Romeo and Juliet

Duke of York’s Theatre  | ★★★★✩

In director Jamie Lloyd’s characteristically muscular and modern take on Shakespeare, I would not have been massively surprised if Tom Holland’s Romeo lowered himself into the action from the flies a la his Spider-Man. Instead he enters with hoody up like the street fighter his Romeo is – that is when he is not the sensitive, diffident soul he becomes when in the presence of Juliet.

Played by the much lesser-known Francesca Amewudah-Rivers, the heroine of this tragedy is the more assured and witty of the two star-crossed lovers. The sparks and chemistry generated by the stars of this show should shame the racist social-media trolls who attacked the casting of Amewudah-Rivers (who is black) in the run-up to the opening. But they won’t because shame is not what bigoted meatheads do.

Lloyd’s productions exists in large part to make classic works look and feel as if they were being performed for the first time. This industrialised, shadowy production is no different. Although if you saw the director’s Sunset Boulevard (starring Nicole Scherzinger), the use of video cameras will be familiar, and those who caught his Cyrano de Bergerac (starring James McAvoy) will recognise the way the lines are spoken to the audience through mics like a song.

New to almost everyone though will be Amewudah-Rivers who is the real marvel here.