In 1601, Shakespeare’s company performed Romeo and Juliet for Queen Elizabeth herself. At court. In a fancy hall with candlelight. Imagine the boy playing Juliet sweating under a silk gown in a room full of nobles. The Queen probably nodded along to the fairy speech. She didn’t clap. Royals back then just nodded if they liked it. If they didn’t, they walked out. She stayed. That’s a win.
The Censored Version
Later, in the 1600s, the play was banned during the English Civil War. Puritans hated theater. They thought plays were sin-caves. So for decades, nobody performed Romeo and Juliet at all. When theaters reopened, they had to relearn the script. Imagine trying to reconstruct a viral TikTok dance from memory, but it’s a 400-year-old tragedy. That’s basically what happened.
