Written by Amanda David
The acclaimed Mexican production Waiting for Julieta, created and performed by Emmanuel Pichardo Caballero, will be presented at the Voila! Europe Theatre Festival 2025 this November at Barons Court Theatre.
A contemporary reworking of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, Waiting for Julieta unfolds during a carne asada, a Mexican gathering with tacos and tequila, where theatre meets cabaret, performance art and pop culture. Blending humour with social critique, the piece revisits one of Shakespeare’s best-known tragedies to question romantic ideals, gender roles and the (self)destructive behaviours born from love.
Set within this environment, Waiting for Julieta examines how ideals of love and identity are formed and constrained by the expectations of a society that prizes conformity and traditional values.
Drawing on lived experiences from the region, the work exposes the tension between personal freedom and social obligation, using Shakespeare’s tragedy as a framework to question the persistence of rigid gender roles and romantic myths. In doing so, it situates a universal story of desire and defiance within the particular realities of northern Mexico today.
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