicious stars
From this world-wearied flesh. Eyes, look your last!
Arms, take your last embrace! and, lips, O you
The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kiss
A dateless bargain to engrossing death!
Come, bitter conduct, come, unsavoury guide!
Thou desperate pilot, now at once run on
The dashing rocks thy sea-sick weary bark!
Here’s to my love!
HE DRINKS THE POISON
O true apothecary!
Thy drugs are quick. Thus with a kiss I die.
HE DIES
ENTER FRIAR LAURENCE, PLAYED BY LEO
F LAURENCE Romeo!
HE ADVANCES
Alack, alack, what blood is this, which stains
The stony entrance of this sepulchre?
What mean these masterless and gory swords
To lie discolour’d by this place of peace?
HE NEARS THE TOMB AND SEES ROMEO’S BODY
Romeo! O, pale! Who else? What, Paris too?
And steep’d in blood? Ah, what an unkind hour
Is guilty of this lamentable chance!
The lady stirs.
JULIET WAKES
JULIET O comfortable friar! where is my lord?
I do remember well where I should be,
And there I am. Where is my Romeo?
F LAURENCE Lady, come from that nest
Of death, contagion, and unnatural sleep:
Come, come away.
Thy husband in thy bosom there lies dead;
And Paris too. Come, go, good Juliet,
I dare no longer stay.
JULIET Go, get thee hence, for I will not away.
EXIT FRIAR LAURENCE
What’s here? a cup, closed in my true love’s hand?
Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end:
O churl! drunk all, and left no friendly drop
To help me after? I will kiss thy lips;
Haply some poison yet doth hang on them,
To make die with a restorative.
KISSES HIM
Thy lips are warm.
SHE SEES ROMEO’S DAGGER AND SNATCHES IT UP
O happy dagger!
This is thy sheath;
SHE STABS HERSELF
there rust, and let me die.
SHE DIES
ENTER LEO PLAYING LADY CAPULET
LADY CAPULET The people in the street cry Romeo,
Some Juliet, and some Paris; and all run,
With open outcry toward our monument.
SEES THE STACK OF BODIES ROUND THE TOMB
O heavens! Look how our daughter bleeds!
This dagger hath mista’en – for, lo, his house
Is empty on the back of Montague,
And it mis-sheathed in my daughter’s bosom!
O me! this sight of death is as a bell,
That warns my old age to a sepulchre.
Never was a story of more woe
Than this of Juliet and her Romeo.
EXIT LADY CAPULET
MUSIC: CD ‘In Memoriam’ Track 1: March from Funeral Music for Queen Mary (Purcell)
AFTER A FEW SAD MOMENTS ROMEO STIRS
ROMEO ‘Tis dark! My bones are chill, my eyes…my eyes
Are closed now open, is this the life
That lies beyond life…the grave…is this
Poor paradise its vaults come down to dust?
HE PEERS AROUND HIM
Juliet!
JULIET STIRS
JULIET Romeo! Was this but a dream, thy leached
And bloodless frame convulsed, thy spittle dried
On cheeks that gaped from brittle teeth no
longer set on love but bitten bitter through?
See you now! Are you heart-cease or heart’s ease?
ROMEO Juliet! Love will live again, young hearts will soar,
What is meant in heaven is now earthbound evermore
JULIET O gentle Romeo! All that was lost is now regain’d
Our vows have drawn us back from death unstain’d
MUSIC: CD ‘Discovery’ Daft Punk Track 11: Veridis Quo
ROMEO AND JULIET MOVE SLOWLY TOWARDS EACH OTHER, CLASP HANDS AND WALK STRAIGHT DOWNSTAGE
PARIS STIRS, GROANS AND SLOWLY STANDS UP
PARIS My wound is healed, my flesh refused, the blade
That leaped from Romeo’s sheath was never used
MUSIC: CD ‘Gatecrasher 10 – This Time It’s Digital’ Vol 2 Track 1: ‘Do You Hear Me’ (Indiana)
ROMEO, JULIET AND PARIS, THEIR DIFFERENCES FORGOTTEN, DANCE HAPPILY FOR A WHILE.
CYCLE II
THE DANCE MUSIC FADES AND IS REPLACED BY
LEO’S MUSIC: The 20th Century Fox anthem
JULIET MOVES TO THE TOMB, SMILES RADIANTLY THEN GRACEFULLY TAKES UP HER ORIGINAL ‘DEAD’ POSITION.
ROMEO MOVES TO THE SIDE PRIOR TO HIS NEXT ENTRANCE.
PARIS REVERTS TO LEO AND MOVES DOWN.
LEO Good evening, my name is Leonardo DiCaprio. Call me Leo. Call me up sometime. People never do. They think I won’t answer. They think I’m unobtainable. I’m so pleased to be here tonight. We live in strange times. We need love in these times. And we need to believe in its power. Here’s a story you’ll like. About a couple of young hotheads. One of them was called Paris.
LEO PLAYS PARIS
PARIS There’s a boy that does my garden, sometimes
I take him with me to watch my back, right now his
Ear is to the ground in case who should come along
But someone and me with things to do.
I must put flowers down on the grave
Of one who nearly was my wife
A REFEREE’S WHISTLE IS BLOWN LOUDLY
Now what? Dead of night, citizens tucked up
In comes some rambler looking for a ruck
ENTER ROMEO (MUSIC: Romeo’s anthem: CD ‘Handel Coronation Anthems’ Track 1: ‘Zadok the Priest’)
HE FACES THE GRAVE AND ADDRESSES IT IN ANGER.
HE IS SPIED UPON BY PARIS.
ROMEO This pit fits but I spit on it. The earth
Has swallowed up everything that made
The world go round so now I’ll just get off
I’ll get off the farce of it into the ditch of it
PARIS A Monty! A naughty bastard Monty,
The one that stuck the steel in my love’s
Cousin causing her to melt away, now
He slithers in doubtless wishing to muck
The corpses up as he fishes through them
COMES FORWARD
Stop right there in your blooded tracks, scummish
Monty cute! You wouldn’t let her lie, would you?
The time is come for me to trim your nails
ROMEO Stick it up, space invading waster, all
I need is a push and you’re very much gone
THEY FIGHT WITH KNIVES
MUSIC: CD ‘Kerrang, Best of 2003’ Track 4: ‘Pure Hatred’ (Chimaira)
PARIS You got me! I’m down and out.
ROMEO That’s the big issue, upstart.
PARIS Romeo – before I kick off, lie me next
To Juliet.
ROMEO Why?
PARIS I loved her so and in her heart
I like to think she had a soft spot too.
ROMEO But not for you, Montagony. Still,
I’m not against a dead’un – try your luck.
PARIS DIES.
ROMEO LOWERS HIM ONTO THE TOMB.
Nice enough but not nice enough –
A nicety, I know, but Juliet is a beacon now
And does not need old flames to make her light.
ROMEO THEN TURNS TO JULIET’S BODY
O my darling girl! You’re still warm, your cheeks give to
My touch but there’s not a thought now, not a breath,
No sigh as you roll in your sheet, no murmur from the
caverns of your sleep. Perhaps death draws you down
And dances lightly with you in his unlit halls. But where’s
The fun in that? Juliet, I never wear a hat but my heart’s
Too heavy to move – my life is smashed, the light is gone,
The bulbs have fractured in the frost. Let me crawl where
You have flown, I’ll die at my own cost.
HE TAKES POISON AND DIES.
ENTER FRIAR LAURENCE PLAYED BY LEO
F LAURENCE Anybody in?
What’s all this? The floor’s awash with gore!
And these blades, they’re hardly Swiss
They have one purpose and that is more
Than prising stones from horses’ hooves!
HE NEARS THE TOMB AND SEES THE BODIES
Romeo! Paris! One run through, the other
etched from gut to garter, both pale, drawn
and hung wretched in their quarters.
JULIET MOVES
But the lady stirs…
JULIET WAKES
JULIET O comfortable friar! where is my lord?
I do remember well where I should be,
And there I am. Where is my Romeo?
F LAURENCE Juliet, step away from that tomb. Your husband
Is dead. Paris is dead. Let me guide you from this place
Of slaughter before it takes us all.
JULIET Go! Get away! Don’t touch me!
EXIT FRIAR LAURENCE
What’s here? a cup, closed in my true love’s hand?
Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end:
O churl! drunk all, and left no friendly drop
To help me after? I will kiss thy lips;
Haply some poison yet doth hang on them,
To make die with a restorative.
KISSES HIM
Thy lips are warm.
SHE SEES ROMEO’S DAGGER
Romeo! I’ll drive you in me!
Sink you to my heart and see you!
SHE PLUNGES THE DAGGER INTO HER CHEST AND DIES.
MUSIC: CD ‘In Memoriam’ Track 9: ‘Funeral March’ (Chopin)
ENTER LADY CAPULET
LADY CAPULET
Romeo! Juliet! Paris! They all call it!
They run through the streets! Wild-eyed!
SHE SEES THE BODIES
Oh God! My daughter bleeds! She carries Romeo
To her heart, his sheath is shot, his eyes rolled up.
Beside him Paris, gaping from his slit.
Never was a tale of more regret
Than Romeo and his Juliet.
MUSIC: CD ‘In Memoriam’ Track 1: March from Funeral Music for Queen Mary (Purcell)
EXIT LADY CAPULET.
AFTER A FEW SAD MOMENTS ROMEO STIRS
MUSIC: SOMETHING FROM CD OF DISNEY ‘ANGELIC CHORUSES’.
ROMEO Is this paradise or is it hell?
Did I fall? Have I flown?
SEES JULIET’S BODY
There’s Juliet, still prone, the blood’s gone from her cheek
JULIET STIRS
And wets her breast but even as I speak
She moves as if a dream had taken her
Or is it just some spectre puppeting
His ghoulish team?
JULIET WAKES UP
JULIET Romeo! I saw ten thousand angels and each one cried
‘Juliet! Go back! There is none here who can love you
On our side – go back, nobody deserves to die!’
ROMEO Juliet! Love will live again, young hearts will soar,
What is meant in heaven is now earthbound evermore
JULIET O gentle Romeo! We live to love and love undoes
The world and all the laws. We fall into our bodies once again
Yet wingëd now we soar above all pain.
MUSIC: CD ‘Discovery’ Daft Punk Track 11: Veridis Quo
ROMEO AND JULIET MOVE SLOWLY TOWARDS EACH OTHER, CLASP HANDS AND WALK STRAIGHT DOWNSTAGE
PARIS STIRS, GROANS AND SLOWLY STANDS UP
PARIS Is death a lie? Or life a perjury?
My gash is whole yet there’s no surgery.
MUSIC: CD ‘Gatecrasher 10 – This Time It’s Digital’ Vol 2 Track 1: ‘Do You Hear Me’ (Indiana)
ROMEO, JULIET AND PARIS, THEIR DIFFERENCES FORGOTTEN, DANCE HAPPILY FOR A WHILE.
CYCLE III
THE DANCE MUSIC FADES AND IS REPLACED BY
LEO’S MUSIC: The 20th Century Fox anthem
JULIET MOVES TO THE TOMB, SMILES RADIANTLY THEN GRACEFULLY TAKES UP HER ORIGINAL ‘DEAD’ POSITION AS ROMEO MOVES TO THE SIDE PRIOR TO HIS NEXT ENTRANCE AND PARIS REVERTS TO LEO AND MOVES DOWN
LEO Hi. I’m Leo. A lot of you have seen my stuff and I guess it’s fair to say that many of you think of me as somehow so near yet so far. If only you knew. The greater the glamour the more it enwraps us. Is that too high-flown? What I mean is: those on the mountain-top can be just as lonely. Like Steve McQueen used to say: altitude is altitude, it doesn’t have to be high. Do you like stories? Here’s one coming along right now…
LEO PLAYS PARIS
PARIS I need to put some flowers down.
My boy will keep an ear out.
A REFEREE’S WHISTLE IS BLOWN LOUDLY
Aye aye!
PARIS HIDES.
ROMEO ENTERS
MUSIC: Romeo’s anthem: CD ‘Handel Coronation Anthems’ Track 1: ‘Zadok the Priest’
HE FACES THE GRAVE AND ADDRESSES IT IN ANGER.
HE IS SPIED UPON BY PARIS.
ROMEO All that’s left is rage. The grave breaks me.
PARIS Here’s my chance to cut the ague from a wandering Mont
And heal the ancient wound with blood.
COMES FORWARD
Freeze, bandigeek and vastopont!
Trouble me with your blade or else
Shorten your life without preamble!
ROMEO Prick me now, gay Paree!
I have a shaft for your boulevard.
THEY FIGHT WITH KNIVES
MUSIC: CD ‘Kerrang, Best of 2003’ Track 4: ‘Pure Hatred’ (Chimaira)
PARIS You got me! So young, so short,
My life is taken all in sport.
ROMEO Have you finished?
PARIS I beg you, let me lie with Juliet
Place me on the plinth of darkness
ROMEO I grant what you will as is my wont.
PARIS DIES.
ROMEO LOWERS HIM ONTO THE TOMB.
HE THEN TURNS TO JULIET’S BODY, BREAKS DOWN AND WEEPS
Juliet! The links have sheared, I’m dropping
Like a hawk whose prey is finity.
Will you know my name when I see you?
Do you look back?
Let me hold you, Juliet, let me hold you!
My ship is run its race, I shall go down.
HE TAKES POISON AND DIES
JULIET STIRS
JULIET Romeo? Romeo! Where is my lord?
SHE SEES ROMEO’S BODY AND SCREAMS
Poison hath been his timeless end:
I will kiss thy lips;
Haply some drop yet doth hang on them,
I am black, I am blank.
KISSES HIM
Thy lips are warm.
SHE SEES ROMEO’S DAGGER
Nothing! Nothing! Nothing!
SHE PLUNGES THE DAGGER INTO HER CHEST AND DIES.
MUSIC: CD ‘In Memoriam’ Track 9: ‘Funeral March’ (Chopin)
ENTER LADY CAPULET
SHE SEES THE BODIES IMMEDIATELY
LADY CAPULET Oh God! My daughter bleeds!
Never was a sadder tale
Than this sweet girl and two pale males.
MUSIC: CD ‘In Memoriam’ Track 1: March from Funeral Music for Queen Mary (Purcell)
EXIT LADY CAPULET.
AFTER A FEW SAD MOMENTS ROMEO STIRS
MUSIC: SOMETHING FROM CD OF DISNEY ‘ANGELIC CHORUSES’.
ROMEO I’m back! It’s like I never went! Death is just a ring road!
JULIET STIRS
And Juliet! Juliet! My only love awakes!
JULIET Oh, Romeo! I missed you so! I thought I’d never get away!
It’s so dark down there!
ROMEO Were you scared, my sweet?
JULIET Not a lot – I heard you call
And thought ‘Why not?’
MUSIC: CD ‘Discovery’ Daft Punk Track 11: Veridis Quo
ROMEO AND JULIET MOVE SLOWLY TOWARDS EACH OTHER, CLASP HANDS AND WALK STRAIGHT DOWNSTAGE
PARIS STIRS, GROANS AND SLOWLY STANDS UP
JULIET Look at Paris! He’s back too!
PARIS I must have nodded off.
JULIET Do you know Romeo?
PARIS We’ve knocked around together.
ROMEO Nice to see you again.
MUSIC: CD ‘Gatecrasher 10 – This Time It’s Digital’ Vol 2 Track 1: ‘Do You Hear Me’ (Indiana)
ROMEO, JULIET AND PARIS, THEIR DIFFERENCES FORGOTTEN, DANCE HAPPILY FOR A WHILE.
CYCLE IV
THE DANCE MUSIC FADES AND IS REPLACED BY
LEO’S MUSIC: The 20th Century Fox anthem
JULIET MOVES TO THE TOMB, SMILES RADIANTLY THEN GRACEFULLY TAKES UP HER ORIGINAL ‘DEAD’ POSITION AS ROMEO MOVES TO THE SIDE PRIOR TO HIS NEXT ENTRANCE AND PARIS REVERTS TO LEO AND MOVES DOWN.
LEO Leo here.
ROMEO BEARS DOWN ON LEO WITH A KNIFE
MUSIC: Romeo’s anthem: CD ‘Handel Coronation Anthems’ Track 1: ‘Zadok the Priest’
ROMEO Up!
LEO WHIPS OUT HIS BLADE
LEO Come on, little boy…
THEY FIGHT WITH KNIVES
MUSIC: CD ‘Kerrang, Best of 2003’ Track 4: ‘Pure Hatred’ (Chimaira)
LEO I’m a goner.
ROMEO ‘Bye.
LEO DIES
ROMEO SEE JULIET’S BODY AND ROARS IN ANGUISH
ROMEO Juliet!
HE TAKES POISON AND DIES
JULIET STIRS, WAKES UP, SEES ROMEO’S BODY.
JULIET Romeo!
SHE SEIZES HIS DAGGER AND KILLS HERSELF.
MUSIC: CD ‘In Memoriam’ Track 9: ‘Funeral March’ (Chopin)
ENTER LADY CAPULET
SHE SEES THE BODIES IMMEDIATELY
LADY CAPULET It’s all so sad.
MUSIC: CD ‘In Memoriam’ Track 1: March from Funeral Music for Queen Mary (Purcell)
EXIT LADY CAPULET.
ROMEO STIRS, WAKES UP.
MUSIC: SOMETHING FROM CD OF DISNEY ‘ANGELIC CHORUSES’.
ROMEO It’s fantastic.
JULIET STIRS
JULIET Amazing!
MUSIC: CD ‘Discovery’ Daft Punk Track 11: Veridis Quo
ROMEO AND JULIET MOVE SLOWLY TOWARDS EACH OTHER, CLASP HANDS AND WALK STRAIGHT DOWNSTAGE
PARIS STIRS, GROANS AND SLOWLY STANDS UP.
HE MOVES TO ROMEO & JULIET. THEY ALL HUG.
MUSIC: CD ‘Gatecrasher 10 – This Time It’s Digital’ Vol 2 Track 1: ‘Do You Hear Me’ (Indiana)
ROMEO, JULIET AND PARIS, THEIR DIFFERENCES FORGOTTEN, DANCE HAPPILY FOR A WHILE.
CYCLE V
THE MUSIC CONTINUES.
PARIS REVERTS TO LEO AND STEPS FORWARD
LEO I’m Leo.
ROMEO STEPS FORWARD
ROMEO I’m Romeo
JULIET STEPS FORWARD
JULIET I’m Juliet
SHE WALKS TO THE TOMB AND LIES DOWN ON IT
ROMEO STABS LEO.
LEO DIES.
ROMEO SEES JULIET AND TAKES POISON.
JULIET WAKES WITH A VIOLENT START LIKE A DISTURBED ZOMBIE.
SHE SEES ROMEO, SCREAMS AND STABS HERSELF WITH HIS KNIFE.
ROMEO WAKES UP.
JULIET WAKES UP.
PARIS WAKES UP.
THEIR DIFFERENCES FORGOTTEN THEY DANCE HAPPILY FOR A WHILE.
CYCLE VI
THE MUSIC CONTINUES. THEY KEEP ON DANCING.
THEN ROMEO STABS LEO, WHO DIES.
THEN JULIET DIES ON THE TOMB.
THEN ROMEO SEES HER AND DRINKS POISON.
THEN JULIET WAKES UP, SEES ROMEO AND STABS HERSELF.
ROMEO WAKES UP.
JULIET WAKES UP.
PARIS WAKES UP.
THEIR DIFFERENCES FORGOTTEN THEY DANCE HAPPILY FOR A WHILE AS THE HOUSE LIGHTS COME UP AND THE AUDIENCE IS USHERED OUT.
THERE IS NO END – THEY KEEP DANCING FOREVER.
2004